Job 9:1-33 ▼

1 Then Job answered:

2 Yes, I know what you’ve said is true, but how can a person be justified before God?

3 If one wanted to take him to court, he could not answer God once in a thousand times.

4 God is wise and all-powerful. Who has opposed him and come out unharmed?

5 He removes mountains without their knowledge, overturning them in his anger.

6 He shakes the earth from its place so that its pillars tremble.

7 He commands the sun not to shine and seals off the stars.

8 He alone stretches out the heavens and treads on the waves of the sea.

9 He makes the stars: the Bear, Orion, the Pleiades, and the constellations of the southern sky.

10 He does great and unsearchable things, wonders without number.

11 If he passed by me, I wouldn’t see him; if he went by, I wouldn’t recognize him.

12 If he snatches something, who can stop him? Who can ask him, “What are you doing? ”

13 God does not hold back his anger; Rahab’s assistants cringe in fear beneath him!

14 How then can I answer him or choose my arguments against him?

15 Even if I were in the right, I could not answer. I could only beg my Judge for mercy.

16 If I summoned him and he answered me, I do not believe he would pay attention to what I said.

17 He batters me with a whirlwind and multiplies my wounds without cause.

18 He doesn’t let me catch my breath but fills me with bitter experiences.

19 If it is a matter of strength, look, he is the powerful one! If it is a matter of justice, who can summon him?

20 Even if I were in the right, my own mouth would condemn me; if I were blameless, my mouth would declare me guilty.

21 Though I am blameless, I no longer care about myself; I renounce my life.

22 It is all the same. Therefore I say, “He destroys both the blameless and the wicked.”

23 When catastrophe brings sudden death, he mocks the despair of the innocent.

24 The earth is handed over to the wicked; he blindfolds its judges. If it isn’t he, then who is it?

25 My days fly by faster than a runner; they flee without seeing any good.

26 They sweep by like boats made of papyrus, like an eagle swooping down on its prey.

27 If I said, “I will forget my complaint, change my expression, and smile,”

28 I would still live in terror of all my pains. I know you will not acquit me.

29 Since I will be found guilty, why should I struggle in vain?

30 If I wash myself with snow, and cleanse my hands with lye,

31 then you dip me in a pit of mud, and my own clothes despise me!

32 For he is not a man like me, that I can answer him, that we can take each other to court.

33 There is no mediator between us, to lay his hand on both of us.