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Job Answers Eliphaz

16 Then Job answered:

“I have heard many things like these.
    You are all ·painful [or troublesome] comforters!
Will your ·long-winded speeches [L windy words] never end?
    What ·makes [L provokes] you keep on ·arguing [L responding]?
I also could speak as you do
    if you were in my place.
I could ·make great speeches [L join words] against you
    and shake my head at you [C like wagging a finger at someone].
But, instead, I would ·encourage you [L strengthen you with my mouth],
    and ·my words [L the words of my lips] would bring you ·relief [comfort].

“Even if I speak, my pain is not less,
    and if I don’t speak, it still does not go away.

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Job Says Friends Are Sorry Comforters

16 Then Job answered and said,


“I have heard many such things;
Wearisome and miserable comforters are you all.

“Is there no end to [your futile] words of wind?
Or what plagues you [so much] that you [so boldly] answer [me like this]?

“I also could speak like you,
If you were in my place;
I could compose and join words together against you
And shake my head at you.

“[But instead] I could strengthen and encourage you with [the words of] my mouth,
And the consolation and solace of my lips would soothe your suffering and lessen your anguish.

Job Says God Shattered Him


“If I speak [to you miserable comforters], my pain is not relieved;
And if I refrain [from speaking], what [pain or anguish] leaves me?

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