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- ¶ THEN answered Bildad the Shuhite, and said,
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- How long will you speak these things?
And how long will your mouth utter proud words?
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- Does God pervert justice?
Or does the Almighty pervert right?
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- If your children have sinned against him, he has sent them away in their transgressions.
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- If you would seek God and make supplication to the Almighty,
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- If you were innocent and upright, surely then he would be attentive to you, and would make the habitation of your righteousness prosperous,
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- So that though your beginning was small he would make your end very great.
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- ¶ For inquire, I pray you, of the former generations, and learn through the search of their fathers;
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- For we are but of yesterday, and know nothing, because our days upon earth are like a shadow;
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- And, behold, they shall teach you, and tell you, and utter words out of their heart.
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- Can papyrus grow in a thirsty land?
Can reeds grow where there is no water?
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- While they are yet in their greenness, and not cut down, they wither before any other herb.
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- So are the paths of all who forget God;
and the hope of the heathen shall perish;
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- Whose confidence shall be cut off, and whose house is a spider’s web.
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- The wicked shall put his trust in his house, but it shall not stand;
he shall hold it fast, but it shall not endure.
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- He is like green vegetation before the sun, and his roots shall rest in a ground liable to be washed away.
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- He shall see his house a heap of stones.
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- If he is uprooted from his place, then he will deny him, saying, I have not seen thee.
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- Behold, it is he who examines all his ways, and out of the earth others shall sprout.
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- ¶ Behold, God will not reject the upright men, nor will he help the evildoers;
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- Until he fill your mouth with laughter, and your lips with a song.
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- Those who hate you shall be clothed with shame;
and the tent of the wicked shall be destroyed.
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