Job 16

CHAPTER 16

Troublesome Comforters

¹Then Job answered and said,

²“I have heard many such things;

^1aTroublesome comforters are you all.

³“Is there no end to ^awindy words?

Or what pains you that you answer?

⁴“I too could speak like you,

If your soul were in the place of my soul.

I could compose words against you

And ^ashake my head at you.

⁵“I could encourage you with my mouth,

And the solace of my lips could lessen your pain.

⁶“If I speak, ^amy pain is not lessened,

And if I cease, what will go forth from me?

⁷“But now He has ^aexhausted me;

You have made ^bdesolate all my company.

⁸“You have shriveled me up,

^aIt has become a witness;

And my ^bleanness rises up against me,

It answers to my face.

⁹“His anger has ^atorn me and ¹hunted me down;

He has ^bgnashed at me with His teeth;

My ^cadversary sharpens his eyes to look at me.

¹⁰“They have ^aopened their mouth wide at me;

They have ^bstruck me on the cheek in reproach;

They have ^cmassed themselves against me.

¹¹“God hands me over to ruffians

And tosses me into the hands of the wicked.

¹²“I was at ease, but ^aHe shattered me,

And He has grasped me by the neck and shaken me to pieces;

He has also set me up as His ^btarget.

¹³“His ^aarrows surround me.

Without mercy He splits my kidneys open;

He pours out ^bmy gall on the ground.

¹⁴“He ^abreaks through me with breach after breach;

He ^bruns at me like a warrior.

¹⁵“I have sewed ^asackcloth over my skin

And ^bthrust my horn in the dust.

¹⁶“My face is flushed from ^aweeping,

^bAnd the shadow of death is on my eyelids,

¹⁷Why?—because there is no ^aviolence in my hands,

And ^bmy prayer is pure.

¹⁸“O earth, do not cover my blood,

And let there be no resting place for my cry.

¹⁹“Even now, behold, ^amy witness is in heaven,

And my ¹advocate is ^bon high.

²⁰“My friends are my scoffers;

^aMy eye ¹weeps to God.

²¹“O that a man might argue with God

As a man with his neighbor!

²²“For when a few years are past,

I shall go the way ^aof no return.