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JobChapitre 21

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Then Job answered:
"Listen closely to what I say; let this be the comfort you offer me.
Bear with me while I speak, and after I have spoken, mock if you must.
Is my complaint against a mere man? Why then should I not lose patience?
Look at me and be appalled; clap your hand over your mouth.
When I remember, I am terrified, and shuddering seizes my flesh.
Why do the wicked go on living, growing old and increasing in power?
Their children are secure around them, their offspring before their eyes.
Their homes are safe and free from fear; the rod of God does not fall on them.
Their bull breeds and never fails; their cow calves and does not miscarry.
They send out their little ones like a flock; their children dance about.
They lift their voices with tambourine and lyre, and rejoice at the sound of the pipe.
They spend their days in prosperity and in a moment go down to the grave.
Yet they say to God, 'Leave us alone! We have no desire to know your ways.
Who is the Almighty, that we should serve him? What would we gain by praying to him?'
But their prosperity is not in their own hands; the counsel of the wicked is far from me.
How often is the lamp of the wicked snuffed out? How often does disaster overtake them, and God in his anger deal out their portion of pain?
How often are they like straw before the wind, like chaff swept away by a storm?
You say, 'God stores up a man's punishment for his children.' Let him repay the man himself, so that he knows it!
Let his own eyes see his ruin; let him drink the wrath of the Almighty.
For what does he care about the household he leaves behind, when the number of his months is cut off?
Can anyone teach knowledge to God, who judges even those on high?
One man dies in full vigor, wholly at ease and secure;
his sides are filled with fat, and the marrow of his bones is moist.
Another dies with a bitter soul, having never tasted anything good.
Side by side they lie down in the dust, and worms cover them both.
I know full well what you are thinking, the schemes by which you would wrong me.
For you ask, 'Where now is the nobleman's house? Where are the tents the wicked lived in?'
Have you never asked those who travel the roads? Do you not recognize the signs they give—
that the evil man is spared in the day of calamity, led away safe on the day of wrath?
Who confronts him to his face with his conduct? Who repays him for what he has done?
He is carried to the grave, and watch is kept over his tomb.
The clods of the valley are sweet to him; everyone follows in his train, and those who went before him are beyond number.
So how can you comfort me with empty words? Of your answers, nothing remains but falsehood."
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