BOOK 18 OF 66 · WISDOM & POETRY · KING JAMES BIBLE

Job 21

Job book home•Chapter 21 of 42•34 verses

Chapter overviewAt a glance + deeper study

REVIEWED OVERVIEW

Job 21 Overview

Job asks the friends to listen and then confronts their retribution theory with observable reality: wicked people often live, grow old, become mighty, enjoy family prosperity, and die without the dramatic collapse the friends predict. Job does not deny final accountability; he denies their claim that present circumstances reliably reveal moral standing.

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21Chapter

34Verses

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Before you read Job 21

Coming from

Zophar had insisted that wicked prosperity is always brief and turns quickly into visible ruin.

In this chapter

Job answers with counterexamples from life, showing that the wicked can prosper for long periods.

Leads into

Chapter 22 begins Eliphaz’s third speech, where he stops implying and directly invents serious accusations against Job.

Key understandingExplore deeper

Job’s argument is not that wickedness is safe forever. He asks why earthly experience does not match the friends’ mechanical formula. This chapter is one of the clearest biblical correctives to prosperity theology and to the assumption that suffering or wealth automatically reveals God’s moral verdict.

Major truths in this chapterExplore deeper

Truth 1

Present prosperity is not reliable proof of righteousness.

Truth 2

Present suffering is not reliable proof of hidden wickedness.

Truth 3

A sound theology of judgment must account for delayed justice and the uneven conditions of this life.

Connections to the rest of ScriptureExplore deeper

Connection 1

Psalm 73 wrestles explicitly with the prosperity of the wicked.

Connection 2

Ecclesiastes 8:14 observes righteous people receiving outcomes associated with the wicked and vice versa.

Connection 3

Luke 13:1-5 rejects the assumption that victims of tragedy were worse sinners than others.

What is clear, and where care is neededExplore deeper

Keep this clear 1

Job is not denying judgment after death merely because he observes wicked prosperity now.

Keep this clear 2

Do not swing from the friends’ error into the opposite claim that conduct has no consequences; Job’s point concerns timing and inference.

Keep this clear 3

This chapter should caution against evaluating spirituality by wealth, health, or visible success.

Read Job 21 watching for…

Job’s request that the friends actually listen.

The prosperity he observes among wicked people.

Their attitude toward God despite prosperity.

The common fate of rich and poor in death.

Job’s rejection of the friends’ consolations as false.

Chapter outline5 sections

1-6Job asks his friends to listen carefully before they continue mocking him 7-16Job points out that wicked people often live long, prosper, and tell God to depart from them 17-21Job questions how often the wicked are visibly destroyed in this life 22-26Job says people die in very different circumstances but lie down alike in the dust 27-34Job rejects his friends’ reasoning and says their answers do not truly comfort him

But Job answered and said,

Hear diligently my speech, and let this be your consolations.

Suffer me that I may speak; and after that I have spoken, mock on.

As for me, is my complaint to man? and if it were so, why should not my spirit be troubled?

Mark me, and be astonished, and lay your hand upon your mouth.

Even when I remember I am afraid, and trembling taketh hold on my flesh.

Wherefore do the wicked live, become old, yea, are mighty in power?

Their seed is established in their sight with them, and their offspring before their eyes.

Their houses are safe from fear, neither is the rod of God upon them.

Their bull gendereth, and faileth not; their cow calveth, and casteth not her calf.

They send forth their little ones like a flock, and their children dance.

They take the timbrel and harp, and rejoice at the sound of the organ.

They spend their days in wealth, and in a moment go down to the grave.

Therefore they say unto God, Depart from us; for we desire not the knowledge of thy ways.

What is the Almighty, that we should serve him? and what profit should we have, if we pray unto him?

Lo, their good is not in their hand: the counsel of the wicked is far from me.

How oft is the candle of the wicked put out! and how oft cometh their destruction upon them! God distributeth sorrows in his anger.

They are as stubble before the wind, and as chaff that the storm carrieth away.

God layeth up his iniquity for his children: he rewardeth him, and he shall know it.

His eyes shall see his destruction, and he shall drink of the wrath of the Almighty.

For what pleasure hath he in his house after him, when the number of his months is cut off in the midst?

Shall any teach God knowledge? seeing he judgeth those that are high.

One dieth in his full strength, being wholly at ease and quiet.

His breasts are full of milk, and his bones are moistened with marrow.

And another dieth in the bitterness of his soul, and never eateth with pleasure.

They shall lie down alike in the dust, and the worms shall cover them.

Behold, I know your thoughts, and the devices which ye wrongfully imagine against me.

For ye say, Where is the house of the prince? and where are the dwelling places of the wicked?

Have ye not asked them that go by the way? and do ye not know their tokens,

That the wicked is reserved to the day of destruction? they shall be brought forth to the day of wrath.

Who shall declare his way to his face? and who shall repay him what he hath done?

Yet shall he be brought to the grave, and shall remain in the tomb.

The clods of the valley shall be sweet unto him, and every man shall draw after him, as there are innumerable before him.

How then comfort ye me in vain, seeing in your answers there remaineth falsehood?