The LORD Speaks
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Then the LORD answered Job out of the storm. He said:
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"Who is this that darkens my counsel with words without knowledge?
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Brace yourself like a man; I will question you, and you shall answer me.
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"Where were you when I laid the earth's foundation? Tell me, if you understand.
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Who marked off its dimensions? Surely you know!
Who stretched a measuring line across it?
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On what were its footings set, or who laid its conrnerstone -
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while the morning stars sang toegther and all the angels shouted for joy?
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"Who shut up the sea behind doors when it burst forth from the womb,
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when I made the clouds its garment and wrapped it in thick darkness,
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when I fixed limits for it and set its doors and bars in place,
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when I said, 'This far you may come and no farther;
here is where your proud waves halt'?
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"Have you ever given orders to the morning, or shown the dawn its place,
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that it might take the earth by the edges and shake the wicked out of it?
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The earth takes shape like clay under a seal;
its features stand out like those of a garment.
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The wicked are denied their light,
and their upraised arm is broken.
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"Have you journeyed to the springs of the sea or
walked in the recesses of the deep?
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Have the gates of death been shown to you?
Have you seen the gates of the shadow of death?
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Have you comprehended the vast expanses of the earth?
Tell me, if you know all this.
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"What is the way to the abode of light?
And where does darkness reside?
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Can you take them to their places?
Do you know the paths to their dwellings?
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Surely you know, for you were already born!
You have lived so many years!
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"Have you entered the storehouses of the snow or
seen the storehouses of the hail,
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which I reserve for times of trouble for days of war and battle?
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What is the way to the place where the lightning is dispersed or
the place where the east winds are scattered over the earth?
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Who cuts a channel for the torrents of rain and a path for the thunderstorm,
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to water a land where no man lives, a desert with no one in it
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to satisfy a desolate wasteland and make it sprout with grass?
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Does the rain have a father? Who fathers the drops of dew?
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From whose womb comes the ice?
Who gives birth to the frost from the heavens
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when the waters become hard as stone,
when the suface of the deep is brozen?
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"Can you bind the beautiful Pleiades?
Can you loose the cords of Orion?
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Can you bring forth the constellations in their seasons or
lead out the Bear with its cubs?
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Do you know the laws of the heavens?
Can you set up God's dominion over the earth?
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"Can you raise your voice to the clouds and
cover yourself with a flood of water?
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Do you send the lightning bolts on their way?
Do they report to you 'Here we are'?
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Who endowed the heart with wisdom or
gave understaning to the mind?
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Who has the wisdom to count the clouds?
Who can tip over the water jars of the heavens
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when the dust becomes hard and the clods of earth stick together?
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"Do you hunt the prey for the lioness and satisfy the hunger of the lions
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when they crouch in their dens or lie in wait in a thicket?
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Who provides food for the raven when its young cry out to God
and wander about for lack of food?
