1Job replied:
2Listen at least to my words,
enough of your consolation.
3Bear with me while I speak;
and then you can mock.
4Is my grudge against humans?
Why then should I not be impatient?
5Look at me and be appalled;
cover your mouth for a moment.
6When I think about this I am troubled
and trembling seizes my body.
Job: It’s well for the wicked!
7 ① Why do the wicked live,
increase in age and in power?
8Their descendants flourish in their sight,
their kinsfolk and their offspring.
9Their homes are safe, free from fear;
they do not feel the scourge of God.
10Their bulls breed without fail;
their cows calve and do not miscarry.
11They have children as they have lambs
their little ones dance like deer.
12They sing to the rhythm of timbrel and harp;
make merry to the sound of the flute.
13They live out their days in happiness
and go down to Sheol in peace.
14Yet they said to God, “Go away!
We have no desire to learn your way.
15Who is the Almighty that we should serve him?
What will it profit us if we pray to him?”
16Though they planned everything far from God
prosperity is in their hands.
17How often is their lamp put out?
How often does calamity befall them?
How often does God’s anger wipe them out?
18How often are they like straw before the wind,
like chaff which the storm sweeps away?
19You say, “His children will pay for his sin.”
Let the man himself pay for his iniquity;
20let his own eyes see his misfortune;
let him drink the wrath of the Almighty!
21What does he care about his family when he dies,
when his months have been cut off?
22Can anyone teach God knowledge,
since he judges even the highest?
23One man dies in full vigor,
at ease and completely secure;
24full and nourished is his figure,
rich in marrow are his bones.
25Another dies in bitterness,
never having enjoyed happiness.
26But in the dust they lie down
side by side, covered with worms.
27I know your thoughts fully
and your schemes about me.
28For you say, “Where is the house of the great prince?
Where is the tent of the wicked?”
29Have you never asked the travelers,
or have you misunderstood what they say –
30that the evil man is spared from calamity,
delivered from the day of God’s fury?
31Who will denounce his conduct to his face
or pay him back for what he has done?
32When people have carried him to the grave his image watches from his tomb.
33The soft earth is sweet to him;
behind him you see everyone follow
and before him a countless horde.
34How then can you console me with your nonsense?
Pure falsehood is all you have said.
- Job 21,7 Here, too, we recognize Jeremiah's complaint in 12:1 and the questions raised in Psalm 73. In the Old Testament the just are scandalized by the prosperity of the wicked, because it seems to deny God's justice. Is it true, as we sometimes hear, that death is the ultimate justice?
