Job 5

¹ “Call now; is there any who will answer you? To which of the holy ones will you turn?

² For resentment kills the foolish man, and jealousy kills the simple.

³ I have seen the foolish taking root, but suddenly I cursed his habitation.

⁴ His children are far from safety. They are crushed in the gate. Neither is there any to deliver them,

⁵ whose harvest the hungry eat up, and take it even out of the thorns. The snare gapes for their substance.

⁶ For affliction doesn’t come out of the dust, neither does trouble spring out of the ground;

⁷ but man is born to trouble, as the sparks fly upward.

⁸ “But as for me, I would seek God. I would commit my cause to God,

⁹ who does great things that can’t be fathomed, marvelous things without number;

¹⁰ who gives rain on the earth, and sends waters on the fields;

¹¹ so that he sets up on high those who are low, those who mourn are exalted to safety.

¹² He frustrates the plans of the crafty, so that their hands can’t perform their enterprise.

¹³ He takes the wise in their own craftiness; the counsel of the cunning is carried headlong.

¹⁴ They meet with darkness in the day time, and grope at noonday as in the night.

¹⁵ But he saves from the sword of their mouth, even the needy from the hand of the mighty.

¹⁶ So the poor has hope, and injustice shuts her mouth.

¹⁷ “Behold, happy is the man whom God corrects. Therefore do not despise the chastening of the Almighty.

¹⁸ For he wounds and binds up. He injures and his hands make whole.

¹⁹ He will deliver you in six troubles; yes, in seven no evil will touch you.

²⁰ In famine he will redeem you from death; in war, from the power of the sword.

²¹ You will be hidden from the scourge of the tongue, neither will you be afraid of destruction when it comes.

²² You will laugh at destruction and famine, neither will you be afraid of the animals of the earth.

²³ For you will be allied with the stones of the field. The animals of the field will be at peace with you.

²⁴ You will know that your tent is in peace. You will visit your fold, and will miss nothing.

²⁵ You will know also that your offspring¹ will be great, your offspring as the grass of the earth.

²⁶ You will come to your grave in a full age, like a shock of grain comes in its season.

²⁷ Behold, we have researched it. It is so. Hear it, and know it for your good.”