Job 20:18

The thief only comes to steal, kill, and destroy. I came that they may have life, and may have it abundantly.

Let not many of you be teachers, my brothers, knowing that we will receive heavier judgment.

“ ‘You shall not oppress your neighbor, nor rob him. “ ‘The wages of a hired servant shall not remain with you all night until the morning.

I also will do this to you: I will appoint terror over you, even consumption and fever, that shall consume the eyes, and make the soul to pine away. You will sow your seed in vain, for your enemies will eat it.

In his day you shall give him his wages, neither shall the sun go down on it; for he is poor and sets his heart on it; lest he cry against you to Yahweh, and it be sin to you.

Yahweh is near to all those who call on him, to all who call on him in truth.

Bel bows down. Nebo stoops. Their idols are carried by animals, and on the livestock. The things that you carried around are heavy loads, a burden for the weary.

They build up Zion with blood, and Jerusalem with iniquity.

Woe to you lawyers! For you took away the key of knowledge. You didn’t enter in yourselves, and those who were entering in, you hindered.”

He has torn me in his wrath and persecuted me. He has gnashed on me with his teeth. My adversary sharpens his eyes on me.

Have all the workers of iniquity no knowledge, who eat up my people as they eat bread, and don’t call on Yahweh?

To you, Yahweh, I call. My rock, don’t be deaf to me, lest, if you are silent to me, I would become like those who go down into the pit.

Yes, they opened their mouth wide against me. They said, “Aha! Aha! Our eye has seen it!”

Whoever mocks the poor reproaches his Maker. He who is glad at calamity shall not be unpunished.

Don’t rejoice when your enemy falls. Don’t let your heart be glad when he is overthrown,

“Israel is a hunted sheep. The lions have driven him away. First, the king of Assyria devoured him, and now at last Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon has broken his bones.”

Yahweh of Armies says: “The wide walls of Babylon will be utterly overthrown. Her high gates will be burned with fire. The peoples will labor for vanity, and the nations for the fire; and they will be weary.”

“All our enemies have opened their mouth wide against us.

They covet fields, and seize them; and houses, and take them away: and they oppress a man and his house, even a man and his heritage.

You will sow, but won’t reap. You will tread the olives, but won’t anoint yourself with oil; and crush grapes, but won’t drink the wine.

Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through a needle’s eye, than for a rich man to enter into God’s Kingdom.”

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitened tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but inwardly are full of dead men’s bones, and of all uncleanness.

Behold, the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you have kept back by fraud, cry out, and the cries of those who reaped have entered into the ears of the Lord of Armies.

“If a man steals an ox or a sheep, and kills it or sells it, he shall pay five oxen for an ox, and four sheep for a sheep.

and also for the innocent blood that he shed; for he filled Jerusalem with innocent blood, and Yahweh would not pardon.

whose harvest the hungry eats up, and take it even out of the thorns. The snare gapes for their substance.

Behold, this is the joy of his way: out of the earth, others will spring.

His children will seek the favor of the poor. His hands will give back his wealth.

He has swallowed down riches, and he will vomit them up again. God will cast them out of his belly.

Don’t let them say in their heart, “Aha! That’s the way we want it!” Don’t let them say, “We have swallowed him up!”

My enemies want to swallow me up all day long, for they are many who fight proudly against me.

Yahweh, how long will the wicked, how long will the wicked triumph?

then they would have swallowed us up alive, when their wrath was kindled against us;

There is a generation whose teeth are like swords, and their jaws like knives, to devour the poor from the earth, and the needy from among men.

It shall happen in the latter days, that the mountain of Yahweh’s house shall be established on the top of the mountains, and shall be raised above the hills; and all nations shall flow to it.

Behold, here comes a troop of men, horsemen in pairs.” He answered, “Fallen, fallen is Babylon; and all the engraved images of her gods are broken to the ground.

Yahweh says: “Execute justice and righteousness, and deliver him who is robbed out of the hand of the oppressor. Do no wrong. Do no violence to the foreigner, the fatherless, or the widow. Don’t shed innocent blood in this place.

“Declare among the nations and publish, and set up a standard; publish, and don’t conceal: say, ‘Babylon has been taken, Bel is disappointed, Merodach is dismayed! Her images are disappointed. Her idols are dismayed.’

He went up and down among the lions. He became a young lion. He learned to catch the prey. He devoured men.

For the day is near, even Yahweh’s day is near. It will be a day of clouds, a time of the nations.

Israel is swallowed up. Now they are among the nations like a worthless thing.

The inhabitants of Samaria will be in terror for the calves of Beth Aven; for its people will mourn over it, Along with its priests who rejoiced over it, for its glory, because it has departed from it.

The great day of Yahweh is near. It is near, and hurries greatly, the voice of the day of Yahweh. The mighty man cries there bitterly.

Woe to the worthless shepherd who leaves the flock! The sword will be on his arm, and on his right eye. His arm will be completely withered, and his right eye will be totally blinded!”

“Enter in by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many are those who enter in by it.

“Woe to you, you blind guides, who say, ‘Whoever swears by the temple, it is nothing; but whoever swears by the gold of the temple, he is obligated.’

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you build the tombs of the prophets, and decorate the tombs of the righteous,

Saul was consenting to his death. A great persecution arose against the assembly which was in Jerusalem in that day. They were all scattered abroad throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except for the apostles.

choosing rather to share ill treatment with God’s people than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a time,

having eyes full of adultery, and who can’t cease from sin; enticing unsettled souls; having a heart trained in greed; children of cursing;

You will carry much seed out into the field, and will gather little in, for the locust will consume it.

He must restore the lamb fourfold, because he did this thing, and because he had no pity!”

If his children are multiplied, it is for the sword. His offspring will not be satisfied with bread.

For the wicked boasts of his heart’s cravings. He blesses the greedy and condemns Yahweh.

They open their mouths wide against me, lions tearing prey and roaring.

Like the profane mockers in feasts, they gnashed their teeth at me.

The wicked plots against the just, and gnashes at him with his teeth.

Don’t trust in oppression. Don’t become vain in robbery. If riches increase, don’t set your heart on them.

Pay back to our neighbors seven times into their bosom their reproach with which they have reproached you, Lord.

Wealth gained dishonestly dwindles away, but he who gathers by hand makes it grow.

The morsel which you have eaten you shall vomit up, and lose your good words.

Yes, the dogs are greedy. They can never have enough. They are shepherds who can’t understand. They have all turned to their own way, each one to his gain, from every quarter.

“For from their least even to their greatest, everyone is given to covetousness. From the prophet even to the priest, everyone deals falsely.

As the partridge that sits on eggs which she has not laid, so is he who gets riches, and not by right. In the middle of his days, they will leave him. At his end, he will be a fool.

But we will certainly perform every word that has gone out of our mouth, to burn incense to the queen of the sky, and to pour out drink offerings to her, as we have done, we and our fathers, our kings and our princes, in the cities of Judah, and in the streets of Jerusalem; for then had we plenty of food, and were well, and saw no evil.

Shout against her all around. She has submitted herself. Her bulwarks have fallen. Her walls have been thrown down, for it is the vengeance of Yahweh. Take vengeance on her. As she has done, do to her.

“ ‘Behold, the day! Behold, it comes! Your doom has gone out. The rod has blossomed. Pride has budded.

They come to you as the people come, and they sit before you as my people, and they hear your words, but don’t do them; for with their mouth they show much love, but their heart goes after their gain.

The Lord gave Jehoiakim king of Judah into his hand, with part of the vessels of the house of God; and he carried them into the land of Shinar to the house of his god. He brought the vessels into the treasure house of his god.

In the same hour, the fingers of a man’s hand came out and wrote near the lamp stand on the plaster of the wall of the king’s palace. The king saw the part of the hand that wrote.

My people consult with their wooden idol, and answer to a stick of wood. Indeed the spirit of prostitution has led them astray, and they have been unfaithful to their God.

Therefore, because you trample on the poor, and take taxes from him of wheat: You have built houses of cut stone, but you will not dwell in them. You have planted pleasant vineyards, but you shall not drink their wine.

The lion tore in pieces enough for his cubs, and strangled for his lionesses, and filled his caves with the kill, and his dens with prey.

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint, dill, and cumin, and have left undone the weightier matters of the law: justice, mercy, and faith. But you ought to have done these, and not to have left the other undone.

Zacchaeus stood and said to the Lord, “Behold, Lord, half of my goods I give to the poor. If I have wrongfully exacted anything of anyone, I restore four times as much.”

If the sun has risen on him, he is guilty of bloodshed. He shall make restitution. If he has nothing, then he shall be sold for his theft.

“If a man causes a field or vineyard to be eaten by letting his animal loose, and it grazes in another man’s field, he shall make restitution from the best of his own field, and from the best of his own vineyard.

that the triumphing of the wicked is short, the joy of the godless but for a moment?

They cut their food in the field. They glean the vineyard of the wicked.

then let me sow, and let another eat. Yes, let the produce of my field be rooted out.

If I have rejoiced because my wealth was great, and because my hand had gotten much;

“If I have rejoiced at the destruction of him who hated me, or lifted up myself when evil found him

Let the creditor seize all that he has. Let strangers plunder the fruit of his labor.

Let’s swallow them up alive like Sheol, and whole, like those who go down into the pit.

but if he is found, he shall restore seven times. He shall give all the wealth of his house.

There is precious treasure and oil in the dwelling of the wise; but a foolish man swallows it up.

“Woe to him who builds his house by unrighteousness, and his rooms by injustice; who uses his neighbor’s service without wages, and doesn’t give him his hire;

But your eyes and your heart are only for your covetousness, for shedding innocent blood, for oppression, and for doing violence.”

“Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon has devoured me. He has crushed me. He has made me an empty vessel. He has, like a monster, swallowed me up. He has filled his mouth with my delicacies. He has cast me out.

I will execute judgment on Bel in Babylon, and I will bring out of his mouth that which he has swallowed up. The nations will not flow any more to him. Yes, the wall of Babylon will fall.

All your enemies have opened their mouth wide against you. They hiss and gnash their teeth. They say, “We have swallowed her up. Certainly this is the day that we looked for. We have found it. We have seen it.”

The time has come! The day draws near. Don’t let the buyer rejoice, nor the seller mourn; for wrath is on all its multitude.

Don’t rejoice, Israel, to jubilation like the nations; for you were unfaithful to your God. You love the wages of a prostitute at every grain threshing floor.

Hear this, you who desire to swallow up the needy, and cause the poor of the land to fail,

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you devour widows’ houses, and as a pretense you make long prayers. Therefore you will receive greater condemnation.

You blind guides, who strain out a gnat, and swallow a camel!