CHAPTER 28
1Yes, there’s a mine for silver
and a place where gold is refined.
2Iron from the dust is taken
and from stone the copper to smelt.
3 An end has man set to darkness,
and each limit he has probed,
the stone of deep gloom and death’s shadow.
4He breaks under a stream without dwellers,
forgotten by any foot,
remote and devoid of men.
5The earth from which bread comes forth,
and beneath it a churning like fire.
6The source of the sapphire, its stones,
and gold dust is there.
7A path that the vulture knows not
nor the eye of the falcon beholds.
8The proud beasts have never trod on it,
nor the lion passed over it.
9To the flintstone he set his hand,
upended mountains from their roots.
10Through the rocks he hacked out channels,
and all precious things his eye has seen.
11The wellsprings of rivers he blocked.
What was hidden he brought out to light.
12But wisdom, where is it found,
and where is the place of discernment?
13Man does not know its worth,
and it is not found in the land of the living.
14The Deep has said, “It is not in me,”
and the Sea has said, “It is not with me.”
15 It cannot be got for fine gold,
nor can silver be paid as its price.
16It cannot be weighed in the gold of Ophir,
in precious onyx and sapphire.
17Gold and glass cannot equal it,
nor its worth in golden vessels.
18Coral and crystal—not to be mentioned,
wisdom’s value surpasses rubies.
19Ethiopian topaz can’t equal it,
in pure gold it cannot be weighed.
20 And wisdom, from where does it come,
and where is the place of discernment?
21It is hidden from the eye of all living,
from the fowl of the heavens, concealed.
22 Perdition and Death have said,
“With our own ears we heard its rumor.”
23God grasps its way,
and He knows its place.
24For He looks to the ends of the earth,
beneath all the heavens He sees,
25 to gauge the heft of the wind,
and to weigh water with a measure,
26when He fixes a limit for rain
and a way for the thunderhead.
27Then He saw and recounted it,
set it firm and probed it, too.
28And He said to man:
Look, fear of the Master, that is wisdom,
and the shunning of evil is insight.