Books of The Bible / Book of Job
1 At this, my very heart quakes and leaps out of its place.
2 Listen, oh listen, to the blast of his voice and the sound that issues from his mouth.
3 His lightning is hurled across the heaven, it strikes to the extremities of earth.
4 After it comes a roaring sound, God thunders with majestic voice. He does not check his thunderbolts until his voice resounds no more.
5 Yes, certainly God shows us marvels and does great deeds that we cannot understand.
6 When he says to the snow, ‘Fall on the earth!’ to the showers, ‘Now rain hard!’
7 he brings all human activity to a standstill, for everyone to acknowledge his work.
8 The animals go back to their dens and take shelter in their lairs.
9 The storm wind comes from the Mansion of the South, and the north winds usher in the cold.
10 At the breath of God, ice comes next, the surface of the waters hardens over.
11 He weighs the clouds down with moisture, and the storm clouds radiate his lightning.
12 He himself guides their wheeling motion presiding over their seasonal changes. They carry out his orders to the letter all over this earthly world.
13 Whether to punish earth’s peoples or as a work of faithful love, he despatches them.
14 Listen to this, Job, without flinching and reflect on the marvellous works of God.
15 Do you know how God controls them or how his clouds make the lightning flash?
16 Do you know how he balances the clouds — a miracle of consummate skill?
17 When your clothes are hot to your body and the earth lies still under the south wind,
18 can you, like him, stretch out the sky, tempered like a mirror of cast metal?
19 Teach me what we should say to him: but better discuss no further, since we are in the dark.
20 Does he take note when I speak? When human beings give orders, does he take it in?
21 There are times when the light vanishes, behind darkening clouds; then comes the wind, sweeping them away.
22 and brightness spreads from the north. God is clothed in fearful splendour:
23 he, Shaddai, is far beyond our reach. Supreme in power, in equity, excelling in saving justice, yet no oppressor-
24 no wonder then that people fear him: everyone thoughtful holds him in awe!