King James Version · The patriarchs
Job 31
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I made a with mine eyes; why then should I think upon a maid? For what of is there from above? and what of from on high? Is not to ? and a strange punishment to the workers of ? Doth not he see my ways, and count all my steps? If I have walked with , or if my foot hath hasted to deceit; Let me be weighed in an even balance, that may know mine integrity. If my step hath turned out of , and mine walked after mine eyes, and if any blot hath cleaved to mine hands; Then let me sow, and let another eat; yea, let my be rooted out. If mine have been deceived by a woman, or if I have laid wait at my neighbour’s door; Then let my wife grind unto another, and let others upon her. For this is an heinous crime; yea, it is an to be punished by the judges. For it is a that consumeth to , and would root out all mine increase. If I did despise the cause of my manservant or of my maidservant, when they contended with me; What then shall I do when riseth up? and when he visiteth, what shall I answer him? Did not he that made me in the make him? and did not one fashion us in the ? If I have withheld from their , or have caused the eyes of the to fail; Or have eaten my morsel myself alone, and hath not eaten thereof; 18(For from my youth he was brought up with me, as with a , and I have guided her from my mother’s ;) If I have seen any for want of clothing, or any without covering; If his loins have not me, and if he were not warmed with the fleece of my sheep; If I have lifted up my hand against , when I saw my help in the : Then let mine arm fall from my shoulder blade, and mine arm be broken from the bone. For from was a terror to me, and by reason of his highness I could not . If I have made gold my , or have said to the fine gold, Thou art my confidence; If I rejoiced because my wealth was great, and because mine hand had gotten much; If I beheld the sun when it shined, or the moon walking in brightness; And hath been secretly enticed, or my hath kissed my hand: This also were an to be punished by the judge: for I should have denied the that is above. If I rejoiced at the of him that hated me, or lifted up myself when evil found him: Neither have I suffered my to by wishing to his . If the men of my said not, Oh that we had of his ! we cannot be satisfied. The did not lodge in the street: but I opened my doors to the traveller. If I covered my as , by hiding mine in my : Did I fear a great multitude, or did the contempt of families terrify me, that I kept silence, and went not out of the door? Oh that one would hear me! behold, my is, that would answer me, and that mine adversary had written a book. Surely I would take it upon my shoulder, and bind it as a to me. I would declare unto him the number of my steps; as a prince would I go near unto him. If my land cry against me, or that the furrows likewise thereof complain; If I have eaten the fruits thereof without money, or have caused the owners thereof to lose their life: Let grow instead of wheat, and cockle instead of barley. The words of are ended.
The 1611 translation, public domain. Its original printing included the Apocrypha, which is why the deuterocanonical books can be read here. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · The patriarchs, 2000 BC to 1600 BC ›
Abraham's family as herdsmen among settled Canaanite city-states, in a world where Egypt and Mesopotamia are the great powers and Canaan is the corridor between them.
- Mesopotamia
- Abraham's own century is Hammurabi's. The great empire of Ur has already fallen, and Babylon rises under a king who published a law code on a stone pillar for everyone to see. Reading Genesis alongside Hammurabi's laws is illuminating in both directions: some provisions are strikingly similar, and the places where Israel's later law diverges are the places worth stopping at.
- Egypt
- The Middle Kingdom, wealthy, bureaucratic, and organised around the Nile flood. Egyptian tomb paintings from this period show Semitic traders arriving with donkeys and striped cloaks, which is more or less the picture Genesis gives of a family going down to Egypt in a famine. Toward the end of the era the Hyksos, rulers of Semitic origin, take the delta.
- Anatolia and the Aegean
- Assyrian merchants run a long-distance trading colony at Kanesh in Anatolia, leaving thousands of clay letters about copper, tin, and debt. On Crete the Minoan palaces are at their height, with plumbing, frescoes, and a script nobody has yet read.
- Further afield
- The Indus Valley cities are in decline after centuries of grid-planned streets and drains. In China the Erlitou culture is building the first palace complexes. Stonehenge is standing and already old.