Eliphaz: Job has sinned
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But Eliphaz the Themanite, answering, said:
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If we start to speak to you, perhaps you will take it badly, but who can hold back the words he has conceived?
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Behold, you have taught many, and you have strengthened weary hands.
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Your words have reassured the wavering, and you have fortified the trembling knees.
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But now the scourge has overcome you, and you falter. It has touched you, and you are disturbed.
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Where is your reverence, your fortitude, your patience, and the perfection of your ways?(a)
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Consider this, I beg you: who ever perished being innocent? Or when have the righteous been destroyed?
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In fact, I have instead seen those who work iniquity and who sow resentments, reap them,
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perishing by the breath of God, and being consumed by the wrath of his spirit.
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The roaring of the lion, and the voice of the lioness, and the teeth of young lions have been worn away.
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The tiger has perished because it does not have prey, and the young lions have been scattered.
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Furthermore, a word was spoken to me in secret, and, as if by theft, my ears received the pulse of its whisper.
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In the horror of a vision by night, when men are accustomed to be overtaken by a deep sleep,
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fear and trembling seized me and all my bones were terrified.
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And when a spirit passed before me, the hair on my body stood up.
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There appeared an image before my eyes, someone whose face I did not recognize, and I heard a voice like a gentle breeze.
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Should man be justified in relation to God, or will a man be more pure than his Maker?(b)
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Behold, those who serve him are not steadfast, and in his angels he finds imperfection.
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How much more will those who live in houses of clay, which have an earthly foundation, be consumed like the moth?
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From morning all the way to evening, they will be cut down, and because no one understands, they will be destroyed without ceasing.
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But those who are left behind will be taken away from them; they will die, and not in wisdom.
Footnotes