Psalms 73:12

73:12 Take a good look! This is what the wicked are like, ¹ 

those who always have it so easy and get richer and richer. ² 

Psalms 73:18-20

73:18 Surely ³  you put them in slippery places;

you bring them down ⁴  to ruin.

73:19 How desolate they become in a mere moment!

Terrifying judgments make their demise complete! ⁵ 

73:20 They are like a dream after one wakes up. ⁶ 

O Lord, when you awake ⁷  you will despise them. ⁸ 

Job 12:6

12:6 But ⁹  the tents of robbers are peaceful,

and those who provoke God are confident ¹⁰  –

who carry their god in their hands. ¹¹ 

Job 21:7-12

The Wicked Prosper

21:7 “Why do the wicked go on living, ¹² 

grow old, ¹³  even increase in power?

21:8 Their children ¹⁴  are firmly established

in their presence, ¹⁵ 

their offspring before their eyes.

21:9 Their houses are safe ¹⁶  and without fear; ¹⁷ 

and no rod of punishment ¹⁸  from God is upon them. ¹⁹ 

21:10 Their bulls ²⁰  breed ²¹  without fail; ²² 

their cows calve and do not miscarry.

21:11 They allow their children to run ²³  like a flock;

their little ones dance about.

21:12 They sing ²⁴  to the accompaniment of tambourine and harp,

and make merry to the sound of the flute.

Jeremiah 12:1-2

12:1 Lord, you have always been fair

whenever I have complained to you. ²⁵ 

However, I would like to speak with you about the disposition of justice. ²⁶ 

Why are wicked people successful? ²⁷ 

Why do all dishonest people have such easy lives?

12:2 You plant them like trees and they put down their roots. ²⁸ 

They grow prosperous and are very fruitful. ²⁹ 

They always talk about you,

but they really care nothing about you. ³⁰ 

Malachi 3:15

3:15 So now we consider the arrogant to be happy; indeed, those who practice evil are successful. ³¹  In fact, those who challenge ³²  God escape!’”

Malachi 4:1

4:1 (3:19) ³³  “For indeed the day ³⁴  is coming, burning like a furnace, and all the arrogant evildoers will be chaff. The coming day will burn them up,” says the Lord who rules over all. “It ³⁵  will not leave even a root or branch.

[73:12]  ¹ tn Heb “Look, these [are] the wicked.”

[73:12]  ² tn Heb “the ones who are always at ease [who] increase wealth.”

[73:18]  ³ tn The use of the Hebrew term אַךְ (’akh, “surely”) here literarily counteracts its use in v. 13. The repetition draws attention to the contrast between the two statements, the first of which expresses the psalmist’s earlier despair and the second his newly discovered confidence.

[73:18]  ⁴ tn Heb “cause them to fall.”

[73:19]  ⁵ tn Heb “they come to an end, they are finished, from terrors.”

[73:20]  ⁶ tn Heb “like a dream from awakening.” They lack any real substance; their prosperity will last for only a brief time.

[73:20]  ⁷ sn When you awake. The psalmist compares God’s inactivity to sleep and the time of God’s judgment to his awakening from sleep.

[73:20]  ⁸ tn Heb “you will despise their form.” The Hebrew term צֶלֶם (tselem, “form; image”) also suggests their short-lived nature. Rather than having real substance, they are like the mere images that populate one’s dreams. Note the similar use of the term in Ps 39:6.

[12:6]  ⁹ tn The verse gives the other side of the coin now, the fact that the wicked prosper.

[12:6]  ¹⁰ tn The plural is used to suggest the supreme degree of arrogant confidence (E. Dhorme, Job, 171).

[12:6]  ¹¹ sn The line is perhaps best understood as describing one who thinks he is invested with the power of God.

[21:7]  ¹² sn A. B. Davidson (Job, 154) clarifies that Job’s question is of a universal scope. In the government of God, why do the wicked exist at all? The verb could be translated “continue to live.”

[21:7]  ¹³ tn The verb עָתַק (’ataq) means “to move; to proceed; to advance.” Here it is “to advance in years” or “to grow old.” This clause could serve as an independent clause, a separate sentence; but it more likely continues the question of the first colon and is parallel to the verb “live.”

[21:8]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “their seed.”

[21:8]  ¹⁵ tn The text uses לִפְנֵיהֶם עִמָּם (lifnehem ’immam, “before them, with them”). Many editors think that these were alternative readings, and so omit one or the other. Dhorme moved עִמָּם (’immam) to the second half of the verse and emended it to read עֹמְדִים (’omÿdim, “abide”). Kissane and Gordis changed only the vowels and came up with עַמָּם (’ammam, “their kinfolk”). But Gordis thinks the presence of both of them in the line is evidence of a conflated reading (p. 229).

[21:9]  ¹⁶ tn The word שָׁלוֹם (shalom, “peace, safety”) is here a substantive after a plural subject (see GKC 452 §141.c, n. 3).

[21:9]  ¹⁷ tn The form מִפָּחַד (mippakhad) is translated “without fear,” literally “from fear”; the preposition is similar to the alpha privative in Greek. The word “fear, dread” means nothing that causes fear or dread – they are peaceful, secure. See GKC 382 §119.w.

[21:9]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “no rod of God.” The words “punishment from” have been supplied in the translation to make the metaphor understandable for the modern reader by stating the purpose of the rod.

[21:9]  ¹⁹ sn In 9:34 Job was complaining that there was no umpire to remove God’s rod from him, but here he observes no such rod is on the wicked.

[21:10]  ²⁰ tn Heb “his bull,” but it is meant to signify the bulls of the wicked.

[21:10]  ²¹ tn The verb used here means “to impregnate,” and not to be confused with the verb עָבַר (’avar, “to pass over”).

[21:10]  ²² tn The use of the verb גָּעַר (ga’ar) in this place is interesting. It means “to rebuke; to abhor; to loathe.” In the causative stem it means “to occasion impurity” or “to reject as loathsome.” The rabbinic interpretation is that it does not emit semen in vain, and so the meaning is it does not fail to breed (see E. Dhorme, Job, 311; R. Gordis, Job, 229).

[21:11]  ²³ tn The verb שָׁלַח (shalakh) means “to send forth,” but in the Piel “to release; to allow to run free.” The picture of children frolicking in the fields and singing and dancing is symbolic of peaceful, prosperous times.

[21:12]  ²⁴ tn The verb is simply “they take up [or lift up],” but the understood object is “their voices,” and so it means “they sing.”

[12:1]  ²⁵ tn Or “Lord, you are fair when I present my case before you.”

[12:1]  ²⁶ tn Heb “judgments” or “matters of justice.” For the nuance of “complain to,” “fair,” “disposition of justice” assumed here, see BDB 936 s.v. רִיב Qal.4 (cf. Judg 21:22); BDB 843 s.v. צַדִּיק 1.d (cf. Ps 7:12; 11:7); BDB 1049 s.v. מִשְׁפָּט 1.f (cf. Isa 26:8; Ps 10:5; Ezek 7:27).

[12:1]  ²⁷ tn Heb “Why does the way [= course of life] of the wicked prosper?”

[12:2]  ²⁸ tn Heb “You planted them and they took root.”

[12:2]  ²⁹ tn Heb “they grow and produce fruit.” For the nuance “grow” for the verb which normally means “go, walk,” see BDB 232 s.v. חָלַךְ Qal.I.3 and compare Hos 14:7.

[12:2]  ³⁰ tn Heb “You are near in their mouths, but far from their kidneys.” The figure of substitution is being used here, “mouth” for “words” and “kidneys” for passions and affections. A contemporary equivalent might be, “your name is always on their lips, but their hearts are far from you.”

[3:15]  ³¹ tn Heb “built up” (so NASB); NIV, NRSV “prosper”; NLT “get rich.”

[3:15]  ³² tn Or “test”; NRSV, CEV “put God to the test.”

[4:1]  ³³ sn Beginning with 4:1, the verse numbers through 4:6 in the English Bible differ from the verse numbers in the Hebrew text (BHS), with 4:1 ET = 3:19 HT, 4:2 ET = 3:20 HT, etc., through 4:6 ET = 3:24 HT. Thus the book of Malachi in the Hebrew Bible has only three chapters, with 24 verses in ch. 3.

[4:1]  ³⁴ sn This day is the well-known “day of the Lord” so pervasive in OT eschatological texts (see Joel 2:30-31; Amos 5:18; Obad 15). For the believer it is a day of grace and salvation; for the sinner, a day of judgment and destruction.

[4:1]  ³⁵ tn Heb “so that it” (so NASB, NRSV). For stylistic reasons a new sentence was begun here in the translation.