Job 20

Zophar Speaks: The Wicked Will Suffer

¹Then Zophar the Naamathite answered and said:

²“Therefore my thoughts answer me,

because of my haste within me.

³I hear censure that insults me,

and out of my understanding a spirit answers me.

⁴Do you not know this from of old,

since man was placed on earth,

⁵that the exulting of the wicked is short,

and the joy of the godless but for a moment?

⁶Though his height mount up to the heavens,

and his head reach to the clouds,

⁷he will perish forever like his own dung;

those who have seen him will say, ‘Where is he?’

⁸He will fly away like a dream and not be found;

he will be chased away like a vision of the night.

⁹The eye that saw him will see him no more,

nor will his place any more behold him.

¹⁰His children will seek the favor of the poor,

and his hands will give back his wealth.

¹¹His bones are full of his youthful vigor,

but it will lie down with him in the dust.

¹²“Though evil is sweet in his mouth,

though he hides it under his tongue,

¹³though he is loath to let it go

and holds it in his mouth,

¹⁴yet his food is turned in his stomach;

it is the venom of cobras within him.

¹⁵He swallows down riches and vomits them up again;

God casts them out of his belly.

¹⁶He will suck the poison of cobras;

the tongue of a viper will kill him.

¹⁷He will not look upon the rivers,

the streams flowing with honey and curds.

¹⁸He will give back the fruit of his toil

and will not swallow it down;

from the profit of his trading

he will get no enjoyment.

¹⁹For he has crushed and abandoned the poor;

he has seized a house that he did not build.

²⁰“Because he knew no contentment in his belly,

he will not let anything in which he delights escape him.

²¹There was nothing left after he had eaten;

therefore his prosperity will not endure.

²²In the fullness of his sufficiency he will be in distress;

the hand of everyone in misery will come against him.

²³To fill his belly to the full,

God will send his burning anger against him

and rain it upon him into his body.

²⁴He will flee from an iron weapon;

a bronze arrow will strike him through.

²⁵It is drawn forth and comes out of his body;

the glittering point comes out of his gallbladder;

terrors come upon him.

²⁶Utter darkness is laid up for his treasures;

a fire not fanned will devour him;

what is left in his tent will be consumed.

²⁷The heavens will reveal his iniquity,

and the earth will rise up against him.

²⁸The possessions of his house will be carried away,

dragged off in the day of God's wrath.

²⁹This is the wicked man's portion from God,

the heritage decreed for him by God.”