Job 27:3-13

3 As long as breath remaineth in me, and the spirit of God in my nostrils,
4 My lips shall not speak iniquity, neither shall my tongue contrive lying.
5 God forbid that I should judge you to be just: till I die I will not depart from my innocence.
6 My justification, which I have begun to hold, I will not forsake: for my heart doth not reprehend me in all my life.
7 Let my enemy be as the ungodly, and my adversary as the wicked one.
8 For what is the hope of the hypocrite if through covetousness he take by violence, and God deliver not his soul?
9 Will God hear his cry, when distress shall come upon him?
10 Or can he delight himself in the Almighty, and call upon God at all times?
11 I will teach you by the hand of God, what the Almighty hath, and I will not conceal it.
12 Behold you all know it, and why do you speak vain things without cause?
13 This is the portion of a wicked man with God, and the inheritance of the violent, which they shall receive of the Almighty.

Job 27:3-13 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO JOB 27

Though Job's friends were become silent, and dropped the controversy with him, he still continued his discourse in this and the four following chapters; in which he asserts his integrity; illustrates and confirms his former sentiments; gives further proof of his knowledge of things, natural and divine; takes notice of his former state of prosperity, and of his present distresses and afflictions, which came upon him, notwithstanding his piety, humanity, and beneficence, and his freedom from the grosser acts of sin, both with respect to God and men, all which he enlarges upon. In this chapter he gives his word and oath for it, that he would never belie himself, and own that he was an hypocrite, when he was not, but would continue to assert his integrity, and the righteousness of his cause, as long as he lived, Job 27:1-6; for to be an hypocrite, and to attempt to conceal his hypocrisy, would be of no advantage to him, either in life, or in death, Job 27:7-10; and was this his character and case, upon their principles, he could expect no other than to be a miserable man, as wicked men are, who have their blessings turned into curses, or taken away from them, and they removed out of the world in the most awful and terrible manner, and under manifest tokens of the wrath and displeasure of God, Job 27:11-23.

The Douay-Rheims Bible is in the public domain.