Job
38
- Then the LORD answered Job out of the storm.
He said:
- "Who is this that darkens my counsel
with words without knowledge ?
- Brace yourself like a man; I will question
you, and you shall answer me.
- "Where were you when I laid the earth's
foundation? Tell me, if you understand.
- Who marked off its dimensions? Surely you
know! Who stretched a measuring line across it ?
- On what were its footings set, or who laid
its cornerstone --
- while the morning stars sang together and
all the angels shouted for joy ?
- "Who shut up the sea behind doors when
it burst forth from the womb,
- when I made the clouds its garment and wrapped
it in thick darkness,
- when I fixed limits for it and set its doors
and bars in place,
- when I said, 'This far you may come and
no farther; here is where your proud waves halt' ?
- "Have you ever given orders to the
morning, or shown the dawn its place,
- that it might take the earth by the edges
and shake the wicked out of it ?
- The earth takes shape like clay under a
seal; its features stand out like those of a garment.
- The wicked are denied their light, and their
upraised arm is broken.
- "Have you journeyed to the springs
of the sea or walked in the recesses of the deep ?
- Have the gates of death been shown to you?
Have you seen the gates of the shadow of death ?
- Have you comprehended the vast expanses
of the earth? Tell me, if you know all this.
- "What is the way to the abode of light?
And where does darkness reside ?
- Can you take them to their places? Do you
know the paths to their dwellings ?
- Surely you know, for you were already born!
You have lived so many years !
- "Have you entered the storehouses of
the snow or seen the storehouses of the hail,
- which I reserve for times of trouble, for
days of war and battle ?
- What is the way to the place where the lightning
is dispersed, or the place where the east winds are scattered over the earth
?
- Who cuts a channel for the torrents of rain,
and a path for the thunderstorm,
- to water a land where no man lives, a desert
with no one in it,
- to satisfy a desolate wasteland and make
it sprout with grass ?
- Does the rain have a father? Who fathers
the drops of dew ?
- From whose womb comes the ice? Who gives
birth to the frost from the heavens
- when the waters become hard as stone, when
the surface of the deep is frozen ?
- "Can you bind the beautiful Pleiades?
Can you loose the cords of Orion ?
- Can you bring forth the constellations in
their seasons or lead out the Bear with its cubs ?
- Do you know the laws of the heavens? Can
you set up God'sdominion over the earth ?
- "Can you raise your voice to the clouds
and cover yourself with a flood of water?
- Do you send the lightning bolts on their
way? Do they report to you, 'Here we are' ?
- Who endowed the heart with wisdom or gave
understanding to the mind ?
- Who has the wisdom to count the clouds?
Who can tip over the water jars of the heavens
- when the dust becomes hard and the clods
of earth stick together ?
- "Do you hunt the prey for the lioness
and satisfy the hunger of the lions
- when they crouch in their dens or lie in
wait in a thicket ?
- Who provides food for the raven when its
young cry out to God and wander about for lack of food ?
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