Job 16–17

Job’s Fifth Speech

16Then^a Job answered and said,

²“I have heard many things like these;

all of you are miserable comforters.^b

³Is there a limit to windy words?

What provokes you that you answer?

⁴I myself^c also could talk as you,

if you were in my place;^d

I could join against you with words,

and I could shake at you with my head.

⁵I could^e encourage you with my mouth,

and the solace of my lips would^f ease the pain.

⁶If I speak, my pain is not relieved;

and if I cease, how much will leave me?

⁷“Surely now he has worn me out;

you^g have devastated all my company.

⁸Thus^h you shriveled me up;ⁱ

it became a witness.

And my leanness has risen up against me;

it testifies to my face.

⁹His wrath has torn, and he has been hostile toward me;

he gnashed at me with his teeth.

My foe sharpens his eyes against me.

¹⁰They gaped at me with their mouth;

they struck my cheeks with disgrace;

they have massed themselves together against me.

¹¹God delivers me to an evil one,

and he casts me into the hands of the wicked.

¹²“I was at ease, then^j he broke me in two,

and he seized me by my neck;

then^k he shattered me

and set me up as a target for him.

¹³His archers surround me;

he slashes open my kidneys, and he does not have compassion;

he pours out my gall on the ground.

¹⁴He breached me breach upon breach;^l

he rushes at me like a warrior.

¹⁵“I have sewed sackcloth on my skin,

and I have inserted my pride^m in the dust.

¹⁶My face is red because of weeping,

and deep shadows are on my eyelids,

¹⁷althoughⁿ violence is not on my hands,

and my prayer is pure.

¹⁸“O earth, you should not cover my blood,

and let there be no place^o for my cry for help.

¹⁹So now look, my witness is in the heavens,

and he who vouches for me is in the heights.

²⁰My friends scorn me;

my eye pours out tears to God,

²¹and it argues^p for a mortal with God,

and as a human^q for his friend.

²²Indeed, after a few years^r have come,

then^s I will go the way from which I will not return.

Job’s Fifth Speech, Continued

17“My spirit is pulled down; my days are extinguished;

the graveyard is for me.

²Surely^a mockery is with me,

and my eye rests^b on their provocation.

³Please lay down a pledge for me with yourself;

who is he who will give security for my hand?^c

⁴Indeed,^d you have closed their mind from understanding;

therefore, you will not let them triumph.

⁵He denounces friends for reward,

so^e his children’s eyes will fail.

⁶“And he has made me a proverb for^f the peoples,

and I am one before whom people spit.^g

⁷And my eye has grown dim from grief,

and the limbs of my body are all^h like a shadow.

⁸The upright are appalled at this,

and the innocent excites himself over the godless.

⁹Butⁱ the righteous holds on to his way,

and he who has clean hands^j increases in strength.

¹⁰But^k all of you must return^l—please come!^m

Butⁿ I shall not find a wise person among you.

¹¹“My days are past; my plans are broken down—

even the desires of my heart.

¹²They make night into day,

saying, ‘Light is near to darkness.’^o

¹³If I hope for Sheol as my house,

if I spread my couch in the darkness,

¹⁴if I call to the pit, ‘You are my father,’

to the maggot, ‘You are my mother or^p my sister,’

¹⁵where^q then is my hope?

And who will see my hope?^r

¹⁶Will they go down to the bars of Sheol?

Or shall we descend together into the dust?”