Book of Job - Ferrar Fenton Bible Translation page 824

3-2 5

4 Eliphaz the Themanite, however, replied and said : I0 II I2 16 18 20 2I If we speak you a word, will you fret ? But who can his excitement restrain? Consider how many you taught, And strengthened the hands of the weak Your speaking supported the faint, And you strengthened the trembling knees; But now it has come on yourself, You stagger and grieve at its touch. Was not your religion your trust, And your trueness in action your hope? Think——where are the innocent lost ? And where are the upright destroyed? I see that the ploughers for vice, And the sowers of wrong, reap the crop l Undone by the blast sent from GOD They waste in His tempest of wrath. As lions and roaring bears moan, And the teeth of the tiger will fail, And oldlions perish for prey, And the young of the leopards will faint. For a word once came stealing to me, And my ears caught a rustle of sound, In thoughts, and in visions of night, When deep slumber falls upon men; Then terror and trembling approached, And my powerful frame was afraid; Then a breathing flowed over my face, The hair on my body stood up l lt stopped ! But I saw not its form! The Appearance approached to my sight lt stopped ! but I heard like a voice, ‘ Can man. be more righteous than GOD 7 Than his Maker a mortal more pure ? Look! In His servants He cannot confide, And He finds in His angels defects} More in us, who reside in clay huts, Built on dust, that are crushed by a moth! We who die between dawn and the dusk, Who unnoticed continuously fade! Whose vitality fritters away, Who die before Wisdom is reached. Call now! Who will answer to you? And to whom of the saints will you turn 2 For the fool by vexation is slain, And the silly is killed by his rage. I have looked on the vile taking root. But I marked out his home for a crash I His children are far from secure, They fail in the gate without help. Their harvests the famished will eat, And the parched seize their coolers of snow, And. the hungry will swallow their wealth! No, affliction springs not from the dust, Nor does grief grow up out of the ground; 824