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35 Elihu continued talking and said,

“Job, it is not fair for you to say,
    ‘I am more right than God,’
because you also ask him,
    ‘What’s the use of trying to please you?
    What good will it do me if I don’t sin?’

“Job, I want to answer you and your friends here with you.
Look up at the sky.
    Look at the clouds, which are so much higher than you.
If you sin, it does not hurt God.
    Even if your sins are too many to count, that does nothing to God.
And if you are good, that does not help God.
    He gets nothing from you.
Job, the good and bad things you do
    affect only other people like yourself.

“If people are being hurt, they cry out
    and beg for protection from those who hurt them.
10 But they forget to say, ‘Where is God, the one who made me?
    He is the one who gives us songs to sing in the night.
11 He is the one who makes us smarter than any animal on earth
    and wiser than any bird.’

12 “Or if evil people ask God for help, he will not answer them,
    because they are too proud.
13 God will not listen to their worthless begging.
    God All-Powerful will not pay attention to them.
14 So, Job, God will not listen to you
    when you say that you don’t see him.
You say you are waiting for your chance to meet with him
    and prove that you are innocent.

15 “Job thinks that God does not punish evil
    and that he pays no attention to sin.
16 So he continues his worthless talking.
    Everything he has said shows he does not know what he is talking about.”

35 Then Elihu said:

“Do you think this is just?
    You say, ‘I am in the right,(A) not God.’(B)
Yet you ask him, ‘What profit is it to me,[a]
    and what do I gain by not sinning?’(C)

“I would like to reply to you
    and to your friends with you.
Look up at the heavens(D) and see;
    gaze at the clouds so high above you.(E)
If you sin, how does that affect him?
    If your sins are many, what does that do to him?(F)
If you are righteous, what do you give to him,(G)
    or what does he receive(H) from your hand?(I)
Your wickedness only affects humans like yourself,(J)
    and your righteousness only other people.(K)

“People cry out(L) under a load of oppression;(M)
    they plead for relief from the arm of the powerful.(N)
10 But no one says, ‘Where is God my Maker,(O)
    who gives songs(P) in the night,(Q)
11 who teaches(R) us(S) more than he teaches[b] the beasts of the earth
    and makes us wiser than[c] the birds in the sky?’
12 He does not answer(T) when people cry out
    because of the arrogance(U) of the wicked.(V)
13 Indeed, God does not listen to their empty plea;
    the Almighty pays no attention to it.(W)
14 How much less, then, will he listen
    when you say that you do not see him,(X)
that your case(Y) is before him
    and you must wait for him,(Z)
15 and further, that his anger never punishes(AA)
    and he does not take the least notice of wickedness.[d](AB)
16 So Job opens his mouth with empty talk;(AC)
    without knowledge he multiplies words.”(AD)

Footnotes

  1. Job 35:3 Or you
  2. Job 35:11 Or night, / 11 who teaches us by
  3. Job 35:11 Or us wise by
  4. Job 35:15 Symmachus, Theodotion and Vulgate; the meaning of the Hebrew for this word is uncertain.