God’s Challenge to Job

6 Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind:
⁷‘Gird up your loins like a man;
   I will question you, and you declare to me.
⁸Will you even put me in the wrong?
   Will you condemn me that you may be justified?
⁹Have you an arm like God,
   and can you thunder with a voice like his?

¹⁰‘Deck yourself with majesty and dignity;
   clothe yourself with glory and splendour.
¹¹Pour out the overflowings of your anger,
   and look on all who are proud, and abase them.
¹²Look on all who are proud, and bring them low;
   tread down the wicked where they stand.
¹³Hide them all in the dust together;
   bind their faces in the world below.^*
14Then I will also acknowledge to you
   that your own right hand can give you victory.

¹⁵‘Look at Behemoth,
   which I made just as I made you;
   it eats grass like an ox.
¹⁶Its strength is in its loins,
   and its power in the muscles of its belly.
¹⁷It makes its tail stiff like a cedar;
   the sinews of its thighs are knit together.
¹⁸Its bones are tubes of bronze,
   its limbs like bars of iron.

¹⁹‘It is the first of the great acts of God—
   only its Maker can approach it with the sword.
²⁰For the mountains yield food for it
   where all the wild animals play.
²¹Under the lotus plants it lies,
   in the covert of the reeds and in the marsh.
²²The lotus trees cover it for shade;
   the willows of the wadi surround it.
²³Even if the river is turbulent, it is not frightened;
   it is confident though Jordan rushes against its mouth.
²⁴Can one take it with hooks^*
   or pierce its nose with a snare?

41^*‘Can you draw out Leviathan^* with a fish-hook,
   or press down its tongue with a cord?
²Can you put a rope in its nose,
   or pierce its jaw with a hook?
³Will it make many supplications to you?
   Will it speak soft words to you?
⁴Will it make a covenant with you
   to be taken as your servant for ever?
⁵Will you play with it as with a bird,
   or will you put it on a leash for your girls?
⁶Will traders bargain over it?
   Will they divide it up among the merchants?
⁷Can you fill its skin with harpoons,
   or its head with fishing-spears?
⁸Lay hands on it;
   think of the battle; you will not do it again!
^9*Any hope of capturing it^* will be disappointed;
   were not even the gods^* overwhelmed at the sight of it?
¹⁰No one is so fierce as to dare to stir it up.
   Who can stand before it?^*
11Who can confront it^* and be safe?^*
   —under the whole heaven, who?^*

¹²‘I will not keep silence concerning its limbs,
   or its mighty strength, or its splendid frame.
¹³Who can strip off its outer garment?
   Who can penetrate its double coat of mail?^*
14Who can open the doors of its face?
   There is terror all around its teeth.
¹⁵Its back^* is made of shields in rows,
   shut up closely as with a seal.
¹⁶One is so near to another
   that no air can come between them.
¹⁷They are joined one to another;
   they clasp each other and cannot be separated.
¹⁸Its sneezes flash forth light,
   and its eyes are like the eyelids of the dawn.
¹⁹From its mouth go flaming torches;
   sparks of fire leap out.
²⁰Out of its nostrils comes smoke,
   as from a boiling pot and burning rushes.
²¹Its breath kindles coals,
   and a flame comes out of its mouth.
²²In its neck abides strength,
   and terror dances before it.
²³The folds of its flesh cling together;
   it is firmly cast and immovable.
²⁴Its heart is as hard as stone,
   as hard as the lower millstone.
²⁵When it raises itself up the gods are afraid;
   at the crashing they are beside themselves.
²⁶Though the sword reaches it, it does not avail,
   nor does the spear, the dart, or the javelin.
²⁷It counts iron as straw,
   and bronze as rotten wood.
²⁸The arrow cannot make it flee;
   slingstones, for it, are turned to chaff.
²⁹Clubs are counted as chaff;
   it laughs at the rattle of javelins.
³⁰Its underparts are like sharp potsherds;
   it spreads itself like a threshing-sledge on the mire.
³¹It makes the deep boil like a pot;
   it makes the sea like a pot of ointment.
³²It leaves a shining wake behind it;
   one would think the deep to be white-haired.
³³On earth it has no equal,
   a creature without fear.
³⁴It surveys everything that is lofty;
   it is king over all that are proud.’

Job Is Humbled and Satisfied

42Then Job answered the Lord:
²‘I know that you can do all things,
   and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted.
³“Who is this that hides counsel without knowledge?”
Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand,
   things too wonderful for me, which I did not know.
⁴“Hear, and I will speak;
   I will question you, and you declare to me.”
⁵I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear,
   but now my eye sees you;
⁶therefore I despise myself,
   and repent in dust and ashes.’

Job’s Friends Are Humiliated

7 After the Lord had spoken these words to Job, the Lord said to Eliphaz the Temanite: ‘My wrath is kindled against you and against your two friends; for you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has. ⁸Now therefore take seven bulls and seven rams, and go to my servant Job, and offer up for yourselves a burnt-offering; and my servant Job shall pray for you, for I will accept his prayer not to deal with you according to your folly; for you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has done.’ ⁹So Eliphaz the Temanite and Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite went and did what the Lord had told them; and the Lord accepted Job’s prayer.

Job’s Fortunes Are Restored Twofold

10 And the Lord restored the fortunes of Job when he had prayed for his friends; and the Lord gave Job twice as much as he had before. ¹¹Then there came to him all his brothers and sisters and all who had known him before, and they ate bread with him in his house; they showed him sympathy and comforted him for all the evil that the Lord had brought upon him; and each of them gave him a piece of money^* and a gold ring. ¹²The Lord blessed the latter days of Job more than his beginning; and he had fourteen thousand sheep, six thousand camels, a thousand yoke of oxen, and a thousand donkeys. ¹³He also had seven sons and three daughters. ¹⁴He named the first Jemimah, the second Keziah, and the third Keren-happuch. ¹⁵In all the land there were no women so beautiful as Job’s daughters; and their father gave them an inheritance along with their brothers. ¹⁶After this Job lived for one hundred and forty years, and saw his children, and his children’s children, four generations. ¹⁷And Job died, old and full of days.