Testimonia — Early Christian Bible Commentary

1Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered,

2“Should a wise man answer with vain knowledge, and fill himself with the east wind?

3Should he reason with unprofitable talk, or with speeches with which he can do no good?

4Yes, you do away with fear, and hinder devotion before God.

5For your iniquity teaches your mouth, and you choose the language of the crafty.

6Your own mouth condemns you, and not I. Yes, your own lips testify against you.

7“Are you the first man who was born? Or were you brought out before the hills?

8Have you heard the secret counsel of God? Do you limit wisdom to yourself?

9What do you know that we don’t know? What do you understand which is not in us?

10With us are both the gray-headed and the very aged men, much older than your father.

11Are the consolations of God too small for you, even the word that is gentle toward you?

12Why does your heart carry you away? Why do your eyes flash,

13that you turn your spirit against God, and let such words go out of your mouth?

14What is man, that he should be clean? What is he who is born of a woman, that he should be righteous?

15Behold, he puts no trust in his holy ones. Yes, the heavens are not clean in his sight;

16how much less one who is abominable and corrupt, a man who drinks iniquity like water!

17“I will show you, listen to me; that which I have seen I will declare

18(which wise men have told by their fathers, and have not hidden it;

19to whom alone the land was given, and no stranger passed among them):

20the wicked man writhes in pain all his days, even the number of years that are laid up for the oppressor.

21A sound of terrors is in his ears. In prosperity the destroyer will come on him.

22He doesn’t believe that he will return out of darkness. He is waited for by the sword.

23He wanders abroad for bread, saying, ‘Where is it?’ He knows that the day of darkness is ready at his hand.

24Distress and anguish make him afraid. They prevail against him, as a king ready to the battle.

25Because he has stretched out his hand against God, and behaves himself proudly against the Almighty,

26he runs at him with a stiff neck, with the thick shields of his bucklers,

27because he has covered his face with his fatness, and gathered fat on his thighs.

28He has lived in desolate cities, in houses which no one inhabited, which were ready to become heaps.

29He will not be rich, neither will his substance continue, neither will their possessions be extended on the earth.

30He will not depart out of darkness. The flame will dry up his branches. He will go away by the breath of God’s mouth.

31Let him not trust in emptiness, deceiving himself, for emptiness will be his reward.

32It will be accomplished before his time. His branch will not be green.

33He will shake off his unripe grape as the vine, and will cast off his flower as the olive tree.

34For the company of the godless will be barren, and fire will consume the tents of bribery.

35They conceive mischief and produce iniquity. Their heart prepares deceit.”