The Word Made Fresh
1“Why doesn’t the Almighty keep track of time, and why do those who know God never get to see the plans made for each day? 2Bad people move landmarks and take others’ flocks to their own pastures. 3They steal donkeys from orphans and oxen from widows. 4They push poor people off the road. Poor folks hide from them, 5and scavenge in the desert like wild animals, looking for food to feed their children. 6They have to work in fields that belong to others and search in the vineyards for whatever the pickers have left. 7They sleep without anything to cover them and suffer in the cold. 8The rain that comes down from the mountains falls on them, and they huddle amid the rocks for shelter.
9“The wicked will even take a child from its mother’s breast and make it an orphan; they’ll take a baby as a pledge from the poor. 10Meanwhile, the poor go naked, without clothes to wear. They carry the sheaves in the fields of the rich even though they have had nothing to eat. 11They crush olives and tread the winepress but suffer from thirst. 12In the city those who are dying groan and those who are injured cry out for help, but God pays no attention to their prayers.
13“There are some who fight against the day, ignorant of how to live, wandering from the path. 14Murderers do their dirty work when the sun goes down, and kill those who are poor and needy, stealing what is not theirs. 15Adulterers wait for the evening and disguise themselves, thinking no one will see them. 16They break into houses during the night, and hide during the day, afraid of the light. 17They treat nightfall as morning because they are friends of the terrors of darkness.
18“But when the rains fall their own property is cursed. No one comes to their vineyards looking to be hired to tread the grapes. 19The melting snow is dried up by drought and heat, and the grave awaits sinners. 20The womb forgets them. The worm feasts on them. They are forgotten, their wickedness shattered like a tree.
21“They prey on the barren woman and refuse to help the widow. 22Still, God extends the lives of the wealthy until they are weary of living. 23God knows their ways but gives them safety and supports them. 24Because of that they are secure for a while, but then they are gone, withered and faded, lying there like the heads of fallen grain. 25If this isn’t true, who will prove me wrong?
Commentary
1-8: Job points out that those who know God do not live any great length of days. The wicked on the other hand simply take whatever they want while the poor live like animals.
9-12: The poor work at heavy labor and have nothing to show for it. They cry in anguish, but God doesn’t pay any attention to them.
13-17: The wicked, however, sneak around in the dark to steal and kill.
18-20: The wicked fare no better than the poor, though. The grave takes them all.
21-25: The mighty may live a longer and more secure life, prolonged by God’s hand, but they, too, wind up like everything else.
Takeaway
Job’s suffering and his friends’ judgments have caused him to have a very negative outlook on everything, and he believes that God doesn’t come to the rescue of the poor nor punish the wicked. He doesn’t seem to grasp the “therefore” of his words – as in, therefore, God leaves it to us to rescue the poor and thwart the ways of the wicked.