Job 15

TODAY’S ENGLISH VERSION

**The Second Dialogue **(Job 15:1 to Job 21:34)

Eliphaz

1-2 Empty words, Job! Empty words I

3 No wise man would talk the way you do,

or defend himself with such meaningless words.

4 You discourage people from fearing God;

you keep them from praying to him.

5 Your guilty conscience is speaking now;

you are trying to hide behind clever words.

6 There is no need for me to condemn you;

you are condemned by every word you speak.

7 Do you think you were the first man born?

Were you there when God made the mountains?

8 Did you overhear the plans God made?

Does human wisdom belong to you alone?

9 There is nothing you know that we don-’t know. 10 We learned our wisdom from gray-headed men

men born before your father was.

11 God offers you comfort; why still reject it?

We have spoken for him with calm, even words.

12 But you are excited and glare at us in anger. 13 You are angry with God and denounce him. 14 Can any man be really pure?

Can anyone be right with God?

15 Why, God does not even trust his angels;

even they are not pure in his sight.

16 And man drinks evil as if it were water;

yes, man is corrupt; man is worthless.

17 Now listen, Job, to what I know. 18 Wise men have taught me truths

which they learned from their fathers, and they kept no secrets hidden.

19 Since their land was free from foreigners,

there was no one to lead them away from God.

20 A wicked man who oppresses others

will be in trouble as long as he lives.

21 Voices of terror will scream in his ears,

and robbers attack when he thinks he is safe.

22 He has no hope of escaping from darkness,

for somewhere a sword is waiting to kill him,

23 and vultures are waiting to eat his body. He knows his future is dark; 24 disaster, like a powerful king, is waiting to attack him.

25 That is the fate of the man

who shakes his fist at God, and defies the Almighty.

2627 That man is proud and rebellious;

he stubbornly holds up his shield and rushes to fight against God.

28 That is the man who captured cities

and seized houses whose owners had fled, but war will destroy those cities and houses.

29 He will not be rich long;

nothing he owns will last. Even his shadow will vanish,

30 and he will not escape from darkness.

He will be like a tree whose branches are burned by fire, whose blossoms are blown away by the wind.

31 If he is foolish enough to trust in wickedness

then wickedness will be all he gets.

32 Before his time is up he will wither,

wither like a branch and never be green again.

33 He will be like a vine that loses its grapes before they are ripe;

like an olive tree that never bears fruit.

34 There will be no descendants for godless men,

and fire will destroy the homes built by bribery.

35 These are the men who plan trouble and do evil;

their hearts are always full of deceit.

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION 15:1-35

There is a real difference in the two speeches of Eliphaz. What is the basic difference?

Eliphaz calls Job wise but it is not a compliment. What does he mean?

Job’s speeches did not reach the conscience of his friends. Why?

Job is irreverent, presumptive, and wicked. How does Eliphaz arrive at this conclusion?

Why say Job is full of hot air?

Eliphaz tries to condemn Job with Job’s own words. How?

Job’s words if followed could destroy the faith of others. How is this strange conclusion made?

Discuss the principle here used and used again in Matthew 26:65 and today.

Job’s arguments are not answered. What has happened? Is such happening now?

In what way is Job supposed to have condemned himself?

Verse seven is supposed to contain a reference to a Jewish myth. What is it? How answered? What is the point of the verse?

Are the words of Jeremiah relevant here? Cf. Jeremiah 23:18; Jeremiah 23:22.

Who has claimed superior knowledge? Are age and wisdom causally related? Discuss.

Who is supposed to have offered the consolations of God? Has anyone dealt gently with Job?

Job’s eyes have flashed in what way? For what reason?

Job is supposed to have attacked God. How?

What is the meaning of the term man in Job 15:14? What opinion of woman is inferred?

Even the angels are not without fault. How can Job claim to be righteous. Is this a fair argument?

Job is characterized as sinning as a man drinking water. Explain this figure.

Eliphaz is very confident of the truthfulness of his advice. To what does he appeal for support?

What help is tradition in establishing the truthfulness of any claim?

According to Eliphaz what nation was the depository of pure wisdom? Why make this claim?

Job had said that robbers prosper (Job 12:6). Eliphaz violently disagrees. Who is right? Discuss.

Are the psychological problems of Job 15:21 really with the wicked or is this only bigoted imagination? Cf. Job 15:22.

Is destruction built in to the life of the wicked man?

Much that Eliphaz has to say is very true. What is the basic mistake he has made? Is this mistake repeated today? Where? Why?

Job attacks God. What are the thick bosses of his bucklers? See Job 15:25-26.

Job is a fat insensitive glutton. What a figure of speech to apply to a man in Job’s condition! How did Eliphaz’s image of Job have any meaning?

Of what is darkness a symbol. Cf. Job 15:30.

Job 15:1-16

II.

CRISIS IN COMMUNICATION OR THE MIRACLE OF DIALOGUE? (Job 15:1, Job 21:34).

A.

THE GOODNESS OF GOD AND THE FATE OF THE WICKEDELIPHAZ’S REBUTTAL (Job 15:1-35).

Job’s speech and conduct are perverted and show that he is guilty. (Job 15:1-16)

**TEXT 15:1-16

Then answered Eliphaz the Temanite, and said,

2 Should a wise man make answer with vain knowledge,

And fill himself with the east wind?

3 Should he reason with unprofitable talk,

Or with speeches wherewith he can do no good?

4 Yea, thou doest away with fear,

And hindered devotion before God.

5 For thine iniquity teacheth thy mouth,

And thou choosest the tongue of the crafty.

6 Thine own mouth condemneth thee, and not I;

Yea, thine own lips testify against thee.

7 Art thou the first man that was born?

Or wast thou brought forth before the hills?

8 Hast thou heard the secret counsel of God?

And dost thou limit wisdom to thyself?

9 What knowest thou, that we know not?

What understandest thou, which to not in us?

10 With us are both the grayheaded and the very aged men,

Much elder than thy father.

11 Are the consolations of God too small for thee,

Even the word that is gentle toward thee?

12 Why doth thy heart carry thee away?

And why do thine eyes flash,

13 That against God thou turnest thy spirit,

And lettest words go out of thy mouth?

14 What to man, that he should be clean?

And he that to born of a woman, that he should be righteous?

15 Behold, he putteth no trust in his holy ones;

Yea, the heavens are not clean in his sight:

16 How much less one that is abominable and corrupt,

A man that drinketh iniquity like water!**

COMMENT 15:1-16

Every man is a potential adversary, even those whom we love, Reuel L. Howe In times of crisis people tend to withdraw timidly. We do not want anything to happen. Seven years we-’ve lived quietly, succeeded in avoiding notice, living and partly living. but now a great fear is on us, Chorus in T. S. Eliot’s Murder in The Cathedral

Men are mesmerized by the magic of media in our global village, yet Thy hand, great Anarch! lets the curtain fall; and Universal Darkness buries All, J. Joyce, Finnegan’s Wake

God’s implicated in that cruelty if He has the power to control it, Ivan in Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov.

**Job 15:1**The second cycle of speeches now begins. Eliphaz’s second speechJob 15:1-35has an entirely different ring to it than his first speechChapter s 45. In his first speech he looked on Job as a wise, God-fearing manJob 4:3-6. Now after hearing Job deny his guilt, reject the thesis that his suffering is the inevitable result of his sins, and challenge God to explain his existential situation to him, Eliphaz’s deep insecurity finds expression in his attack on the person of Job. The encouraging tone of the first speechreward to the righteoushas escaped from his consoling heart, and now the negative and menacing onepunishment of the unrighteouscontrols the speech. He accuses Job with being a windbag, full of hot air. The word wise is emphatic in the text and means a truly wise man. Job’s claim to wisdom, which is in complete opposition to the wisdom of the ancients, is adjudged to be sheer arrogance. Job is now presented as a rebel without a cause; whereas Eliphaz in his first speech asserted Job’s essential piety, now he is hardened against the sovereign creator of heaven and earth. God’s moral perfection has been set forth in Eliphaz’s first speech, while Bildad eloquently presents His unchanging justice, and Zophar His omniscience (all knowing). Job’s responses have thus far failed to prick either their conscious or God’s concern for his suffering. Now in Eliphaz’s second speech, the irreligious and impious Job is confronted with his inevitable fate: (1) Job is rebuked for his irreverent rashnessJob 15:2-6; (2) Denounced for his presumptive confidence in his superior wisdomJob 15:7-16; and (3) The doctrine of the fate of the wickedJob 15:17-35.

**Job 15:2**Job has claimed that his wisdom is not inferior to that of his friendsJob 8:2; Job 11:2; Job 12:3; and Job 13:2. This stance receives Eliphaz’s blistering denunciationit’s all empty (ruah and hebet) knowledge. The parallel between Job’s words and the dreaded, hot violent searing sirocco winds is self-evident. If Job were truly wise, he would have better arguments.

**Job 15:3**Eliphaz picks up a Jobian word from Job 13:3; Job 13:6, and deduces that Job’s arguments are profitless (lit. which does not profit, used five times in Job in this sense). The words are useless; they neither convince nor convict.

**Job 15:4**Job’s words bring only pain and spiritual suffocation to man. His speech does away with reverence (sihahmeditationPsa 119:97-99, fear) of GodJob 4:6. In fact, Job’s words, if taken seriously, would destroy his religion, and impair the faith of others. The verb employed here means to violate the covenant or vow. This meaning of the first line of the verse is confirmed by the second line, as Eliphaz asserts that Job’s words are hinderinglit. diminishingdevotions in others. Eliphaz’s orthodoxy is both threatened and challenged. But Job remains a seeker after Truth who is still deeply pious. Still we hear their outcryWhat further need have we of witnesses? Matthew 26:65.

**Job 15:5**Job’s blasphemous utterances are too grounded in his diabolical desire to conceal his own evil heart. Job is, like the crafty (used here and Job 5:12) serpent of Gen 3:1 ff, attempting to misrepresent God. The Hebrew can be translated several ways, but your guilt teaches your mouth is, in accordance with the parallelism of Job 15:5 b, to be preferred. Eliphaz, like his many contemporary counterparts, seeks to psychoanalyze Job, rather than answer his arguments.[170] Job’s attempts to express his innocence, Eliphaz insinuates, are really efforts to hide his guilt (cf. Freudian rationalization).[171]

[170] Certainly since Herder, Schelling, Dilthey, Nietzsche, and Freud hermeneutics (literary Criticism) has become psychologized. (Interpreters ask Why anyone declares what he does, instead of asking whether what anyone declares is true or false.) [171] M. Dahood, Biblica, 44, 1963, 204, for technical analysis of the grammar of this verse.

**Job 15:6**Eliphaz is arguing that Job’s own protestation of innocence is his own condemnationJob 9:20. Thus far Job has admitted only of youthful sinsJob 13:26, but he has asserted that God could coerce him into a false confession of guiltJob 9:20. Is not Job’s protest against God tantamount to self-incrimination? Job is convicted out of his own mouth.

**Job 15:7**Eliphaz here questions Job with a blistering series of interrogations. Though we can often encounter the claims that this verse has reference to the Jewish myth of primeval man (-adam haq-quadmon), there is neither need nor proof that this is the case here. Simply, the verse declares that if you were the first man (-adam) you might be wise enough to say what you-’re saying, but you are not. The first man did not steal God’s wisdom as Prometheus stole fire from the godsPro 7:25 and Psalms 90:2.

**Job 15:8**Jeremiah derides the false prophets who talk like they have stood in God’s council room and heard Him speak directly to themJer 23:18; Jeremiah 23:22. Jeremiah chides them by declaring that they have neither divine word nor mission. The word council (sodmeaning intimate and confidential) is one of the designations of the assembly of the gods. The usage of the council of the gods is at least as old as Mesopotamian and Canaanite antecedents. Eliphaz is asking Job whether or not he has a monopoly on wisdomEze 28:11-19; Proverbs 8:22; Proverbs 8:26.

**Job 15:9-10**Here we encounter questions which assume that Job is claiming the possession of superior knowledge. This is minimally odd in that he has never made such claims. He has only criticized their claims to superior knowledge of God’s will and purposeJob 12:3; Job 13:3. His friends are actually the ones who are claiming superior knowledge, not Job. Wisdom[172] is a virtue of seniority acclaims Eliphaz’s theme. Job has already rejected the thesis that wisdom is a necessary result of old ageJob 12:12. Senility and sagacity are not necessarily causally relatedWisdom of Solomon, Job 4:8-9.

[172] For exhaustive analysis of the wisdom concept, see A. Feuillet, Le Christ Sagesse de Deus (Paris: 1966), and articles in both Kittel, TWNT, and Botterweck and Ringgren, TDOT.

**Job 15:11**Eliphaz is claiming that the consolation of Job’s three friends is from God. Yet Job dismisses his friends as miserable comfortersJob 16:2. Perhaps the deals gently does apply to Eliphaz’s initial speech, but certainly not his second. His words (dabarmeans creative and often relevatory. This is the Hebrew word for the Genesis creation account and the Ten Words or commandments) are scarcely to be termed consolation, unless his doctrine of suffering is always merited is to be understood as consolation. His words are identical with God’S, according to Eliphaz.

**Job 15:12**Why do you allow your heart (feelings) to carry you away.[173] The verb r-z-m is here translated flash in A. V.[174] The word means to wink or flash, perhaps in rage, not weakness as some suggest. Job is being rebuked for his uncontrolled passion, not his helplessness.

[173] See for technical analysis of grammatical possibilities, G. R. Driver, Die Welt des Orients I, 1947-52, 235.

[174] The Jewish scholar Rashi suggests that the verb is the same as ramaz (Aramaic root) to flash in anger. This is most likely as R.S.V. translates.

**Job 15:13**Job is rebuked for his anger against God. Your spirit refers to Job’s anger. In anger you attack God by letting such words out of your mouth.

**Job 15:14**The theme from Job 4:17 ff reoccurs hereJob 9:2 and Job 24:4. Eliphaz also quotes Job’s phraseJob 14:1. A man, not the genus but a particular individual, whom Eliphaz need not name. The image suggests impurity not finitude. The Near Eastern negative attitude toward women is here apparent.

**Job 15:15**Eliphaz returns to his thoughts expressed in Job 4:18; Job 25:5-6; Job 38:7; and Isaiah 40:25-26. The holy ones, perhaps angels, are not without fault before God2 Peter 2:4.-’[175]

[175] On heaven and the power of evil, see Calvin R. Schoonhoven, The Wrath of Heaven (Eerdmans, pb., 1966). See also eschatology of Isaiah 60-66; 1 Peter 3; and Revelation 21 ff. The imagery of a new heaven as well as a new earthwhy a new heaven? P. Volz, Die Eschatologie der judischen Gemeinde in neutestanmentliche Zeitalter (Tubingen, 1934; and D. H. Odendaal, The Eschatological Expectation of Isaiah 40-66 (Presb. and Reformed Pub. Co., 1970).

**Job 15:16**The word translated corrupt (foul) appears in the Old Testament only in a moral sensealso Psalms 14:3; Psalms 53:3. Perhaps a proverbial sayinga man sins like drinking water presents Eliphaz’s judgment on Job. One is abominable,[176] i.e., disgusting, revolting, loathed as R. S. V.also Psalms 107:15; Psalms 119:163.

[176] For analysis of this word root, see Paul Humbert, Zeitschrift fur die alttestamenttiche Wissenschaft, N. F. XXXI, 1960, 217ff.

Job 15:17-35

2. The destiny of the ungodly shows the retributive justice of God. (Job 15:17-35)

TEXT 15:17-35

**17 I will show thee, hear thou me;

And that which I have seen I will declare

18 (Which wise men have told

From their fathers, and have not hid it;

19 Unto whom alone the land was given,

And no stranger passed among them):

20 The wicked man travaileth with pain all his days,

Even the number of years that are laid up for the oppressor.

21 A sound of terrors is in his ears;

In prosperity the destroyer shall come upon him.

22 He believeth not that he shall return out of darkness,

And he is waiting for the sword.

23 He wandereth abroad for bread, saying, Where Is it?

He knoweth that the day of darkness is ready at his hand.

24 Distress and anguish make him afraid;

They prevail against him, as a king ready to the battle.

25 Because he hath stretched out his hand against God,

And behaveth himself proudly against the Almighty;

26 He runneth upon him with a stiff neck,

With the thick bosses of his bucklers;

27 Because he hath covered his face with his fatness,

And gathered fat upon his loins;

28 And he hath dwelt in desolate cities,

In houses which no man inhabited, Which were ready to become heaps;

29 He shall not be rich, neither shall his substance continue,

Neither shall their possessions be extended on the earth.

30 He shall not depart out of darkness;

The flame shall dry up his branches, And by the breath of God’S mouth shall he go away.

31 Let him not trust in vanity, deceiving himself;

For vanity shall be his recompense.

32 It shall be accomplished before his time,

And his branch shall not be green.

33 He shall shake off his unripe grape as the vine,

And shall cast off his flower as the olive-tree.

34 For the company of the godless shall be barren,

And fire shall consume the tents of bribery.

35 They conceive mischief, and bring forth iniquity,

And their heart prepareth deceit.

COMMENT 15:17-35

Job 15:17Here again is Eliphaz’s favorite theme, the destiny **of the wicked. Once more the doctrine is supported by reference to the accumulated wisdom of the ages. (Compare Eliphaz’s claim with Psalms 73). Eliphaz’s unbridled eloquence is still not very convincing, though he claims revelation (hazahprophetic gazing) as source for his message.

**Job 15:18**Eliphaz is here claiming that his convictions are confirmed by the observation of past generations. Tradition confirms the accuracy of Eliphaz’s judgment. Where have we heard that claim before? (Even Tevye, from Fiddler on the Roof, knew both the power of tradition and change.) Eliphaz, like his many successors, never learned that tradition is never to be necessarily identified with truth, either human or divine.[177]

[177] The verse might contain a clue to the date of the book of Job. If the land is Canaan, which the text does not claim, Israel had undisputed control up to the fall of Samaria ca 722-1 B.C.; or perhaps the fall of Judah 586-5 B.C. Surely Delitzsch’s views are still appropriateEliphaz has reference to his own country and tribesee Joe 3:17.

**Job 15:19**The tradition of wisdom has been transmitted pure, uncontaminated by foreign influences.-’ Edom was the proverbial home of wisdomJer 49:7. Eliphaz’s provincialism shines forth in his belief that the purest wisdom is that in the possession of his own people. Remember, he is not a member of the covenant nation.

**Job 15:20**Job has earlier asserted that robbers prosperJob 12:6. Eliphaz responds to Job that the wicked are in constant agonyIsa 57:20 ff. The prosperity of the unrighteous man is hollow because he is tortured psychologically, by a guilty conscienceall his days.- The Hebrew text has mispar, which means a number, i.e., a few, but the parallelism calls for all his daysall his years. The word translated oppressor in the A. V., in Job 6:23; Job 27:13, comes from the root to terrify, or to inspire awe and means here a ruthless person. The verse means that the unrighteous are miserable and short-lived, but the pious are happy and long-lived.[178]

[178] For analysis of critical problems with the grammar, see M. Dahood, Biblica, 48, 1967, 428ff; A. C. M. Blommerde, Northwest Semitic Grammar and Job, Biblica et Orient alia, 22, 1969. This indispensable study follows Dahood’s analysis.

**Job 15:21**Eliphaz continues to describe the frightful calamities that come upon the corrupt man. The imagination of the wicked condemns himPro 28:1. Peace is an illusion to the impious. Prosperity is only temporal security to the wicked. There is a constant dread of coming destruction.

**Job 15:22**Darkness (hosek), the figure of misfortune, hovers over the life and possession of the wicked. The condemning conscience of the wicked is haunted by the finality of darkness. The sword is waiting[179] for the wicked. The threat of assassination generates constant dread. An evil conscience creates a constant apprehension of disaster.

[179] See analysis of grammar by G. R. Driver, Vetus Testamentum, Supplement III, 1955, 78, renders this phrase he is marked down for the sword.

**Job 15:23**The verse means that the wicked-prosperous is always haunted by fears of poverty. This gnawing dread graphically portrays the frustration of the wandering wicked (so LXX). They expect the worst and receive the worst. The LXX attaches the phrase a day of darkness to Job 15:24, so others follow. The unbearable tyranny of a pessimistically conceived day of darkness is ever lurking at hand to bring all of existence crashing down.[180]

[180] For technical discussion, see Dhorme, Job, pp. 217-8.

**Job 15:24**A day of darkness (from Hebrew of Job 15:23) terrifies him. Anguish and sickness unto death prevail against him. Misfortune is pictured as an army of vultures prepared for attack.

**Job 15:25**A divine assault is imminent. Suddenly, Eliphaz switches to imagery portraying an attack on God. Job is here projected as one attacking God. An outstretched hand is a symbol of a threatIsa 5:29; Isaiah 9:21; Isaiah 10:4; Proverbs 1:24.

**Job 15:26**The picture of Job’s foolish defiance continues. Job stubbornly (stiff neck, insolently; LXXhybrispride) opposes God with the thickness of the bosses of his shields, i.e., the bosses (or convex side of shield turned toward the enemy) of his shields are set closely together for more protection against the Almighty.

**Job 15:27**The image is one of gluttonous fatness, the characteristic of spiritual insensibilityDeu 32:15; Jeremiah 5:28; and Psalms 73:7; Psalms 119:70. This wicked insensitive person sits around and gets fatter. The Hebrew pimah means blubber or a superabundance of fat on the man’s loins. This imagery stands in marked contrast to Job’s present physical condition.

**Job 15:28**Formerly inhabited cities, now desolate, were considered to be so because of God’s judgment. Again the same theology appearsfailure means judgment; success means blessingJoshua 6:26; 1 Kings 16:34; Isaiah 13:20 ff; and Isaiah 34:13 ff. The wicked man, according to Eliphaz, is prepared to risk God’s curse in his idolatrous confidence in his own prosperity.

**Job 15:29**Here we return to the theme of the fears of the wicked. Though there are lexical problems in this verse, the sense is clear enough. Dahood[181] yields a relevant meaning. The stretching out of the shadow is a figure of the extent of a person’s influencePsa 80:8 ff. The A. V. makes little sense, and does speak to several important grammatical issues in the verse. The essence of the verse is that a wicked man’s influence will not long endure on the earth.

[181] See M. Dahood, Northwest Semitic Philology and Job, in The Bible in Current Catholic Thought, ed. by J. L. McKenzie, 1962, pp. 60ff; also M. Dahood, Biblica, 50, 1969, 343.

**Job 15:30**Here the fate of the wicked is described. Darkness is an image of misfortuneJob 15:22 ff. The destiny of the wicked is not an accident, but rather it is set by God. The Hebrew text reads ruahbreath or spirit of Godand does not require repointing as some suggest. The verse describes the swift disaster of the unrighteous, whose security through prosperity will vanish like flames that reduce a forest to ashes.

**Job 15:31**The verse might be -congruous with a series of images based on plant lifeJob 15:29-30; Job 15:32-33. He who trusts in emptiness will be rewarded by emptiness. The image of the tree from Job 15:30 continues into this verse. All of the promised greatness will not reach fulfillment, rather it will be rewarded with destructionJob 4:8.

**Job 15:32**The subject it refers to his recompense which will be demanded of him before his number of years is finished, i.e., his end will be premature. If we take the LXX reading, it will be withered, rather than the Hebrew text, it will be paid in full, we continue the parallel, which speaks of palm tree and not a trading profit. His branchIsa 9:13supports the view that the palm tree should be supplied in the first line of the verse; therefore, the A. V. translation is probably not an adequate rendering of the verse. The metaphor becomes more vivid when we recall that the palm tree is the symbol of longevity.

**Job 15:33**Delitzsch correctly observes that the vine does not cast off (Heb. lit. treat with violenceIsa 18:5) its unripe fruit. What then can be the sense of this verse? The tree will not produce mature fruitJer 31:29 ff and Ezekiel 18:2. The second line of the verse beautifully symbolizes the point at stake. The Syrian olive tree bears during its first, third, and fifth years, but rests during the second, fourth, and sixth years. It also sheds many of its blossoms like snowflakes.[182]

[182] See Dhorme, Job, p. 223, for tree imagery.

**Job 15:34**The word translated company of impious in A. V. is the Hebrew term for congregation and is here used in a derogatory senseJob 13:6; Job 17:8; Job 20:5; Job 27:8; Job 34:30; Job 36:13. Bribery is frequently condemned in scripture and is here used as a general term for injustice. The word rendered barren in A. V. appears also in Job 3:7 and should be translated sterile. The phrase tents of bribery carries the meaning that the wealth of the wicked has been obtained through deceptive and unjust means by either giving or receiving bribes. How appropriate an image for twentieth century industry and multi-national industrial combines 1

**Job 15:35**At the beginning of his speech, Eliphaz attacked Job for filling his belly with the hot east windJob 15:1.

Here, once more, their belly (lit. their belly, though translated heart in A. V.) produced only deceit. Eliphaz’s conclusion is that misfortune is self-entailed. The penalty of the ungodly is premature deathJob 15:31-33, and lack of prosperityJob 15:34.