Job: Why are the Wicked Unpunished

1“Why does the Almighty not reserve times for judgment? Why may those who know Him never see His days?

2Men move boundary stones; they pasture stolen flocks.

3They drive away the donkey of the fatherless and take the widow’s ox in pledge.

4They push the needy off the road and force all the poor of the land into hiding.

5Indeed, like wild donkeys in the desert, the poor go to work foraging for food; the wasteland is food for their children.

6They gather fodder in the fields and glean the vineyards of the wicked.

7Without clothing, they spend the night naked; they have no covering against the cold.

8Drenched by mountain rains, they huddle against the rocks for want of shelter.

9The fatherless infant is snatched from the breast; the nursing child of the poor is seized for a debt.

10Without clothing, they wander about naked. They carry the sheaves, but still go hungry.

11They crush olives within their walls; they tread the winepresses, but go thirsty.

12From the city, men groan, and the souls of the wounded cry out, yet God charges no one with wrongdoing.

13Then there are those who rebel against the light, not knowing its ways or staying on its paths.

14When daylight is gone, the murderer rises to kill the poor and needy; in the night he is like a thief.

15The eye of the adulterer watches for twilight. Thinking, ‘No eye will see me,’ he covers his face.

16In the dark they dig through houses; by day they shut themselves in, never to experience the light.

17For to them, deep darkness is their morning; surely they are friends with the terrors of darkness!

18They are but foam on the surface of the water; their portion of the land is cursed, so that no one turns toward their vineyards.

19As drought and heat consume the melting snow, so Sheol steals those who have sinned.

20The womb forgets them; the worm feeds on them; they are remembered no more. So injustice is like a broken tree.

21They prey on the barren and childless, and show no kindness to the widow.

22Yet by His power, God drags away the mighty; though rising up, they have no assurance of life.

23He gives them a sense of security, but His eyes are on their ways.

24They are exalted for a moment, then they are gone; they are brought low and gathered up like all others; they are cut off like heads of grain.

25If this is not so, then who can prove me a liar and reduce my words to nothing?”