This page needs to be proofread.
3.4
JOB
- Neither let the light shine upon it.
- 5Let darkness and the shadow of death claim it for their own;
- Let a cloud dwell upon it;
- Let all that maketh black the day terrify it.
- 6As for that night, let thick darkness seize upon it;
- Let it not rejoice among the days of the year;
- Let it not come into the number of the months.
- 7Lo, let that night be desolate;
- Let no joyful voice come therein.
- 8Let them curse it that curse the day,
- Who are ready to rouse up leviathan.
- 9Let the stars of the twilight thereof be dark;
- Let it look for light, but have none;
- Neither let it behold the eyelids of the morning;
- 10Because it shut not up the doors of my [mother's] womb,
- Nor hid trouble from mine eyes.
- 11Why died I not from the womb?
- Why did I not perish at birth?
- 12Why did the knees receive me?
- And wherefore the breasts, that I should suck?
- 13For now should I have lain still and been quiet;
- I should have slept; then had I been at rest—
- 14With kings and counsellors of the earth,
- Who built up waste places for themselves;
- 15Or with princes that had gold,
- Who filled their houses with silver;
- 16Or as a hidden untimely birth I had not been;
- As infants that never saw light.
- 17There the wicked cease from troubling;
- And there the weary are at rest.
- 18There the prisoners are at ease together;
- They hear not the voice of the taskmaster.
- 19The small and great are there alike; And the servant is free from his master.
- 20Wherewith is light given to him that is in misery,
- And life unto the bitter in soul—
- 21Who long for death, but it cometh not;
- And dig for it more than for hid treasures;
- 22Who rejoice unto exultation,
- And are glad, when they can find the grave?—
- 23To a man whose way is hid,
- And whom God hath hedged in?
- 24For my sighing cometh instead of my food,
- And my roarings are poured out like water.
- 25For the thing which I did fear is come upon me,
- And that which I was afraid of hath overtaken me.
- 26I was not at ease, neither was I quiet,
- Neither had I rest; but trouble came.
4 Then answered Eliphaz the Temanite, and said:
- 2If one venture a word unto thee, wilt thou be weary?
- But who can withhold himself from speaking?
- 3Behold, thou hast instructed many,
- And thou hast strengthened the weak hands.
- 4Thy words have upholden him that was falling,
- And thou hast strengthened the feeble knees.
- 5But now it is come upon thee, and thou art weary;
926