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¹ And it came to pass on a certain day, that the angels of God came to stand before the Lord, and the devil came among them to stand before the Lord. ² And the Lord, said to the devil, Whence comest thou? Then the devil said before the Lord, I am come from going through the world, and walking about the whole earth. ³ And the Lord said to the devil, Hast thou then observed my servant Job, that there is none of men upon the earth like him, a harmless, true, blameless, godly man, abstaining from all evil? and he yet cleaves to innocence, whereas thou has told me to destroy his substance without cause? ⁴ And the devil answered and said to the Lord, Skin for skin, all that a man has will he give as a ransom for his life. ⁵ Nay, but put forth thine hand, and touch his bones and his flesh: verily he will bless thee to thy face. ⁶ And the Lord said to the devil, Behold, I deliver him up to thee; only save his life.

⁷ So the devil went out from the Lord, and smote Job with sore boils from his feet to his head. ⁸ And he took a potsherd to scrape away the discharge, and sat upon a dung-heap outside the city. ⁹ And when much time had passed, his wife said to him, How long wilt thou hold out, saying, Behold, I wait yet a little while, expecting the hope of my deliverance? for, behold, thy memorial is abolished from the earth, even thy sons and daughters, the pangs and pains of my womb which I bore in vain with sorrows; and thou thyself sittest down to spend the nights in the open air among the corruption of worms, and I am a wanderer and a servant from place to place and house to house, waiting for the setting of the sun, that I may rest from my labours and my pangs which now beset me: but say some word against the Lord, and die. ¹⁰ But he looked on her, and said to her, Thou hast spoken like one of the foolish women. If we have received good things of the hand of the Lord, shall we not endure evil things?

¹¹ Now his three friends having heard of all the evil that was come upon him, came to him each from his own country: Eliphaz the king of the Thaemans, Baldad sovereign of the Saucheans, Sophar king of he Minaeans: and they came to him with one accord, to comfort and to visit him. ¹² And when they saw him from a distance they did not know him; and they cried with a loud voice, and wept, and rent every one his garment, and sprinkled dust upon their heads, ¹³ and they sat down beside him seven days and seven nights, and no one of them spoke; for they saw that his affliction was dreadful and very great.