Job Loses his Health
1 Again, on the day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, Satan came also among them to present himself before the Lord. 2 The Lord asked Satan, “Where have you come from?”
Satan answered God and said, “From going back and forth in the earth and from walking up and down in it.”
3 Then the Lord said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job? For there is no one like him on the earth, a blameless and an upright man, one who fears God and turns away from evil. He still maintains his integrity, although you incited me against him, to ruin him without cause.”
4 Satan answered God and said, “Skin for skin. Yes, all that a man has he will give for his life. 5 But stretch out your hand now and touch his bone and his flesh, and he will renounce you to your face.”
6 The Lord said to Satan, “He is in your hand. Only spare his life.”
7 So Satan went out from the Lord’s presence and struck Job with painful sores from the sole of his foot to his head. 8 Scraping himself with broken pottery, Job sat among the ashes.
9 Then his wife said to him, “Do you still maintain your integrity? Renounce God and die.”
10 But he said to her, “You speak like one of the foolish women would speak. What? Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive trouble?”
In all this Job did not sin with his lips.
Job’s Three Friends
11 Now when Job’s three friends heard of all this trouble that had come on him, they each came from his own place: Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite. They made an appointment together to come to sympathize with him and to comfort him. 12 When they looked up from a distance and did not recognize him, they raised their voices and wept, and they each tore his robe and sprinkled dust toward the sky, over their heads.
13 So they sat down with him on the ground seven days and seven nights, and no one spoke a word to him, for they saw that his grief was very great.