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12 “Is not God high in the heavens?
    See the highest stars, how lofty they are!
13 Therefore you say, ‘What does God know?
    Can he judge through the deep darkness?(A)
14 Thick clouds enwrap him, so that he does not see,
    and he walks on the dome of heaven.’
15 Will you keep to the old way
    that the wicked have trod?
16 They were snatched away before their time;
    their foundation was washed away by a flood.(B)
17 They said to God, ‘Leave us alone,’
    and ‘What can the Almighty[a] do to us?’[b]
18 Yet he filled their houses with good things—
    but the plans of the wicked are repugnant to me.(C)
19 The righteous see it and are glad;
    the innocent laugh them to scorn,(D)
20 saying, ‘Surely our adversaries are cut off,
    and what they left, the fire has consumed.’(E)

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Footnotes

  1. 22.17 Traditional rendering of Heb Shaddai
  2. 22.17 Gk Syr: Heb them

12 “God is so great—higher than the heavens,
    higher than the farthest stars.
13 But you reply, ‘That’s why God can’t see what I am doing!
    How can he judge through the thick darkness?
14 For thick clouds swirl about him, and he cannot see us.
    He is way up there, walking on the vault of heaven.’

15 “Will you continue on the old paths
    where evil people have walked?
16 They were snatched away in the prime of life,
    the foundations of their lives washed away.
17 For they said to God, ‘Leave us alone!
    What can the Almighty do to us?’
18 Yet he was the one who filled their homes with good things,
    so I will have nothing to do with that kind of thinking.

19 “The righteous will be happy to see the wicked destroyed,
    and the innocent will laugh in contempt.
20 They will say, ‘See how our enemies have been destroyed.
    The last of them have been consumed in the fire.’

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