Job, Chapter 15

¹Then answered Eliphaz the Temanite, and said, ²Should a wise man utter vain knowledge, and fill his belly with the east wind? ³Should he reason with unprofitable talk? or with speeches wherewith he can do no good? ⁴Yea, thou castest off fear, and restrainest prayer before God. ⁵For thy mouth uttereth thine iniquity, and thou choosest the tongue of the crafty. ⁶Thine own mouth condemneth thee, and not I: yea, thine own lips testify against thee. ⁷Art thou the first man that was born? or wast thou made before the hills? ⁸Hast thou heard the secret of God? and dost thou restrain wisdom to thyself?

⁹What knowest thou, that we know not? what understandest thou, which is not in us? ¹⁰With us are both the grayheaded and very aged men, much elder than thy father. ¹¹Are the consolations of God small with thee? is there any secret thing with thee? ¹²Why doth thine heart carry thee away? and what do thy eyes wink at, ¹³That thou turnest thy spirit against God, and lettest such words go out of thy mouth? ¹⁴What is man, that he should be clean? and he which is born of a woman, that he should be righteous? ¹⁵Behold, he putteth no trust in his saints; yea, the heavens are not clean in his sight. ¹⁶How much more abominable and filthy is man, which drinketh iniquity like water?

¹⁷I will shew thee, hear me; and that which I have seen I will declare; ¹⁸Which wise men have told from their fathers, and have not hid it: ¹⁹Unto whom alone the earth was given, and no stranger passed among them. ²⁰The wicked man travaileth with pain all his days, and the number of years is hidden to the oppressor. ²¹A dreadful sound is in his ears: in prosperity the destroyer shall come upon him. ²²He believeth not that he shall return out of darkness, and he is waited for of the sword. ²³He wandereth abroad for bread, saying, Where is it? he knoweth that the day of darkness is ready at his hand. ²⁴Trouble and anguish shall make him afraid; they shall prevail against him, as a king ready to the battle.

²⁵For he stretcheth out his hand against God, and strengtheneth himself against the Almighty. ²⁶He runneth upon him, even on his neck, upon the thick bosses of his bucklers: ²⁷Because he covereth his face with his fatness, and maketh collops of fat on his flanks. ²⁸And he dwelleth in desolate cities, and in houses which no man inhabiteth, which are ready to become heaps. ²⁹He shall not be rich, neither shall his substance continue, neither shall he prolong the perfection thereof upon the earth. ³⁰He shall not depart out of darkness; the flame shall dry up his branches, and by the breath of his mouth shall he go away. ³¹Let not him that is deceived trust in vanity: for vanity shall be his recompence. ³²It shall be accomplished before his time, and his branch shall not be green.

³³He shall shake off his unripe grape as the vine, and shall cast off his flower as the olive. ³⁴For the congregation of hypocrites shall be desolate, and fire shall consume the tabernacles of bribery. ³⁵They conceive mischief, and bring forth vanity, and their belly prepareth deceit.