Chapter 8

1Bildad the Shuhite said in reply:

2How long will you speak such things?Your utterances are a mighty wind!

3Will God pervert the right?Will the Almighty pervert justice?

4If your sons sinned against Him,He dispatched them for their transgression.

5But if you seek GodAnd supplicate the Almighty,

6If you are blameless and upright,He will protect you,And grant well-being to your righteous home.

7Though your beginning be small,In the end you will grow very great.

8Ask the generation past,Study what their fathers have searched out—

9For we are of yesterday and know nothing;Our days on earth are a shadow—

10Surely they will teach you and tell you,Speaking out of their understanding.

11Can papyrus thrive without marsh?Can rushes grow without water?

12While still tender, not yet plucked,They would wither before any other grass.

13Such is the fate of all who forget God;The hope of the impious man comes to naught—

14Whose confidence is a athread of gossamer,Whose trust is a spider’s web.

15He leans on his house—it will not stand;He seizes hold of it, but it will not hold.

16He stays fresh even in the sun;His shoots spring up in his garden;

17aHis roots are twined around a heap,They take hold of a house of stones.

18When he is uprooted from his place,It denies him, [saying,]“I never saw you.”

19Such is his happy lot;And from the earth others will grow.

20Surely God does not despise the blameless;He gives no support to evildoers.

21He will yet fill your mouth with laughter,And your lips with shouts of joy.

22Your enemies will be clothed in disgrace;The tent of the wicked will vanish.