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Job Describes Social Injustice

24 Why doesn’t the Almighty reserve time for judgment?
    And why don’t those who know him perceive his days?
They move boundary stones,[a]
    steal flocks, and pasture them.[b]
They drive away the orphan’s donkey;
    they take the ox of the widow as security for a loan;[c]
They push the needy off the road,
    and force the poor of the land into hiding.

“Look! Like wild donkeys in the wilderness,
    they work diligently as they seek wild game in the desert,
        food for them and their young ones.
They reap fodder in the field
    and glean in the vineyard of the wicked.
They spend the night naked, without clothing,
    with no covering against the cold.
They are wet from mountain rains;
    without shelter, they cling to a rock.

“The fatherless are torn from the breast;
    the poor are taken away as security for a loan.[d]
10 They wander around naked, without clothes;
    hungry, though they carry sheaves of grain.[e]
11 They press oil between the olive groves owned by the wicked;
    they suffer from thirst, even while treading the winepress.
12 From the city, dying men groan aloud,
    and the wounded cries out for help,
        but God charges no one with wrong.

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Footnotes

  1. Job 24:2 Or borders
  2. Job 24:2 The Heb. lacks them
  3. Job 24:3 The Heb. lacks for a loan
  4. Job 24:9 The Heb. lacks for a loan
  5. Job 24:10 The Heb. lacks grain