Job 18

Bildad's Second Attack

1-4 Plunged from Light into Darkness Bildad from Shuhah chimed in: "How monotonous these word games are getting! Get serious! We need to get down to business. Why do you treat your friends like slow-witted animals? You look down on us as if we don't know anything. Why are you working yourself up like this? Do you want the world redesigned to suit you? Should reality be suspended to accommodate you?
5-21 "Here's the rule: The light of the wicked is put out. Their flame dies down and is extinguished. Their house goes dark— every lamp in the place goes out. Their strong strides weaken, falter; they stumble into their own traps. They get all tangled up in their own red tape, Their feet are grabbed and caught, their necks in a noose. They trip on ropes they've hidden, and fall into pits they've dug themselves. Terrors come at them from all sides. They run helter-skelter. The hungry grave is ready to gobble them up for supper, To lay them out for a gourmet meal, a treat for ravenous Death. They are snatched from their home sweet home and marched straight to the death house. Their lives go up in smoke; acid rain soaks their ruins. Their roots rot and their branches wither. They'll never again be remembered— nameless in unmarked graves. They are plunged from light into darkness, banished from the world. And they leave empty-handed—not one single child— nothing to show for their life on this earth. Westerners are aghast at their fate, easterners are horrified: 'Oh no! So this is what happens to perverse people. This is how the God-ignorant end up!'"

Job 18

1 Then answered Bildad the Shuhite, and said,

2 How long will ye hunt for words? Consider, and afterwards we will speak.

3 Wherefore are we counted as beasts, And are become unclean in your sight?

4 Thou that tearest thyself in thine anger, Shall the earth be forsaken for thee? Or shall the rock be removed out of its place?

5 Yea, the light of the wicked shall be put out, And the spark of his fire shall not shine.

6 The light shall be dark in his tent, And his lamp above him shall be put out.

7 The steps of his strength shall be straitened, And his own counsel shall cast him down.

8 For he is cast into a net by his own feet, And he walketh upon the toils.

9 A gin shall take him by the heel, And a snare shall lay hold on him.

10 A noose is hid for him in the ground, And a trap for him in the way.

11 Terrors shall make him afraid on every side, And shall chase him at his heels.

12 His strength shall be hunger-bitten, And calamity shall be ready at his side.

13 The members of his body shall be devoured, Yea, the first-born of death shall devour his members.

14 He shall be rooted out of his tent where he trusteth; And he shall be brought to the king of terrors.

15 There shall dwell in his tent that which is none of his: Brimstone shall be scattered upon his habitation.

16 His roots shall be dried up beneath, And above shall his branch be cut off.

17 His remembrance shall perish from the earth, And he shall have no name in the street.

18 He shall be driven from light into darkness, And chased out of the world.

19 He shall have neither son nor son’s son among his people, Nor any remaining where he sojourned.

20 They that come after shall be astonished at his day, As they that went before were affrighted.

21 Surely such are the dwellings of the unrighteous, And this is the place of him that knoweth not God.