1
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Then Eliphaz the Temanite replied: |
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2
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“If one ventures a word with you, will you be wearied? Yet who can keep from speaking? |
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3
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Surely you have instructed many, and have strengthened their feeble hands. |
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4
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Your words have steadied those who stumbled; you have braced the knees that were buckling. |
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5
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But now trouble has come upon you, and you are weary. It strikes you, and you are dismayed. |
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6
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Is your reverence not your confidence, and the uprightness of your ways your hope? |
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7
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Consider now, I plead: Who, being innocent, has ever perished? Or where have the upright been destroyed? |
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8
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As I have observed, those who plow iniquity and those who sow trouble reap the same. |
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9
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By the breath of God they perish, and by the blast of His anger they are consumed. |
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10
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The lion may roar, and the fierce lion may growl, yet the teeth of the young lions are broken. |
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11
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The old lion perishes for lack of prey, and the cubs of the lioness are scattered. |
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12
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Now a word came to me secretly; my ears caught a whisper of it. |
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13
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In disquieting visions in the night, when deep sleep falls on men, |
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14
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fear and trembling came over me and made all my bones shudder. |
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15
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Then a spirit glided past my face, and the hair on my body bristled. |
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16
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It stood still, but I could not discern its appearance; a form loomed before my eyes, and I heard a whispering voice: |
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17
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‘Can a mortal be more righteous than God, or a man more pure than his Maker? |
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18
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If God puts no trust in His servants, and He charges His angels with error, |
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19
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how much more those who dwell in houses of clay, whose foundations are in the dust, who can be crushed like a moth! |
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20
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They are smashed to pieces from dawn to dusk; unnoticed, they perish forever. |
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21
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Are not their tent cords pulled up, so that they die without wisdom?’ |
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