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Critique of Sages on Justice and Wickedness. 15 [a]I have seen all manner of things in my vain days: the just perishing in their justice, and the wicked living long in their wickedness.

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Footnotes

  1. 7:15–24 The author continues both to affirm and to counter traditional wisdom. He affirms a certain validity to wisdom, but challenges complacency and mindless optimism. His sense of life’s uncertainty and insecurity finds expression, for example, in the irony evident when v. 16 is read in the light of vv. 20–24: How can one be “excessively” just or wise, when justice and wisdom may be out of reach to begin with? The only sure thing is to “fear God” (v. 18).