Job 24:2–12

¹⁴¶ Thou shalt not remove thy neighbour’s landmark, which they of old time have set in thine inheritance, which thou shalt inherit in the land that the Lord thy God giveth thee to possess it.

¹⁷Cursed be he that removeth his neighbour’s landmark. And all the people shall say, Amen.

¹⁰Remove not the old landmark; and enter not into the fields of the fatherless:

²⁸Remove not the ancient landmark, which thy fathers have set.

¹⁰The princes of Judah were like them that remove the bound: therefore I will pour out my wrath upon them like water.

¹⁵And the Sabeans fell upon them, and took them away; yea, they have slain the servants with the edge of the sword; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.

¹⁷While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, The Chaldeans made out three bands, and fell upon the camels, and have carried them away, yea, and slain the servants with the edge of the sword; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.

⁵Whose harvest the hungry eateth up, and taketh it even out of the thorns, and the robber swalloweth up their substance.

⁶¶ No man shall take the nether or the upper millstone to pledge: for he taketh a man’s life to pledge.

³Behold, here I am: witness against me before the Lord, and before his anointed: whose ox have I taken? or whose ass have I taken? or whom have I defrauded? whom have I oppressed? or of whose hand have I received any bribe to blind mine eyes therewith? and I will restore it you.

¹⁰¶ When thou dost lend thy brother any thing, thou shalt not go into his house to fetch his pledge.

¹¹Thou shalt stand abroad, and the man to whom thou dost lend shall bring out the pledge abroad unto thee.

¹²And if the man be poor, thou shalt not sleep with his pledge:

¹³In any case thou shalt deliver him the pledge again when the sun goeth down, that he may sleep in his own raiment, and bless thee: and it shall be righteousness unto thee before the Lord thy God.

¹⁷¶ Thou shalt not pervert the judgment of the stranger, nor of the fatherless; nor take a widow’s raiment to pledge:

¹⁸But thou shalt remember that thou wast a bondman in Egypt, and the Lord thy God redeemed thee thence: therefore I command thee to do this thing.

¹⁹¶ When thou cuttest down thine harvest in thy field, and hast forgot a sheaf in the field, thou shalt not go again to fetch it: it shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, and for the widow: that the Lord thy God may bless thee in all the work of thine hands.

²⁰When thou beatest thine olive tree, thou shalt not go over the boughs again: it shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, and for the widow.

²¹When thou gatherest the grapes of thy vineyard, thou shalt not glean it afterward: it shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, and for the widow.

⁶For thou hast taken a pledge from thy brother for nought, and stripped the naked of their clothing.

⁷Thou hast not given water to the weary to drink, and thou hast withholden bread from the hungry.

⁸But as for the mighty man, he had the earth; and the honourable man dwelt in it.

⁹Thou hast sent widows away empty, and the arms of the fatherless have been broken.

¹⁶If I have withheld the poor from their desire, or have caused the eyes of the widow to fail;

¹⁷Or have eaten my morsel myself alone, and the fatherless hath not eaten thereof;

²⁸When the wicked rise, men hide themselves: but when they perish, the righteous increase.

¹⁴The murderer rising with the light killeth the poor and needy, and in the night is as a thief.

⁷That pant after the dust of the earth on the head of the poor, and turn aside the way of the meek: and a man and his father will go in unto the same maid, to profane my holy name:

²⁹The people of the land have used oppression, and exercised robbery, and have vexed the poor and needy: yea, they have oppressed the stranger wrongfully.

⁴¶ Hear this, O ye that swallow up the needy, even to make the poor of the land to fail,

⁵Saying, When will the new moon be gone, that we may sell corn? and the sabbath, that we may set forth wheat, making the ephah small, and the shekel great, and falsifying the balances by deceit?

⁶That we may buy the poor for silver, and the needy for a pair of shoes; yea, and sell the refuse of the wheat?

¹²Hath oppressed the poor and needy, hath spoiled by violence, hath not restored the pledge, and hath lifted up his eyes to the idols, hath committed abomination,

¹⁸As for his father, because he cruelly oppressed, spoiled his brother by violence, and did that which is not good among his people, lo, even he shall die in his iniquity.

²To turn aside the needy from judgment, and to take away the right from the poor of my people, that widows may be their prey, and that they may rob the fatherless!

⁴Behold, the hire of the labourers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth: and the cries of them which have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth.

⁵Ye have lived in pleasure on the earth, and been wanton; ye have nourished your hearts, as in a day of slaughter.

⁶Ye have condemned and killed the just; and he doth not resist you.

¹²Because I delivered the poor that cried, and the fatherless, and him that had none to help him.

²⁵Did not I weep for him that was in trouble? was not my soul grieved for the poor?

¹⁶If I have withheld the poor from their desire, or have caused the eyes of the widow to fail;

¹WOE to them that devise iniquity, and work evil upon their beds! when the morning is light, they practise it, because it is in the power of their hand.

²And they covet fields, and take them by violence; and houses, and take them away: so they oppress a man and his house, even a man and his heritage.

¹⁶He that oppresseth the poor to increase his riches, and he that giveth to the rich, shall surely come to want.

¹²When righteous men do rejoice, there is great glory: but when the wicked rise, a man is hidden.

¹⁴There is a generation, whose teeth are as swords, and their jaw teeth as knives, to devour the poor from off the earth, and the needy from among men.

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

¹BLESSED is he that considereth the poor: the Lord will deliver him in time of trouble.

⁵Who hath sent out the wild ass free? or who hath loosed the bands of the wild ass?

⁶Whose house I have made the wilderness, and the barren land his dwellings.

⁷He scorneth the multitude of the city, neither regardeth he the crying of the driver.

⁵Whose harvest the hungry eateth up, and taketh it even out of the thorns, and the robber swalloweth up their substance.

¹WOE to them that devise iniquity, and work evil upon their beds! when the morning is light, they practise it, because it is in the power of their hand.

²³Man goeth forth unto his work and to his labour until the evening.

¹²And when it was day, certain of the Jews banded together, and bound themselves under a curse, saying that they would neither eat nor drink till they had killed Paul.

¹²And he will be a wild man; his hand will be against every man, and every man’s hand against him; and he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren.

⁴⁰And by thy sword shalt thou live, and shalt serve thy brother; and it shall come to pass when thou shalt have the dominion, that thou shalt break his yoke from off thy neck.

⁶For they have made ready their heart like an oven, whiles they lie in wait: their baker sleepeth all the night; in the morning it burneth as a flaming fire.

⁹For they are gone up to Assyria, a wild ass alone by himself: Ephraim hath hired lovers.

²⁴A wild ass used to the wilderness, that snuffeth up the wind at her pleasure; in her occasion who can turn her away? all they that seek her will not weary themselves; in her month they shall find her.

⁶The tabernacles of robbers prosper, and they that provoke God are secure; into whose hand God bringeth abundantly.

¹⁴The murderer rising with the light killeth the poor and needy, and in the night is as a thief.

²⁸¶ Then led they Jesus from Caiaphas unto the hall of judgment: and it was early; and they themselves went not into the judgment hall, lest they should be defiled; but that they might eat the passover.

¹⁶For they sleep not, except they have done mischief; and their sleep is taken away, unless they cause some to fall.

³Her princes within her are roaring lions; her judges are evening wolves; they gnaw not the bones till the morrow.

¹⁵Thou shalt sow, but thou shalt not reap; thou shalt tread the olives, but thou shalt not anoint thee with oil; and sweet wine, but shalt not drink wine.

³³The fruit of thy land, and all thy labours, shall a nation which thou knowest not eat up; and thou shalt be only oppressed and crushed alway:

⁵¹And he shall eat the fruit of thy cattle, and the fruit of thy land, until thou be destroyed: which also shall not leave thee either corn, wine, or oil, or the increase of thy kine, or flocks of thy sheep, until he have destroyed thee.

³And so it was, when Israel had sown, that the Midianites came up, and the Amalekites, and the children of the east, even they came up against them;

⁴And they encamped against them, and destroyed the increase of the earth, till thou come unto Gaza, and left no sustenance for Israel, neither sheep, nor ox, nor ass.

⁵For they came up with their cattle and their tents, and they came as grasshoppers for multitude; for both they and their camels were without number: and they entered into the land to destroy it.

⁶And Israel was greatly impoverished because of the Midianites; and the children of Israel cried unto the Lord.

²⁶If thou at all take thy neighbour’s raiment to pledge, thou shalt deliver it unto him by that the sun goeth down:

²⁷For that is his covering only, it is his raiment for his skin: wherein shall he sleep? and it shall come to pass, when he crieth unto me, that I will hear; for I am gracious.

⁶For thou hast taken a pledge from thy brother for nought, and stripped the naked of their clothing.

¹¹Thou shalt stand abroad, and the man to whom thou dost lend shall bring out the pledge abroad unto thee.

¹²And if the man be poor, thou shalt not sleep with his pledge:

¹³In any case thou shalt deliver him the pledge again when the sun goeth down, that he may sleep in his own raiment, and bless thee: and it shall be righteousness unto thee before the Lord thy God.

³¹Then had the churches rest throughout all Judæa and Galilee and Samaria, and were edified; and walking in the fear of the Lord, and in the comfort of the Holy Ghost, were multiplied.

⁴⁰Thus I was; in the day the drought consumed me, and the frost by night; and my sleep departed from mine eyes.

⁷Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house? when thou seest the naked, that thou cover him; and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh?

¹⁰They cause him to go naked without clothing, and they take away the sheaf from the hungry;

¹⁹If I have seen any perish for want of clothing, or any poor without covering;

²⁰If his loins have not blessed me, and if he were not warmed with the fleece of my sheep;

²¹She is not afraid of the snow for her household: for all her household are clothed with scarlet.

⁵They that did feed delicately are desolate in the streets: they that were brought up in scarlet embrace dunghills.

³⁸(Of whom the world was not worthy:) they wandered in deserts, and in mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth.

²¶ I sleep, but my heart waketh: it is the voice of my beloved that knocketh, saying, Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled: for my head is filled with dew, and my locks with the drops of the night.

⁵Yet now our flesh is as the flesh of our brethren, our children as their children: and, lo, we bring into bondage our sons and our daughters to be servants, and some of our daughters are brought unto bondage already: neither is it in our power to redeem them; for other men have our lands and vineyards.

¹NOW there cried a certain woman of the wives of the sons of the prophets unto Elisha, saying, Thy servant my husband is dead; and thou knowest that thy servant did fear the Lord: and the creditor is come to take unto him my two sons to be bondmen.

⁷That pant after the dust of the earth on the head of the poor, and turn aside the way of the meek: and a man and his father will go in unto the same maid, to profane my holy name:

⁸And they lay themselves down upon clothes laid to pledge by every altar, and they drink the wine of the condemned in the house of their god.

¹¹Forasmuch therefore as your treading is upon the poor, and ye take from him burdens of wheat: ye have built houses of hewn stone, but ye shall not dwell in them; ye have planted pleasant vineyards, but ye shall not drink wine of them.

¹²For I know your manifold transgressions and your mighty sins: they afflict the just, they take a bribe, and they turn aside the poor in the gate from their right.

¹⁹¶ When thou cuttest down thine harvest in thy field, and hast forgot a sheaf in the field, thou shalt not go again to fetch it: it shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, and for the widow: that the Lord thy God may bless thee in all the work of thine hands.

⁴Behold, the hire of the labourers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth: and the cries of them which have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth.

¹³¶ Woe unto him that buildeth his house by unrighteousness, and his chambers by wrong; that useth his neighbour’s service without wages, and giveth him not for his work;

⁴¶ Thou shalt not muzzle the ox when he treadeth out the corn.

¹SO I returned, and considered all the oppressions that are done under the sun: and behold the tears of such as were oppressed, and they had no comforter; and on the side of their oppressors there was power; but they had no comforter.

¹¹Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil.

¹²¶ Though a sinner do evil an hundred times, and his days be prolonged, yet surely I know that it shall be well with them that fear God, which fear before him:

¹⁷¶ Ye have wearied the Lord with your words. Yet ye say, Wherein have we wearied him? When ye say, Every one that doeth evil is good in the sight of the Lord, and he delighteth in them; or, Where is the God of judgment?

¹⁵And now we call the proud happy; yea, they that work wickedness are set up; yea, they that tempt God are even delivered.

²¹These things hast thou done, and I kept silence; thou thoughtest that I was altogether such an one as thyself: but I will reprove thee, and set them in order before thine eyes.

⁴Or despisest thou the riches of his goodness and forbearance and longsuffering; not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance?

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;

¹⁵And account that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation; even as our beloved brother Paul also according to the wisdom given unto him hath written unto you;

¹³And the Egyptians made the children of Israel to serve with rigour:

¹⁴And they made their lives bitter with hard bondage, in morter, and in brick, and in all manner of service in the field: all their service, wherein they made them serve, was with rigour.

²³¶ And it came to pass in process of time, that the king of Egypt died: and the children of Israel sighed by reason of the bondage, and they cried, and their cry came up unto God by reason of the bondage.

²⁴And God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob.

²⁷For that is his covering only, it is his raiment for his skin: wherein shall he sleep? and it shall come to pass, when he crieth unto me, that I will hear; for I am gracious.

⁵Now therefore, what have I here, saith the Lord, that my people is taken away for nought? they that rule over them make them to howl, saith the Lord; and my name continually every day is blasphemed.

²³If the scourge slay suddenly, he will laugh at the trial of the innocent.

¹⁶And they put away the strange gods from among them, and served the Lord: and his soul was grieved for the misery of Israel.

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

⁵For the oppression of the poor, for the sighing of the needy, now will I arise, saith the Lord; I will set him in safety from him that puffeth at him.

²⁶For they persecute him whom thou hast smitten; and they talk to the grief of those whom thou hast wounded.