Job
Chapter 13
Job answers his three friends. He tells them he knows everything they know, calls their advice worthless, and warns them against defending God with lies. Then he turns from them to God, asking for two conditions so he can argue his case, and demanding to be told what he has actually done wrong. He ends by asking why God treats a weak, fading man like an enemy.
Plain reading written for preteens. Clear and complete, at about a fifth grade reading level.
Lo, mine eye hath seen all this, mine ear hath heard and understood it.
1Job said, "My own eyes have seen all of this. My own ears have heard it, and I understood it.
2What ye know, the same do I know also: I am not inferior unto you.
2Whatever you know, I know it too. I am not less than you are.
3Surely I would speak to the Almighty, and I desire to reason with God.
3But I want to speak to the Almighty. I want to argue my case in front of God himself.
4But ye are forgers of lies, ye are all physicians of no value.
4You, though, cover the truth with lies. You are all doctors who cannot heal anything.
5O that ye would altogether hold your peace! and it should be your wisdom.
5I wish you would all just be quiet. Staying quiet would be the wisest thing you could do.
6Hear now my reasoning, and hearken to the pleadings of my lips.
6Now listen to my argument. Pay attention to the case I am making.
7Will ye speak wickedly for God? and talk deceitfully for him?
7Will you tell lies and say they are for God? Will you speak dishonestly and claim it is for him?
8Will ye accept his person? will ye contend for God?
8Will you take his side unfairly? Will you argue his case for him?
"Accept his person" is old English for showing favoritism. Job is asking if his friends will twist the truth to take God's side.
9Is it good that he should search you out? or as one man mocketh another, do ye so mock him?
9Would it go well for you if he examined you closely? Can you fool him the way people fool each other?
10He will surely reprove you, if ye do secretly accept persons.
10He would certainly correct you if you secretly played favorites.
11Shall not his excellency make you afraid? and his dread fall upon you?
11Wouldn't his greatness terrify you? Wouldn't the fear of him fall on you?
12Your remembrances are like unto ashes, your bodies to bodies of clay.
12The wise sayings you repeat are nothing but ashes. Your arguments are as weak as clay.
13Hold your peace, let me alone, that I may speak, and let come on me what will.
13Be quiet and leave me alone so I can speak. Then let whatever comes to me come.
14Wherefore do I take my flesh in my teeth, and put my life in mine hand?
14Why am I risking so much? Why am I holding my own life in my hands?
"Take my flesh in my teeth" and "put my life in mine hand" were both sayings that meant putting yourself in great danger.
15Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him: but I will maintain mine own ways before him.
15Even if he kills me, I will still hope in him. But I will defend the way I have lived, right to his face.
16He also shall be my salvation: for an hypocrite shall not come before him.
16That very thing will save me, because no one who fakes his goodness could stand in front of God.
17Hear diligently my speech, and my declaration with your ears.
17Listen carefully to what I say. Let my words go right into your ears.
18Behold now, I have ordered my cause; I know that I shall be justified.
18Look, I have my case ready. I know that I will be shown to be in the right.
19Who is he that will plead with me? for now, if I hold my tongue, I shall give up the ghost.
19Is there anyone who can bring a charge against me? If there is, I will be quiet and die.
"Give up the ghost" is old English for dying. It does not mean a spirit or a haunting.
20Only do not two things unto me: then will I not hide myself from thee.
20God, only give me these two things, and then I will not hide from you.
21Withdraw thine hand far from me: and let not thy dread make me afraid.
21Take your heavy hand off me, and stop terrifying me.
22Then call thou, and I will answer: or let me speak, and answer thou me.
22Then call me, and I will answer. Or let me speak, and you can answer me.
23How many are mine iniquities and sins? make me to know my transgression and my sin.
23How many wrongs and sins have I done? Show me what I did wrong.
24Wherefore hidest thou thy face, and holdest me for thine enemy?
24Why do you turn your face away from me? Why do you treat me like your enemy?
25Wilt thou break a leaf driven to and fro? and wilt thou pursue the dry stubble?
25Would you frighten a leaf blown around by the wind? Would you chase after dry straw?
26For thou writest bitter things against me, and makest me to possess the iniquities of my youth.
26You write down bitter charges against me. You make me pay for the wrongs I did when I was young.
27Thou puttest my feet also in the stocks, and lookest narrowly unto all my paths; thou settest a print upon the heels of my feet.
27You lock my feet in wooden clamps and watch every step I take. You mark out how far my feet may go.
Stocks were a wooden frame that locked around a prisoner's feet so he could not walk away. "Lookest narrowly" means watches very closely.
28And he, as a rotten thing, consumeth, as a garment that is moth eaten.
28So a person wears out like something rotting away, like a coat eaten full of holes by moths."
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