Job Reproaches His Pitiless Friends

16 Then Job answered and said:

2 “I have heard many such things;

aMiserable 1comforters are you all!

3 Shall 2words of wind have an end?

Or what provokes you that you answer?

4 I also could speak as you do,

If your soul were in my soul’s place.

I could heap up words against you,

And bshake my head at you;

5 But I would strengthen you with my mouth,

And the comfort of my lips would relieve your grief.

6 “Though I speak, my grief is not relieved;

And if I remain silent, how am I eased?

7 But now He has cworn me out;

You dhave made desolate all my company.

8 You have shriveled me up,

And it is a ewitness against me;

My leanness rises up against me

And bears witness to my face.

9 fHe tears me in His wrath, and hates me;

He gnashes at me with His teeth;

gMy adversary sharpens His gaze on me.

10 They hgape at me with their mouth,

They istrike me reproachfully on the cheek,

They gather together against me.

11 God jhas delivered me to the ungodly,

And turned me over to the hands of the wicked.

12 I was at ease, but He has kshattered me;

He also has taken me by my neck, and shaken me to pieces;

He has lset me up for His target,

13 His archers surround me.

He pierces my 3heart and does not pity;

He pours out my gall on the ground.

14 He breaks me with wound upon wound;

He runs at me like a 4warrior.

15 “I have sewn sackcloth over my skin,

And mlaid my 5head in the dust.

16 My face is 6flushed from weeping,

And on my eyelids is the shadow of death;

17 Although no violence is in my hands,

And my prayer is pure.

18 “O earth, do not cover my blood,

And nlet my cry have no resting place!

19 Surely even now omy witness is in heaven,

And my evidence is on high.

20 My friends scorn me;

My eyes pour out tears to God.

21 pOh, that one might plead for a man with God,

As a man pleads for his 7neighbor!

22 For when a few years are finished,

I shall qgo the way of no return.