Prologue

In the land of Uz there lived a man whose name was Job. This man was blameless and upright; he feared God and shunned evil.

and he owned seven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred yoke of oxen and five hundred donkeys, and had a large number of servants. He was the greatest man among all the people of the East.

Then the Lord said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job? There is no one on earth like him; he is blameless and upright, a man who fears God and shuns evil.”

The Lord said to Satan, “Very well, then, everything he has is in your power, but on the man himself do not lay a finger.” Then Satan went out from the presence of the Lord.

Then the Lord said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job? There is no one on earth like him; he is blameless and upright, a man who fears God and shuns evil. And he still maintains his integrity, though you incited me against him to ruin him without any reason.”

“Skin for skin!” Satan replied. “A man will give all he has for his own life.

Why is life given to a man whose way is hidden, whom God has hedged in?

Think how you have instructed many, how you have strengthened feeble hands.

‘Can a mortal be more righteous than God? Can even a strong man be more pure than his Maker?

Yet man is born to trouble as surely as sparks fly upward.

You will know that your children will be many, and your descendants like the grass of the earth.

“What is mankind that you make so much of them, that you give them so much attention,

Are your days like those of a mortal or your years like those of a strong man,

You will lie down, with no one to make you afraid, and many will court your favor.

In his hand is the life of every creature and the breath of all mankind.

How many wrongs and sins have I committed? Show me my offense and my sin.

“So man wastes away like something rotten, like a garment eaten by moths.

But a man dies and is laid low; he breathes his last and is no more.

“Are you the first man ever born? Were you brought forth before the hills?

All his days the wicked man suffers torment, the ruthless man through all the years stored up for him.

“I have heard many things like these; you are miserable comforters, all of you!

on behalf of a man he pleads with God as one pleads for a friend.

“God has made me a byword to everyone, a man in whose face people spit.

“But come on, all of you, try again! I will not find a wise man among you.

“The lamp of a wicked man is snuffed out; the flame of his fire stops burning.