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.

In all this, Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing.

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

He replied, “You are talking like a foolish woman. Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble?” In all this, Job did not sin in what he said.

When Job’s three friends, Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite, heard about all the troubles that had come upon him, they set out from their homes and met together by agreement to go and sympathize with him and comfort him.

At the breath of God they perish; at the blast of his anger they are no more.

fear and trembling seized me and made all my bones shake.

“If only my anguish could be weighed and all my misery be placed on the scales!

so I have been allotted months of futility, and nights of misery have been assigned to me.

When I lie down I think, ‘How long before I get up?’ The night drags on, and I toss and turn until dawn.

Such is the destiny of all who forget God; so perishes the hope of the godless.

He moves mountains without their knowing it and overturns them in his anger.

God does not restrain his anger; even the cohorts of Rahab cowered at his feet.

It is all the same; that is why I say, ‘He destroys both the blameless and the wicked.’

I still dread all my sufferings, for I know you will not hold me innocent.

You bring new witnesses against me and increase your anger toward me; your forces come against me wave upon wave.

“Are all these words to go unanswered? Is this talker to be vindicated?

if you put away the sin that is in your hand and allow no evil to dwell in your tent,

But I have a mind as well as you; I am not inferior to you. Who does not know all these things?

Which of all these does not know that the hand of the Lord has done this?

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

“My eyes have seen all this, my ears have heard and understood it.

You, however, smear me with lies; you are worthless physicians, all of you!

You fasten my feet in shackles; you keep close watch on all my paths by putting marks on the soles of my feet.

“If only you would hide me in the grave and conceal me till your anger has passed! If only you would set me a time and then remember me!