Job 24

Why as times are not hidden from Shaddai,

   Do those that know Him not behold His days?

They move boundary landmarks,

   Carry off flocks to pasture.

They drive before them the ass of the fatherless,

   Seize the widow’s ox in pledge.

They force the paupers from the path,

   The land’s poor to hide together.

 

Behold, as wild asses in the wilderness,

   Going forth to their toil,

Scavenging in the wasteland,

   Sustenance for their young.

Reaping in a field not their own,

   Gleaning until late in the wicked’s vineyard.

At night, they lie naked without clothes,

   With no covering in the cold.

Drenched by the mountain rains,

   Lacking shelter, clinging to the rocks.

The fatherless are snatched from the breast,

   Taken as a pledge from the poor.

For lack of clothing, they go about naked,

   Hungry, they carry the sheaves.

Among rows of olive trees, they press out oil,

   They tread the wine vats yet remain thirsty.

 

In terror, the dying groan,

   Screaming from those mortally wounded,

      Yet God attributes no regard.

They are those who rebel against the light,

   Who will not know its ways,

      Nor abide in its path.

The murderer rises after dusk,

   To kill the poor and the indigent,

      At night to act as the thief.

The eye of the adulterer watches for twilight,

   Think, ‘No one will recognize me’,

      He masks his face.

In the dark, they dig through homes,

   In which, by day, they seal themselves up,

      They never see the light.

For to them, every morning is like darkness,

   Day break like the terrors of deepest gloom.

 

May they be flotsam on the face of the water,

   May their portion in the land be cursed,

      May no treader of vineyards turn their way.

May drought and heat snatch away their snow waters,

   And Sheol, those who have sinned.

May the womb forget them,

   May the worms find they taste sweet.

May they be remembered no more,

   Thus their wickedness be broken as a tree.

May he consort with a barren woman,

   Who bears no child,

      Leave his widow deprived of good.

The mighty man may continue in his strength,

   He may rise up,

      But may he have no assurance of life.

Although God is the provider of security,

   They rely on it,

      Yet may His eyes be on their ways.

A little while we await, then may they be gone,

   May they wither and fade like the mallow,

      May they be cutoff like heads of grain.

If this were not so, who could prove the falsehood,

   And show my words to be worthless?

 

Job 252