Eliphaz accuses Job of folly
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Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered and said,
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“Should a wise man answer with useless knowledge and fill himself with the east wind?
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Should he reason with unprofitable talk or with speeches with which he can do no good?
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Indeed, you diminish respect for God; you obstruct devotion to him,
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for your iniquity teaches your mouth; you choose to have the tongue of a crafty man.
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Your own mouth condemns you, not mine; indeed, your own lips testify against you.
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Are you the first man that was born? Were you brought into existence before the hills?
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Have you heard the secret knowledge of God? Do you limit wisdom to yourself?
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What do you know that we do not know? What do you understand that is not also in us?
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With us are both the gray-headed and the very aged men who are much older than your father.
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Are the consolations of God too small for you, the words that are gentle toward you?
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Why does your heart carry you away? Why do your eyes flash,
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so that you turn your spirit against God and bring out such words from your mouth?
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What is man that he should be clean? What is he who is born of a woman that he should be righteous?
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See, God puts no trust even in his holy ones; indeed, the heavens are not clean in his sight;
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how much less clean is one who is abominable and corrupt, a man who drinks iniquity like water!
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I will show you; listen to me; I will announce to you the things I have seen,
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the things that wise men have passed down from their fathers, the things that their ancestors did not hide.
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These were their ancestors, to whom alone the land was given, and among whom no stranger ever passed.
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The wicked man twists in pain all his days, the number of years that are laid up for the oppressor to suffer.
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A sound of terrors is in his ears; while he is in prosperity, the destroyer will come upon him.
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He does not think that he will return out of darkness; the sword waits for him.
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He goes to various places for bread, saying, ‘Where is it?’ He knows that the day of darkness is at hand.
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Distress and anguish make him afraid; they prevail against him, as a king ready for battle.
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Because he has reached out with his hand against God and has behaved proudly against the Almighty,
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this wicked man runs at God with a stiff neck, with a thick shield.
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This is true, even though he has covered his face with his fat and gathered fat on his loins,
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and has lived in desolate cities; in houses which no man inhabits now and which were ready to become heaps.
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He will not be rich; his wealth will not last; not even his shadow will last on the earth.
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He will not depart out of darkness; a flame will dry up his stalks; at the breath of God’s mouth he will go away.
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Let him not trust in useless things, deceiving himself; for uselessness will be his reward.
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It will happen before his time should come to die; his branch will not be green.
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He will drop his unripe grapes like a grapevine; he will cast off his flowers like the olive tree.
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For the company of godless people will be barren; fire will consume their tents of bribery.
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They conceive mischief and give birth to iniquity; their womb conceives deceit.”
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