Job 24:1–25

¹ “Why does the Almighty not reserve times for judgment? Why may those who know Him never see His days? ² Men move boundary stones; they pasture stolen flocks. ³ They drive away the donkey of the fatherless and take the widow’s ox in pledge. ⁴ They push the needy off the road and force all the poor of the land into hiding. ⁵ Indeed, like wild donkeys in the desert, the poor go to work foraging for food; the wasteland is food for their children. ⁶ They gather fodder in the fields and glean the vineyards of the wicked. ⁷ Without clothing, they spend the night naked; they have no covering against the cold. ⁸ Drenched by mountain rains, they huddle against the rocks for want of shelter. ⁹ The fatherless infant is snatched from the breast; the nursing child of the poor is seized for a debt. ¹⁰ Without clothing, they wander about naked. They carry the sheaves, but still go hungry. ¹¹ They crush olives within their walls; they tread the winepresses, but go thirsty. ¹² From the city, men groan, and the souls of the wounded cry out, yet God charges no one with wrongdoing. ¹³ Then there are those who rebel against the light, not knowing its ways or staying on its paths. ¹⁴ When daylight is gone, the murderer rises to kill the poor and needy; in the night he is like a thief. ¹⁵ The eye of the adulterer watches for twilight. Thinking, ‘No eye will see me,’ he covers his face. ¹⁶ In the dark they dig through houses; by day they shut themselves in, never to experience the light. ¹⁷ For to them, deep darkness is their morning; surely they are friends with the terrors of darkness! ¹⁸ They are but foam on the surface of the water; their portion of the land is cursed, so that no one turns toward their vineyards. ¹⁹ As drought and heat consume the melting snow, so Sheol steals those who have sinned. ²⁰ The womb forgets them; the worm feeds on them; they are remembered no more. So injustice is like a broken tree. ²¹ They prey on the barren and childless, and show no kindness to the widow. ²² Yet by His power, God drags away the mighty; though rising up, they have no assurance of life. ²³ He gives them a sense of security, but His eyes are on their ways. ²⁴ They 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. ²⁵ If this is not so, then who can prove me a liar and reduce my words to nothing?”