Job
Chapter 26
Job answers Bildad with sharp questions: what help has any of this talk been to someone weak and without wisdom? Then Job gives his own description of God's power, stretching from the place of the dead below the seas to the clouds, the sea, and the sky. He ends by saying that all of this is only the outer edge of what God does.
Plain reading written for preteens. Clear and complete, at about a fifth grade reading level.
But Job answered and said,
1Then Job answered:
2How hast thou helped him that is without power? how savest thou the arm that hath no strength?
2"What a help you have been to the man with no power! How you have rescued the arm that has no strength!
3How hast thou counselled him that hath no wisdom? and how hast thou plentifully declared the thing as it is?
3What advice you have given to a man with no wisdom! What a full and clear explanation you have offered!
4To whom hast thou uttered words? and whose spirit came from thee?
4Who did you think you were talking to? And whose spirit was speaking through you?
5Dead things are formed from under the waters, and the inhabitants thereof.
5Deep below the seas the dead shake with fear, along with everything that lives down there.
6Hell is naked before him, and destruction hath no covering.
6The world of the dead lies open and bare before God. The place of ruin has nothing to hide behind.
The KJV word "hell" here is the Hebrew word Sheol, which means the place where the dead are, not a place of punishment. "Destruction" is the Hebrew name Abaddon, another name for that same place.
7He stretcheth out the north over the empty place, and hangeth the earth upon nothing.
7God spreads the northern sky over empty space. He hangs the earth on nothing at all.
8He bindeth up the waters in his thick clouds; and the cloud is not rent under them.
8He wraps up the waters inside his thick clouds, and the clouds do not split open under the weight.
9He holdeth back the face of his throne, and spreadeth his cloud upon it.
9He covers the face of the moon, spreading his cloud across it.
The KJV reads "the face of his throne," but the Hebrew word means the full moon. The picture is a cloud passing over the moon and hiding it.
10He hath compassed the waters with bounds, until the day and night come to an end.
10He drew a circle on the surface of the waters, marking the line where light ends and darkness begins.
11The pillars of heaven tremble and are astonished at his reproof.
11The pillars that hold up the sky shake. They are stunned when God speaks against them.
12He divideth the sea with his power, and by his understanding he smiteth through the proud.
12By his power he stirs up the sea. By his understanding he shatters Rahab, the monster of the deep.
The KJV translates the Hebrew name Rahab as "the proud." Rahab was a name for a sea monster in old poetry, used here as a picture of the roaring sea that God overpowers.
13By his spirit he hath garnished the heavens; his hand hath formed the crooked serpent.
13By his breath the skies turn clear. His hand pierced the serpent as it fled.
14Lo, these are parts of his ways: but how little a portion is heard of him? but the thunder of his power who can understand?
14Look, these are only the edges of what God does. We hear no more than a whisper of him. Who could understand the thunder of his full power?"
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