8:1
Bildad of Shuah spoke next. He said:
8:2
How much longer are you going to talk like this and go blustering on in this way?
8:3
Can God deflect the course of right or Shaddai falsify justice?
8:4
If your sons sinned against him, he has punished them for their wrong-doing.
8:5
You for your part, if you are pure and honest, must now seek God, plead with Shaddai.
8:6
Forthwith his light will shine on you and he will restore an upright man's house to prosperity.
8:7
Your former state will seem as nothing to you, so great will your future be.
8:8
Question the generation that has passed, meditate on the experience of its ancestors-
8:9
for we children of yesterday, we know nothing, our life on earth passes like a shadow-
8:10
but they will teach you, they will tell you, and their thought is expressed in these sayings,
8:11
'Can papyrus flourish except in marshes? Without water can the rushes grow?
8:12
Even when green and before being cut, fastest of all plants they wither.
8:13
Such is the fate of all who forget God; so perishes the hope of the godless.
8:14
His hope is nothing but gossamer, his confidence a spider's web.
8:15
Let him lean on his house, it will not stand firm; cling to it, it will not hold.
8:16
Like some lush plant in the sunlight, he sent his young shoots sprouting over the garden;
8:17
but his roots were twined in a heap of stones, he drew his life among the rocks.
8:18
Snatch him from his bed, and it denies it ever saw him.
8:19
Now he rots on the roadside, and others are springing up in the soil.
8:20
Believe me, God neither spurns anyone of integrity, nor lends his aid to the evil.
8:21
Once again laughter may fill your mouth and cries of joy break from your lips.
8:22
Your enemies will be covered with shame and the tent of the wicked will vanish!'
Previous
Next