Zophar’s Second Speech

1Then Zophar the Naamathite answered:

2“This is why my troubled thoughts bring me back –

because of my feelings within me.

3When I hear a reproof that dishonors me,

then my understanding prompts me to answer.

4“Surely you know that it has been from old,

ever since humankind was placed on the earth,

5that the elation of the wicked is brief,

the joy of the godless lasts but a moment.

6Even though his stature reaches to the heavens

and his head touches the clouds,

7he will perish forever, like his own excrement;

those who used to see him will say, ‘Where is he?’

8Like a dream he flies away, never again to be found,

and like a vision of the night he is put to flight.

9People who had seen him will not see him again,

and the place where he was

will recognize him no longer.

10His sons must recompense the poor;

his own hands must return his wealth.

11His bones were full of his youthful vigor,

but that vigor will lie down with him in the dust.

12“If evil is sweet in his mouth

and he hides it under his tongue,

13if he retains it for himself

and does not let it go,

and holds it fast in his mouth,

14his food is turned sour in his stomach;

it becomes the venom of serpents within him.

15The wealth that he consumed he vomits up,

God will make him throw it out of his stomach.

16He sucks the poison of serpents;

the fangs of a viper kill him.

17He will not look on the streams,

the rivers, which are the torrents

of honey and butter.

18He gives back the ill-gotten gain

without assimilating it;

he will not enjoy the wealth from his commerce.

19For he has oppressed the poor and abandoned them;

he has seized a house which he did not build.

20For he knows no satisfaction in his appetite;

he does not let anything he desires escape.

21“Nothing is left for him to devour;

that is why his prosperity does not last.

22In the fullness of his sufficiency,

distress overtakes him.

the full force of misery will come upon him.

23“While he is filling his belly,

God sends his burning anger against him,

and rains down his blows upon him.

24If he flees from an iron weapon,

then an arrow from a bronze bow pierces him.

25When he pulls it out and it comes out of his back,

the gleaming point out of his liver,

terrors come over him.

26Total darkness waits to receive his treasures;

a fire which has not been kindled

will consume him

and devour what is left in his tent.

27The heavens reveal his iniquity;

the earth rises up against him.

28A flood will carry off his house,

rushing waters on the day of God’s wrath.

29Such is the lot God allots the wicked,

and the heritage of his appointment from God.”