Eliphaz Speaks: Job Has Sinned
4 Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered:
2 “If one ventures a word with you, will you be offended?
But who can keep from speaking?(A)
3 See, you have instructed many;
you have strengthened the weak hands.(B)
4 Your words have supported those who were stumbling,
and you have made firm the feeble knees.(C)
5 But now it has come to you, and you are impatient;
it touches you, and you are dismayed.(D)
6 Is not your fear of God your confidence
and the integrity of your ways your hope?(E)
7 “Think now, who that was innocent ever perished?
Or where were the upright cut off?(F)
8 As I have seen, those who plow iniquity
and sow trouble reap the same.(G)
9 By the breath of God they perish,
and by the blast of his anger they are consumed.(H)
10 The roar of the lion, the voice of the fierce lion,
and the teeth of the young lions are broken.(I)
11 The strong lion perishes for lack of prey,
and the whelps of the lioness are scattered.(J)
12 “Now a word came stealing to me;
my ear received the whisper of it.(K)
13 Amid thoughts from visions of the night,
when deep sleep falls on mortals,
14 dread came upon me and trembling,
which made all my bones shake.(L)
15 A spirit glided past my face;
the hair of my flesh bristled.
16 It stood still,
but I could not discern its appearance.
A form was before my eyes;
there was silence; then I heard a voice:
17 ‘Can mortals be righteous before[a] God?
Can humans be pure before[b] their Maker?(M)
18 Even in his servants he puts no trust,
and his angels he charges with error;(N)
19 how much more those who live in houses of clay,
whose foundation is in the dust,
who are crushed like a moth.(O)
20 Between morning and evening they are destroyed;
they perish forever without any regarding it.(P)
21 Their tent cord is plucked up within them,
and they die devoid of wisdom.’(Q)
Footnotes
Cross references
- 4.2 : Job 32.18–20
- 4.3 : Isa 35.3; Heb 12.12
- 4.4 : Isa 35.3; Heb 12.12
- 4.5 : Job 6.14; 19.21
- 4.6 : Job 1.1
- 4.7 : Ps 37.25
- 4.8 : Prov 22.8; Hos 10.13; Gal 6.7, 8
- 4.9 : Job 15.30; Ps 59.13; Isa 30.33
- 4.10 : Ps 58.6
- 4.11 : Ps 34.10
- 4.12 : Job 26.14
- 4.14 : Jer 23.9
- 4.17 : Job 9.2; 35.10
- 4.18 : Job 15.15
- 4.19 : Job 10.9; 22.16
- 4.20 : Job 20.7; Ps 90.5, 6
- 4.21 : Job 36.12