Job 21:19–25

⁵Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;

¹⁹¶ Yet say ye, Why? doth not the son bear the iniquity of the father? When the son hath done that which is lawful and right, and hath kept all my statutes, and hath done them, he shall surely live.

²⁰The soul that sinneth, it shall die. The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son: the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him.

²What mean ye, that ye use this proverb concerning the land of Israel, saying, The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge?

²¹Prepare slaughter for his children for the iniquity of their fathers; that they do not rise, nor possess the land, nor fill the face of the world with cities.

⁴¶ Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.

⁵But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.

⁶All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.

²⁹In those days they shall say no more, The fathers have eaten a sour grape, and the children’s teeth are set on edge.

²¹For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.

¹⁴Alexander the coppersmith did me much evil: the Lord reward him according to his works:

³⁴Is not this laid up in store with me, and sealed up among my treasures?

¹⁴¶ Now, lo, if he beget a son, that seeth all his father’s sins which he hath done, and considereth, and doeth not such like,

³¹Wherefore ye be witnesses unto yourselves, that ye are the children of them which killed the prophets.

³²Fill ye up then the measure of your fathers.

³³Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell?

³⁴¶ Wherefore, behold, I send unto you prophets, and wise men, and scribes: and some of them ye shall kill and crucify; and some of them shall ye scourge in your synagogues, and persecute them from city to city:

³⁵That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and the altar.

⁹Let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow.

¹⁰Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg: let them seek their bread also out of their desolate places.

¹¹Let the extortioner catch all that he hath; and let the strangers spoil his labour.

¹²Let there be none to extend mercy unto him: neither let there be any to favour his fatherless children.

¹³Let his posterity be cut off; and in the generation following let their name be blotted out.

¹⁴Let the iniquity of his fathers be remembered with the Lord; and let not the sin of his mother be blotted out.

¹⁵Let them be before the Lord continually, that he may cut off the memory of them from the earth.

¹⁶Because that he remembered not to shew mercy, but persecuted the poor and needy man, that he might even slay the broken in heart.

¹⁷As he loved cursing, so let it come unto him: as he delighted not in blessing, so let it be far from him.

¹⁸As he clothed himself with cursing like as with his garment, so let it come into his bowels like water, and like oil into his bones.

¹⁹Let it be unto him as the garment which covereth him, and for a girdle wherewith he is girded continually.

²⁰Let this be the reward of mine adversaries from the Lord, and of them that speak evil against my soul.

²¹But do thou for me, O God the Lord, for thy name’s sake: because thy mercy is good, deliver thou me.

²²For I am poor and needy, and my heart is wounded within me.

²³I am gone like the shadow when it declineth: I am tossed up and down as the locust.

²⁴My knees are weak through fasting; and my flesh faileth of fatness.

²⁵I became also a reproach unto them: when they looked upon me they shaked their heads.

²⁶Help me, O Lord my God: O save me according to thy mercy:

²⁷That they may know that this is thy hand; that thou, Lord, hast done it.

²⁸Let them curse, but bless thou: when they arise, let them be ashamed; but let thy servant rejoice.

²⁹Let mine adversaries be clothed with shame, and let them cover themselves with their own confusion, as with a mantle.

³⁰I will greatly praise the Lord with my mouth; yea, I will praise him among the multitude.

³¹For he shall stand at the right hand of the poor, to save him from those that condemn his soul.

⁵He shall reward evil unto mine enemies: cut them off in thy truth.

⁶Reward her even as she rewarded you, and double unto her double according to her works: in the cup which she hath filled fill to her double.

⁵But after thy hardness and impenitent heart treasurest up unto thyself wrath against the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God;

³⁹And I am this day weak, though anointed king; and these men the sons of Zeruiah be too hard for me: the Lord shall reward the doer of evil according to his wickedness.

⁴¹If I whet my glittering sword, and mine hand take hold on judgment; I will render vengeance to mine enemies, and will reward them that hate me.

⁷If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door. And unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him.

²⁴Then shalt thou lay up gold as dust, and the gold of Ophir as the stones of the brooks.

¹⁸Then shall ye return, and discern between the righteous and the wicked, between him that serveth God and him that serveth him not.

²⁷For the Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then he shall reward every man according to his works.

¹⁹¶ Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal:

²⁰But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal:

¹⁷¶ Awake, awake, stand up, O Jerusalem, which hast drunk at the hand of the Lord the cup of his fury; thou hast drunken the dregs of the cup of trembling, and wrung them out.

⁸For in the hand of the Lord there is a cup, and the wine is red; it is full of mixture; and he poureth out of the same: but the dregs thereof, all the wicked of the earth shall wring them out, and drink them.

¹⁰The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb:

¹⁵¶ For thus saith the Lord God of Israel unto me; Take the wine cup of this fury at my hand, and cause all the nations, to whom I send thee, to drink it.

¹⁶And they shall drink, and be moved, and be mad, because of the sword that I will send among them.

⁷Babylon hath been a golden cup in the Lord’s hand, that made all the earth drunken: the nations have drunken of her wine; therefore the nations are mad.

¹⁹The rich man shall lie down, but he shall not be gathered: he openeth his eyes, and he is not.

²³And in hell he lift up his eyes, being in torments, and seeth Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom.

³Thou hast shewed thy people hard things: thou hast made us to drink the wine of astonishment.

¹⁵And out of his mouth goeth a sharp sword, that with it he should smite the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron: and he treadeth the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God.

⁵Seeing his days are determined, the number of his months are with thee, thou hast appointed his bounds that he cannot pass;

¹⁸¶ Yea, I hated all my labour which I had taken under the sun: because I should leave it unto the man that shall be after me.

¹⁹And who knoweth whether he shall be a wise man or a fool? yet shall he have rule over all my labour wherein I have laboured, and wherein I have shewed myself wise under the sun. This is also vanity.

²¹His sons come to honour, and he knoweth it not; and they are brought low, but he perceiveth it not of them.

²⁷Then he said, I pray thee therefore, father, that thou wouldest send him to my father’s house:

²⁸For I have five brethren; that he may testify unto them, lest they also come into this place of torment.

²⁴I said, O my God, take me not away in the midst of my days: thy years are throughout all generations.

²³But thou, O God, shalt bring them down into the pit of destruction: bloody and deceitful men shall not live out half their days; but I will trust in thee.

³⁴For who hath known the mind of the Lord? or who hath been his counseller?

¹⁶For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ.

¹³Who hath directed the Spirit of the Lord, or being his counseller hath taught him?

¹⁴With whom took he counsel, and who instructed him, and taught him in the path of judgment, and taught him knowledge, and shewed to him the way of understanding?

³Know ye not that we shall judge angels? how much more things that pertain to this life?

⁴For if God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment;

⁸¶ If thou seest the oppression of the poor, and violent perverting of judgment and justice in a province, marvel not at the matter: for he that is higher than the highest regardeth; and there be higher than they.

²²It is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers; that stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain, and spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in:

²³That bringeth the princes to nothing; he maketh the judges of the earth as vanity.

⁹Woe unto him that striveth with his Maker! Let the potsherd strive with the potsherds of the earth. Shall the clay say to him that fashioneth it, What makest thou? or thy work, He hath no hands?

¹⁵Behold, he putteth no trust in his saints; yea, the heavens are not clean in his sight.

¹⁷Shall even he that hateth right govern? and wilt thou condemn him that is most just?

¹⁸Is it fit to say to a king, Thou art wicked? and to princes, Ye are ungodly?

¹⁹How much less to him that accepteth not the persons of princes, nor regardeth the rich more than the poor? for they all are the work of his hands.

¹¹Who teacheth us more than the beasts of the earth, and maketh us wiser than the fowls of heaven?

²²Behold, God exalteth by his power: who teacheth like him?

¹⁸Behold, he put no trust in his servants; and his angels he charged with folly:

²Shall he that contendeth with the Almighty instruct him? he that reproveth God, let him answer it.

⁶And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day.

⁵Who is like unto the Lord our God, who dwelleth on high,

⁶Who humbleth himself to behold the things that are in heaven, and in the earth!

¹GOD standeth in the congregation of the mighty; he judgeth among the gods.

¹AND I saw an angel come down from heaven, having the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand.

²And he laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil, and Satan, and bound him a thousand years,

³And cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should deceive the nations no more, till the thousand years should be fulfilled: and after that he must be loosed a little season.

¹²And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works.

¹³And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works.

¹⁴And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death.

¹⁵And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.

²²In the fulness of his sufficiency he shall be in straits: every hand of the wicked shall come upon him.

²³When he is about to fill his belly, God shall cast the fury of his wrath upon him, and shall rain it upon him while he is eating.

¹⁹And I will say to my soul, Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry.

²⁰But God said unto him, Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee: then whose shall those things be, which thou hast provided?

²¹So is he that layeth up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God.

¹⁷For when he dieth he shall carry nothing away: his glory shall not descend after him.

⁴For there are no bands in their death: but their strength is firm.

⁵They are not in trouble as other men; neither are they plagued like other men.

⁸It shall be health to thy navel, and marrow to thy bones.

²⁷Because he covereth his face with his fatness, and maketh collops of fat on his flanks.

¹⁰They are inclosed in their own fat: with their mouth they speak proudly.

¹⁶Moreover he said unto me, Son of man, behold, I will break the staff of bread in Jerusalem: and they shall eat bread by weight, and with care; and they shall drink water by measure, and with astonishment:

¹⁷That they may want bread and water, and be astonied one with another, and consume away for their iniquity.

¹¹Therefore I will not refrain my mouth; I will speak in the anguish of my spirit; I will complain in the bitterness of my soul.

¹²And she said, As the Lord thy God liveth, I have not a cake, but an handful of meal in a barrel, and a little oil in a cruse: and, behold, I am gathering two sticks, that I may go in and dress it for me and my son, that we may eat it, and die.

⁸For, said Hushai, thou knowest thy father and his men, that they be mighty men, and they be chafed in their minds, as a bear robbed of her whelps in the field: and thy father is a man of war, and will not lodge with the people.

²A man to whom God hath given riches, wealth, and honour, so that he wanteth nothing for his soul of all that he desireth, yet God giveth him not power to eat thereof, but a stranger eateth it: this is vanity, and it is an evil disease.

¹⁸Son of man, eat thy bread with quaking, and drink thy water with trembling and with carefulness;

¹⁵What shall I say? he hath both spoken unto me, and himself hath done it: I shall go softly all my years in the bitterness of my soul.

¹⁶O Lord, by these things men live, and in all these things is the life of my spirit: so wilt thou recover me, and make me to live.

¹⁷Behold, for peace I had great bitterness: but thou hast in love to my soul delivered it from the pit of corruption: for thou hast cast all my sins behind thy back.

¹MY soul is weary of my life; I will leave my complaint upon myself; I will speak in the bitterness of my soul.

²³When he is about to fill his belly, God shall cast the fury of his wrath upon him, and shall rain it upon him while he is eating.

²⁰Wherefore is light given to him that is in misery, and life unto the bitter in soul;

¹⁸He will not suffer me to take my breath, but filleth me with bitterness.

¹⁰The heart knoweth his own bitterness; and a stranger doth not intermeddle with his joy.