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Eliphaz Speaks: Job Has Sinned

4Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered:
² ‘If one ventures a word with you, will you be offended?
   But who can keep from speaking?
³ See, you have instructed many;
   you have strengthened the weak hands.
⁴ Your words have supported those who were stumbling,
   and you have made firm the feeble knees.
⁵ But now it has come to you, and you are impatient;
   it touches you, and you are dismayed.
⁶ Is not your fear of God your confidence,
   and the integrity of your ways your hope?

⁷ ‘Think now, who that was innocent ever perished?
   Or where were the upright cut off?
⁸ As I have seen, those who plough iniquity
   and sow trouble reap the same.
⁹ By the breath of God they perish,
   and by the blast of his anger they are consumed.
¹⁰ The roar of the lion, the voice of the fierce lion,
   and the teeth of the young lions are broken.
¹¹ The strong lion perishes for lack of prey,
   and the whelps of the lioness are scattered.

¹² ‘Now a word came stealing to me,
   my ear received the whisper of it.
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.
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^* God?
   Can human beings be pure before^* their Maker?
¹⁸ Even in his servants he puts no trust,
   and his angels he charges with error;
¹⁹ how much more those who live in houses of clay,
   whose foundation is in the dust,
   who are crushed like a moth.
²⁰ Between morning and evening they are destroyed;
   they perish for ever without any regarding it.
²¹ Their tent-cord is plucked up within them,
   and they die devoid of wisdom.”