Job 36

1Elihu continued:

2“Bear with me a little longer, and I will show you, for there is still more to say on God’s behalf.

3I will bring my knowledge from far away, and I will ascribe righteousness to my Maker.

4For truly my words are not false; one who is complete in knowledge is with you.

5Look, God is mighty, and he does not despise anyone; he is mighty, strong in understanding.

6He does not keep the wicked alive, but he gives the afflicted their rights.

7He does not take his eyes off the righteous; he seats them with kings on the throne forever, and they are exalted.

8But if they are bound in chains, caught in the cords of affliction,

9then he tells them what they have done, their transgressions, how they have behaved arrogantly.

10He opens their ears to correction and commands them to turn back from evil.

11If they listen and serve him, they will finish their days in prosperity and their years in pleasantness.

12But if they do not listen, they will perish by the sword and die without knowledge.

13The godless in heart harbor anger; they do not cry for help when he binds them.

14They die in their youth; their life ends among the male shrine prostitutes.

15He rescues the afflicted through their affliction and opens their ears through oppression.

16He was also drawing you away from the jaws of distress into a broad place free of constraint, and what was set on your table was full of rich food.

17But you are full of the judgment due the wicked; judgment and justice have taken hold of you.

18Beware that wrath does not lure you into scoffing; do not let a large ransom turn you aside.

19Can your cry for help keep you from distress, or all your mighty efforts?

20Do not long for the night, when peoples vanish from their place.

21Take care; do not turn to evil, for you have chosen this rather than affliction.

22Look, God is exalted in his power; who is a teacher like him?

23Who has prescribed his way for him? Who can say, ‘You have done wrong’?

24Remember to extol his work, which people have praised in song.

25All humankind has looked on it; mortals gaze at it from afar.

26Look, God is great, beyond our knowledge; the number of his years cannot be searched out.

27For he draws up the drops of water; they distill as rain from his mist,

28which the clouds pour down and shower abundantly on humankind.

29Can anyone understand the spreading of the clouds, the thunderings from his pavilion?

30Look, he spreads his light around him and covers the roots of the sea.

31For by these he judges peoples; he gives food in abundance.

32He covers his hands with lightning and commands it to strike its mark.

33His thunder announces him; even the livestock tell of what is rising.