1Job responded:
2Surely you are the people, and wisdom will die with you.
3I am also intelligent; I'm not inferior to you. Who isn't like these people?
4I'm a joke to friends who called to God and he answered; the innocent and blameless one is a joke,
5a torch of contempt to one who is idle, a fixed point for slipping feet.
6Raiders' tents are prosperous and God's provokers secure, who carry God in their hands.
7But ask Behemoth, and he will teach you, the birds in the sky, and they will tell you;
8or talk to earth, and it will teach you; the fish of the sea will recount it for you.
9Among all these, who hasn't known that the LORD's hand did this?
10In whose grasp is the life of every thing, the breath of every person?
11Doesn't the ear test words and the palate taste food?
12"In old age is wisdom; understanding in a long life."
13With him are wisdom and power; counsel and understanding are his.
14If he tears down, it can't be rebuilt; if he ties a person up, he can't be set free.
15If he restricts water, they have drought; if he lets it loose, it overturns the land.
16With him are might and success; the deceiver and the deceived are his.
17He leads advisors away barefoot; makes madmen of judges;
18unties the belt of kings, binds a garment around their loins;
19leads priests away barefoot; overthrows the well-established;
20silences the talk of trusted people; takes away elders' discernment;
21pours contempt on royalty; loosens the belt of the strong;
22discloses deep secrets of darkness, makes utter darkness enter the light;
23makes nations prominent and destroys them, expands nations and leads them astray;
24takes away the power to think from earth's leaders, making them wander in untraveled wastelands.
25They feel their way in the dark without light; he makes them stumble like drunks.