Eliphaz: The Innocent Prosper

¹Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered,

²“If someone ventures to talk with you, will you be grieved?

But who can withhold himself from speaking?

³Indeed, you have instructed many,

you have strengthened the weak hands.

⁴Your words have supported him who was falling,

you have made the feeble knees firm.

⁵But now it has come to you, and you faint.

It touches you, and you are troubled.

⁶Isn’t your piety your confidence?

Isn’t the integrity of your ways your hope?

⁷“Consider: who has perished that was innocent?

Or where were the upright cut off?

⁸According to what I have seen, those who plow iniquity

and sow trouble, reap the same.

⁹By the breath of God they perish.

By the blast of ʜɪꜱ anger are they consumed.

¹⁰The roaring of the lion,

and the voice of the fierce lion,

the teeth of the young lions, are broken.

¹¹The old lion perishes for lack of prey.

The cubs of the lioness are scattered abroad.

¹²“Now a thing was secretly brought to me.

My ear received a whisper of it.

¹³In thoughts from the visions of the night,

when deep sleep falls on men,

¹⁴fear came on me, and trembling,

which made all my bones shake.

¹⁵Then a spirit passed before my face.

The hair of my flesh stood up.

¹⁶It stood still, but I couldn’t discern its appearance.

A form was before my eyes.

Silence, then I heard a voice, saying,

¹⁷‘Can a mortal be more just than God?

Can even a strong man be more pure than his Maker?

¹⁸If ʜᴇ puts no trust in ʜɪꜱ servants,

if ʜᴇ charges ʜɪꜱ angels with error,

¹⁹how much more those who dwell in houses of clay,

whose foundation is in the dust,

who are crushed before the moth!

²⁰Between morning and evening they are destroyed.

They perish forever without any regarding it.

²¹Isn’t their tent cord plucked up within them?

They die, and that without wisdom.’