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cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tr><td><div id="topheading"><a href="../job/20.htm" title="Job 20">◄</a> Job 21 <a href="../job/22.htm" title="Job 22">►</a></div></td></tr></table></div><div align="center" class="maintable2"><table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" align="center"><tr><td><div id="leftbox"><div class="padleft"><div class="vheading"><table width="100%"><tr><td width="99%" valign="top">New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition</td><td width="1%" valign="top"></td></tr></table></div><div class="chap"><div class="text-html"> <h3><span id="en" class="text">Job Replies: The Wicked Often Go Unpunished</span></h3><p class="chapter-2"><span class="text"><span class="versenum">1</span>Then Job answered:</span></p> <div class="poetry"><p class="line"><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">2</span>“Listen carefully to my words,</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">and let this be your consolation.</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">3</span>Bear with me, and I will speak;</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">then after I have spoken, mock on.</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">4</span>As for me, is my complaint addressed to mortals?</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">Why should I not be impatient?</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">5</span>Look at me, and be appalled,</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">and lay your hand upon your mouth.</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">6</span>When I think of it I am dismayed,</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">and shuddering seizes my flesh.</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">7</span>Why do the wicked live on,</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">reach old age, and grow mighty in power?</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">8</span>Their children are established in their presence,</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">and their offspring before their eyes.</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">9</span>Their houses are safe from fear,</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">and no rod of God is upon them.</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">10</span>Their bull breeds without fail;</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">their cow calves and never miscarries.</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">11</span>They send out their little ones like a flock,</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">and their children dance around.</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">12</span>They sing to the tambourine and the lyre,</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">and rejoice to the sound of the pipe.</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">13</span>They spend their days in prosperity,</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">and in peace they go down to Sheol.</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">14</span>They say to God, ‘Leave us alone!</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">We do not desire to know your ways.</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">15</span>What is the Almighty,<span data-fn='#fen' class='footnote' data-link='[<a href="#fen-NRSVCE-15441a" title="See footnote a">a</a>]'>[<a href="#fen" xtitle="See footnote a">a</a>]</span> that we should serve him?</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">And what profit do we get if we pray to him?’</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">16</span>Is not their prosperity indeed their own achievement?<span data-fn='#fen' class='footnote' data-link='[<a href="#fen-NRSVCE-15442b" title="See footnote b">b</a>]'>[<a href="#fen" xtitle="See footnote b">b</a>]</span></span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">The plans of the wicked are repugnant to me.</span></span></p></div> <div class="poetry top-1"><p class="line"><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">17</span>“How often is the lamp of the wicked put out?</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">How often does calamity come upon them?</span></span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">How often does God<span data-fn='#fen' class='footnote' data-link='[<a href="#fen-NRSVCE-15443c" title="See footnote c">c</a>]'>[<a href="#fen" xtitle="See footnote c">c</a>]</span> distribute pains in his anger?</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">18</span>How often are they like straw before the wind,</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">and like chaff that the storm carries away?</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">19</span>You say, ‘God stores up their iniquity for their children.’</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">Let it be paid back to them, so that they may know it.</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">20</span>Let their own eyes see their destruction,</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">and let them drink of the wrath of the Almighty.<span data-fn='#fen' class='footnote' data-link='[<a href="#fen-NRSVCE-15446d" title="See footnote d">d</a>]'>[<a href="#fen" xtitle="See footnote d">d</a>]</span></span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">21</span>For what do they care for their household after them,</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">when the number of their months is cut off?</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">22</span>Will any teach God knowledge,</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">seeing that he judges those that are on high?</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">23</span>One dies in full prosperity,</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">being wholly at ease and secure,</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">24</span>his loins full of milk</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">and the marrow of his bones moist.</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">25</span>Another dies in bitterness of soul,</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">never having tasted of good.</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">26</span>They lie down alike in the dust,</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">and the worms cover them.</span></span></p></div> <div class="poetry top-1"><p class="line"><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">27</span>“Oh, I know your thoughts,</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">and your schemes to wrong me.</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">28</span>For you say, ‘Where is the house of the prince?</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">Where is the tent in which the wicked lived?’</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">29</span>Have you not asked those who travel the roads,</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">and do you not accept their testimony,</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">30</span>that the wicked are spared in the day of calamity,</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">and are rescued in the day of wrath?</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">31</span>Who declares their way to their face,</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">and who repays them for what they have done?</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">32</span>When they are carried to the grave,</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">a watch is kept over their tomb.</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">33</span>The clods of the valley are sweet to them;</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">everyone will follow after,</span></span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">and those who went before are innumerable.</span></span><br /><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">34</span>How then will you comfort me with empty nothings?</span><br /><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks">    </span><span class="text">There is nothing left of your answers but falsehood.”</span></span></p></div> <A name="fen"></a><div class="footnotes"><h4>Footnotes</h4><ol><li id="fen"><a hlef="#en" xtitle="Go to Job 21:15">Job 21:15</a> <span class='footnote-text'>Traditional rendering of Heb <i>Shaddai</i></span></li><li id="fen"><a hlef="#en" xtitle="Go to Job 21:16">Job 21:16</a> <span class='footnote-text'>Heb <i>in their hand</i></span></li><li id="fen"><a hlef="#en" xtitle="Go to Job 21:17">Job 21:17</a> <span class='footnote-text'>Heb <i>he</i></span></li><li id="fen"><a hlef="#en" xtitle="Go to Job 21:20">Job 21:20</a> <span class='footnote-text'>Traditional rendering of Heb <i>Shaddai</i></span></li></ol></div> </div></div></div></div></div> </div> </div><div id="botbox"><div class="padbot"><div align="center">Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Catholic Edition, 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