“Ask the former generation(A)
    and find out what their ancestors learned,
for we were born only yesterday and know nothing,(B)
    and our days on earth are but a shadow.(C)
10 Will they not instruct(D) you and tell you?
    Will they not bring forth words from their understanding?(E)
11 Can papyrus grow tall where there is no marsh?(F)
    Can reeds(G) thrive without water?
12 While still growing and uncut,
    they wither more quickly than grass.(H)
13 Such is the destiny(I) of all who forget God;(J)
    so perishes the hope of the godless.(K)
14 What they trust in is fragile[a];
    what they rely on is a spider’s web.(L)
15 They lean on the web,(M) but it gives way;
    they cling to it, but it does not hold.(N)
16 They are like a well-watered plant in the sunshine,
    spreading its shoots(O) over the garden;(P)
17 it entwines its roots around a pile of rocks
    and looks for a place among the stones.
18 But when it is torn from its spot,
    that place disowns(Q) it and says, ‘I never saw you.’(R)
19 Surely its life withers(S) away,
    and[b] from the soil other plants grow.(T)

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Footnotes

  1. Job 8:14 The meaning of the Hebrew for this word is uncertain.
  2. Job 8:19 Or Surely all the joy it has / is that

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