Eliphaz Answers Again
15 1 Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered: 2 "Should a wise man answer with windy knowledge and fill his belly with the east wind? a a v2 The east wind was the scorching desert sirocco — a recurring symbol of emptiness and destruction throughout Job. 3 Should he argue with useless talk, with words that do no good? 4 But you are doing away with the fear of God and hindering meditation before God. 5 For your iniquity instructs your mouth, and you choose the tongue of the crafty. 6 Your own mouth condemns you, not I; your own lips testify against you. 7 Are you the first man ever born? Were you brought forth before the hills? 8 Have you listened in the council of God? Do you limit wisdom to yourself? b b v8 The "council of God" is the heavenly assembly where God presides with his celestial beings — Eliphaz is mocking Job's pretension to insider knowledge. 9 What do you know that we do not? What do you understand that is not in us as well? 10 The gray-haired and the aged are among us, men older than your father. 11 Are the comforts of God too small for you, the word spoken gently to you? 12 Why does your heart carry you away, and why do your eyes flash, 13 that you turn your spirit against God and let such words pour from your mouth? 14 What is man, that he should be pure? What is one born of woman, that he should be righteous? 15 Look, God puts no trust in his holy ones, and the heavens are not pure in his sight; 16 how much less one who is detestable and corrupt, a man who drinks injustice like water! 17 I will show you; listen to me; I will tell you what I have seen — 18 what wise men have declared, not hiding what they received from their fathers, 19 to whom alone the land was given, when no foreigner had yet come among them. 20 The wicked man writhes in pain all his days, through all the years in store for the ruthless. 21 Terrifying sounds fill his ears; in his prosperity the destroyer comes upon him. 22 He does not believe he will escape the darkness; he is marked for the sword. 23 He wanders about for bread, asking, 'Where is it?' He knows a day of darkness is close at hand. 24 Distress and anguish terrify him; they overpower him like a king poised for battle, 25 because he stretched out his hand against God and defied the Almighty, 26 charging at him stubbornly with a thick, reinforced shield; 27 because he covered his face with fat and piled flesh around his waist, 28 he settled in ruined cities, in houses no one should live in, ready to become heaps of rubble. 29 He will not grow rich; his wealth will not endure, nor will his possessions spread over the land. 30 He will not escape from darkness; a flame will wither his shoots, and the breath of God's mouth will sweep him away. 31 Let him not trust in emptiness, deceiving himself, for emptiness will be his reward. 32 It will be paid in full before his time, and his branch will not be green. 33 He will shake off his unripe grapes like a vine and drop his blossoms like an olive tree. 34 For the company of the godless is barren, and fire consumes the homes of bribery. 35 They conceive trouble and give birth to evil; their womb prepares deceit."