Job 35

NEW JERUSALEM	NEW AMERICAN BIBLE
1 Elihu continued his speech. He said:	1 Then Elihu proceeded and said:
2 Do you think you can prove yourself upright and establish your uprightness before God	2 Do you think it right to say, "I am just rather than God?"
3 by daring to say to him, 'What does it matter to you, or how does it benefit me, whether I have sinnedor not?'	3 To say, "What does it profit me; what advantage have I more than if I had sinned?"
4 Very well, I shal tel you and your friends as wel .	4 I have words for a reply to you and your three companions as well.
5 Take a look at the skies and see, observe how high the clouds are above you.	5 Look up to the skies and behold; regard the heavens high above you.
6 If you sin, how can you affect him? If you heap up crimes, what effect has it on him?	6 If you sin, what injury do you do to God? Even if your offenses are many, how do you hurt him?
7 If you are upright, what do you give him, what benefit does he receive at your hands?	7 If you are righteous, what do you give him, or what does he receive from your hand?
8 Your wickedness affects only your fel ows, your uprightness, other human beings.	8 Your wickedness can affect only a man like yourself; and your justice only a fellow human being.
9 They too groan under the weight of oppression, they cry for help under the tyranny of the mighty,	9 In great oppression men cry out; they call for help because of the power of the mighty,
10 but none of them thinks of saying, 'Where is God, my Maker, who makes glad songs ring out at night,	10 Saying, "Where is God, my Maker, who has given visions in the night,
11 who has made us more intel igent than wild animals wiser than birds in the sky?'	11 Taught us rather than the beasts of the earth, and made us wise rather than the birds of the heavens?"
12 Cry they may, but get no answer, to be spared from the arrogance of the wicked.	12 Though thus they cry out, he answers not against the pride of the wicked.
13 Of course God does not listen to trivialities, Shaddai pays no attention to them.	13 But it is idle to say God does not hear or that the Almighty does not take notice.
14 And how much less when you say, 'I cannot see him, my case is open and I am waiting for him.'	14 Even though you say that you see him not, the case is before him; with trembling should you wait upon him.
15 Or, 'His anger never punishes, he does not seem aware of human rebel ion.'	15 But now that you have done otherwise, God's anger punishes, nor does he show concern that a man will die.
16 Hence, when Job speaks, he talks nonsense, ignorantly babbling on and on.	16 Yet Job to no purpose opens his mouth, and without knowledge multiplies words.