Job 39

The LORD Speaks of His Creation

¹“Do you know when mountain goats give birth?

Have you watched the doe bear her fawn?

²Can you count the months they are pregnant?

Do you know the time they give birth?

³They crouch down and bring forth their young;

they deliver their newborn.

⁴Their young ones thrive and grow up in the open field;

they leave and do not return.

⁵Who set the wild donkey free?

Who released the swift donkey from the harness?

⁶I made the wilderness his home

and the salt flats his dwelling.

⁷He scorns the tumult of the city

and never hears the shouts of a driver.

⁸He roams the mountains for pasture,

searching for any green thing.

⁹Will the wild ox consent to serve you?

Will he stay by your manger at night?

¹⁰Can you hold him to the furrow with a harness?

Will he plow the valleys behind you?

¹¹Can you rely on his great strength?

Will you leave your hard work to him?

¹²Can you trust him to bring in your grain

and gather it to your threshing floor?

¹³The wings of the ostrich flap joyfully,

but cannot match the pinions and feathers of the stork.

¹⁴For she leaves her eggs on the ground

and lets them warm in the sand.

¹⁵She forgets that a foot may crush them,

or a wild animal may trample them.

¹⁶She treats her young harshly, as if not her own,

with no concern that her labor was in vain.

¹⁷For God has deprived her of wisdom;

He has not endowed her with understanding.

¹⁸Yet when she proudly spreads her wings,

she laughs at the horse and its rider.

¹⁹Do you give strength to the horse

or adorn his neck with a mane?

²⁰Do you make him leap like a locust,

striking terror with his proud snorting?

²¹He paws in the valley and rejoices in his strength;

he charges into battle.

²²He laughs at fear, frightened of nothing;

he does not turn back from the sword.

²³A quiver rattles at his side,

along with a flashing spear and lance.

²⁴Trembling with excitement, he devours the distance;

he cannot stand still when the ram’s horn sounds.

²⁵At the blast of the horn, he snorts with fervor.

He catches the scent of battle from afar,

the shouts of captains and the cry of war.

²⁶Does the hawk take flight by your understanding

and spread his wings toward the south?

²⁷Does the eagle soar at your command

and make his nest on high?

²⁸He dwells on a cliff and lodges there;

his stronghold is on a rocky crag.

²⁹From there he spies out food;

his eyes see it from afar.

³⁰His young ones feast on blood;

and where the slain are, there he is.”