Job 18

Bildad’s Second Speech

How Long Will You Talk?

1 Bildad from Shuah*18.1 Shuah: See the note at 2.11. said:

2 How long will you talk?

Be sensible! Let us speak.

3 Or do you think that we

are dumb animals?

4 You cut yourself in anger.

Will that shake the earth

or even move the rocks?

* 5 *Job 21.17. The lamps of sinful people

soon are snuffed out,

6 leaving their tents dark.

7 Their powerful legs become weak,

and they stumble on schemes

of their own doing.

* 8 Before they know it,

9 they are trapped in a net,

10 hidden along the path.

11 Terror strikes and pursues

from every side.

12 Starving, they run,

only to meet disaster,

13 then afterwards to be eaten alive

by death itself.

14 Those sinners are dragged

from the safety of their tents

to die a gruesome death.

15 Then their tents and possessions

are burned to ashes,

16 and they are left like trees,

dried up from the roots.

17 They are gone and forgotten,

18 thrown far from the light

into a world of darkness,

19 without any children

to carry on their name.

20 Everyone, from east to west,

is overwhelmed with horror.

21 Such is the fate of sinners

and their families

who don’t know God.