Wisdom · Chapter 20 of 42

Job 20

Zophar the Naamathite answers with his second and final speech, provoked by what he hears as an insult. He argues that the triumph of the wicked is brief, a fleeting dream. However high the godless rise, they perish; the riches they swallow are vomited up. Because they crushed the poor and seized what they did not build, God rains wrath upon them, and darkness, fire, and heaven's judgment strip away all they gained.

What happens in Job 20

Stung by Job's words, Zophar hastens to reply. He rehearses an ancient truth: the triumphing of the wicked is short and the hypocrite's joy lasts only a moment. Though a wicked man's pride climbs to the clouds, he perishes forever like his own refuse, and onlookers ask where he has gone. He vanishes like a dream. His children must repay the poor he robbed. Wickedness is sweet in his mouth but turns to serpent's venom in his belly; the riches he swallowed God makes him vomit up.

Because he oppressed the poor and seized a house he did not build, he finds no peace. Terrors, iron weapons, and a glittering sword pierce him; fire not kindled by human hands consumes him; heaven reveals his guilt and earth rises against him. His household is swept away in the day of wrath. This, Zophar concludes, is the wicked man's portion from God.

Job 20 in context

Zophar delivers the last speech of the friends' second cycle, and he never speaks again after this. Like Bildad, he defends strict retribution, insisting the wicked always meet swift ruin. His vivid focus on greed and the oppression of the poor may be a veiled charge that Job's losses expose hidden wickedness.

The reader knows better. Zophar's speech is powerful poetry about the emptiness of ill-gotten gain, yet it is misapplied, aimed at a righteous man whose suffering has nothing to do with the crimes Zophar imagines.

Main themes of Job 20

Job 20 (KJV)

1Then answered Zophar the Naamathite, and said, 2Therefore do my thoughts cause me to answer, and for this I make haste. 3I have heard the check of my reproach, and the spirit of my understanding causeth me to answer. 4Knowest thou not this of old, since man was placed upon earth, 5That the triumphing of the wicked is short, and the joy of the hypocrite but for a moment? 6Though his excellency mount up to the heavens, and his head reach unto the clouds; 7Yet he shall perish for ever like his own dung: they which have seen him shall say, Where is he? 8He shall fly away as a dream, and shall not be found: yea, he shall be chased away as a vision of the night. 9The eye also which saw him shall see him no more; neither shall his place any more behold him. 10His children shall seek to please the poor, and his hands shall restore their goods. 11His bones are full of the sin of his youth, which shall lie down with him in the dust. 12Though wickedness be sweet in his mouth, though he hide it under his tongue; 13Though he spare it, and forsake it not; but keep it still within his mouth: 14Yet his meat in his bowels is turned, it is the gall of asps within him. 15He hath swallowed down riches, and he shall vomit them up again: God shall cast them out of his belly. 16He shall suck the poison of asps: the viper’s tongue shall slay him. 17He shall not see the rivers, the floods, the brooks of honey and butter. 18That which he laboured for shall he restore, and shall not swallow it down: according to his substance shall the restitution be, and he shall not rejoice therein. 19Because he hath oppressed and hath forsaken the poor; because he hath violently taken away an house which he builded not; 20Surely he shall not feel quietness in his belly, he shall not save of that which he desired. 21There shall none of his meat be left; therefore shall no man look for his goods. 22In the fulness of his sufficiency he shall be in straits: every hand of the wicked shall come upon him. 23When he is about to fill his belly, God shall cast the fury of his wrath upon him, and shall rain it upon him while he is eating. 24He shall flee from the iron weapon, and the bow of steel shall strike him through. 25It is drawn, and cometh out of the body; yea, the glittering sword cometh out of his gall: terrors are upon him. 26All darkness shall be hid in his secret places: a fire not blown shall consume him; it shall go ill with him that is left in his tabernacle. 27The heaven shall reveal his iniquity; and the earth shall rise up against him. 28The increase of his house shall depart, and his goods shall flow away in the day of his wrath. 29This is the portion of a wicked man from God, and the heritage appointed unto him by God.

Verses to carry from Job 20

“That the triumphing of the wicked is short, and the joy of the hypocrite but for a moment?”Job 20:5

“He hath swallowed down riches, and he shall vomit them up again: God shall cast them out of his belly.”Job 20:15

“Because he hath oppressed and hath forsaken the poor; because he hath violently taken away an house which he builded not;”Job 20:19

Reflection

Zophar rightly warns that gain built on injustice turns to poison, yet he wrongly aims it at an innocent man. Examine where you seek satisfaction. Riches grasped at others' expense cannot fill the soul. Christ calls you to a wealth that lasts, being rich toward God and generous toward the poor he loves.

A prayer from Job 20