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Job 9

Job’s Third Speech: A Response to Bildad

¹Then Job spoke again:

²“Yes, I know all this is true in principle. But how can a person be declared innocent in God’s sight?

³If someone wanted to take God to court, would it be possible to answer him even once in a thousand times?

⁴For God is so wise and so mighty. Who has ever challenged him successfully?

⁵“Without warning, he moves the mountains, overturning them in his anger.

⁶He shakes the earth from its place, and its foundations tremble.

⁷If he commands it, the sun won’t rise and the stars won’t shine.

⁸He alone has spread out the heavens and marches on the waves of the sea.

⁹He made all the stars—the Bear and Orion, the Pleiades and the constellations of the southern sky.

¹⁰He does great things too marvelous to understand. He performs countless miracles.

¹¹“Yet when he comes near, I cannot see him. When he moves by, I do not see him go.

¹²If he snatches someone in death, who can stop him? Who dares to ask, ‘What are you doing?’

¹³And God does not restrain his anger. Even the monsters of the sea are crushed beneath his feet.

¹⁴“So who am I, that I should try to answer God or even reason with him?

¹⁵Even if I were right, I would have no defense. I could only plead for mercy.

¹⁶And even if I summoned him and he responded, I’m not sure he would listen to me.

¹⁷For he attacks me with a storm and repeatedly wounds me without cause.

¹⁸He will not let me catch my breath, but fills me instead with bitter sorrows.

¹⁹If it’s a question of strength, he’s the strong one. If it’s a matter of justice, who dares to summon him to court?

²⁰Though I am innocent, my own mouth would pronounce me guilty. Though I am blameless, it would prove me wicked.

²¹“I am innocent, but it makes no difference to me— I despise my life.

²²Innocent or wicked, it is all the same to God. That’s why I say, ‘He destroys both the blameless and the wicked.’

²³When a plague sweeps through, he laughs at the death of the innocent.

²⁴The whole earth is in the hands of the wicked, and God blinds the eyes of the judges. If he’s not the one who does it, who is?

²⁵“My life passes more swiftly than a runner. It flees away without a glimpse of happiness.

²⁶It disappears like a swift papyrus boat, like an eagle swooping down on its prey.

²⁷If I decided to forget my complaints, to put away my sad face and be cheerful,

²⁸I would still dread all the pain, for I know you will not find me innocent, O God.

²⁹Whatever happens, I will be found guilty. So what’s the use of trying?

³⁰Even if I were to wash myself with soap and clean my hands with lye,

³¹you would plunge me into a muddy ditch, and my own filthy clothing would hate me.

³²“God is not a mortal like me, so I cannot argue with him or take him to trial.

³³If only there were a mediator between us, someone who could bring us together.

³⁴The mediator could make God stop beating me, and I would no longer live in terror of his punishment.

³⁵Then I could speak to him without fear, but I cannot do that in my own strength.

Job 9 (NLT)

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Job

Chapter 9

9 of 42