¹Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered, and he said:

²Should a wise man answer with windy knowledge, and fill his belly with the east wind?

³Does he argue with a word that is not of use, and with speech by which he does not profit?

⁴Even you annul fear, and you lessen meditation before the face of God.

⁵For your guilt teaches your mouth, and you choose the tongue of the crafty.

⁶Your own mouth condemns you, and not I; your own lips answer against you.

⁷Were you born the first man, and before the face of the hills were you brought forth?

⁸Did you listen in the council of God, and hold wisdom back for yourself?

⁹What do you know that we do not know? What do you understand that is not with us?

¹⁰Among us are both the gray-haired and the aged, mightier in days than your father.

¹¹Are God's consolations too little for you, and a word spoken gently with you?

¹²Why does your heart take you away, and why do your eyes flash,

¹³that you turn your breath against God, and bring out such speech out of your mouth?

¹⁴What is man, that he can be pure, or one born of a woman, that he can be righteous?

¹⁵Behold, he does not trust his holy ones, and the skies are not clean in his eyes.

¹⁶How much more, one who is abhorrent and corrupt, a man who drinks injustice like water!

¹⁷I will declare it to you; listen to me; and what I have seen I will recount,

¹⁸what the wise have told, and have not hidden from their fathers,

¹⁹to whom alone the land was given, and no stranger passed through their midst.

²⁰All the days of the wicked, he writhes in pain, and the number of years is stored up for the ruthless.

²¹The sound of fears is in his ears; in his wholeness a destroyer will come upon him.

²²He does not believe he will return from darkness, and he is watched for the sword.

²³He wanders about for food: where is it? He knows that a day of darkness is ready at his hand.

²⁴Trouble and anguish terrify him; it overpowers him like a king ready for the onset.

²⁵For he stretched out his hand against God, and plays the mighty one against the Almighty.

²⁶He runs at him with his neck, with the thick bosses of his shields.

²⁷For he has covered his face with his fat, and made flab over his loins.

²⁸He dwelt in cities wiped out, in houses where no one will dwell, which are destined to become heaps of stones.

²⁹He will not grow rich, and his wealth will not stand, and their gain will not stretch out over the land.

³⁰He will not depart from darkness; a flame will dry up his young shoots, and he will be removed by the breath of his mouth.

³¹Let him not trust in emptiness; he has been led astray, for emptiness will be his exchange.

³²It will be completed before his time, and his palm frond will not be fresh and green.

³³He will wrong his unripe grapes like the vine, and cast off his blossom like the olive tree.

³⁴For the company of the godless is barren, and fire eats the tents of bribery.

³⁵They conceive trouble and give birth to iniquity, and their belly prepares deceit.