章 |
4:1 |
Then Eli'phaz the Te'manite answered:
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4:2 |
'If one ventures a word with you, will you be offended? Yet who can keep from speaking?
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4:3 |
Behold, you have instructed many, and you have strengthened the weak hands.
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4:4 |
Your words have upheld him who was stumbling, and you have made firm the feeble knees.
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4:5 |
But now it has come to you, and you are impatient;it touches you, and you are dismayed.
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4:6 |
Is not your fear of God your confidence, and the integrity of your ways your hope?
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4:7 |
'Think now, who that was innocent ever perished? Or where were the upright cut off?
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4:8 |
As I have seen, those who plow iniquity and sow trouble reap the same.
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4:9 |
By the breath of God they perish, and by the blast of his anger they are consumed.
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4:10 |
The roar of the lion, the voice of the fierce lion, the teeth of the young lions, are broken.
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4:11 |
The strong lion perishes for lack of prey, and the whelps of the lioness are scattered.
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4:12 |
'Now a word was brought to me stealthily, my ear received the whisper of it.
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4:13 |
Amid thoughts from visions of the night, when deep sleep falls on men,
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4:14 |
dread came upon me, and trembling, which made all my bones shake.
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4:15 |
A spirit glided past my face;the hair of my flesh stood up.
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4:16 |
It stood still, but I could not discern its appearance. A form was before my eyes;there was silence, then I heard a voice:
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4:17 |
Can mortal man be righteous before God? Can a man be pure before his Maker?
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4:18 |
Even in his servants he puts no trust, and his angels he charges with error;
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4:19 |
how much more those who dwell in houses of clay, whose foundation is in the dust, who are crushed before the moth.
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4:20 |
Between morning and evening they are destroyed;they perish for ever without any regarding it.
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4:21 |
If their tent-cord is plucked up within them, do they not die, and that without wisdom?'
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