Job’s Reply to Bildad

19 Then Job answered:

2 How long will you torment me

and crush me with words?

3 You have humiliated me ten times now,

and you mistreat v me without shame. w

4 Even if it is true that I have sinned,

my mistake concerns only x me.

5 If you really want to appear superior y to me

and would use my disgrace as evidence against me,

6 then understand that it is God who has wronged me

and caught me in His net. z

7 I cry out: “Violence!” but get no response; a

I call for help, but there is no justice.

8 He has blocked b my way so that I cannot pass through;

He has veiled my paths with darkness. c

9 He has stripped me of my honor

and removed the crown from my head.

10 He tears me down on every side so that I am ruined. d

He uproots my hope like a tree. e

11 His anger f burns against me,

and He regards me as one of His enemies. g

12 His troops advance together;

they construct a ramp h against me

and camp i around my tent.

13 He has removed my brothers from me;

my acquaintances have abandoned me. j

14 My relatives stop coming by,

and my close friends have forgotten me.

15 My house guests k and female servants regard me as a stranger;

I am a foreigner in their sight. l

16 I call for my servant, but he does not answer,

even if I beg him with my own mouth.

17 My breath is offensive to my wife,

and my own family m finds me repulsive.

18 Even young boys scorn me.

When I stand up, they mock me. n

19 All of my best friends o despise me, p

and those I love have turned against me. q

20 My skin and my flesh cling to my bones;

I have escaped by the skin of my teeth.

21 Have mercy on me, my friends, r have mercy,

for God’s hand s has struck me. t

22 Why do you persecute me as God does?

Will you never get enough of my flesh?

23 I wish that my words were written down,

that they were recorded on a scroll

24 or were inscribed in stone forever

by an iron stylus and lead!

25 But I know my living Redeemer, u v

and He will stand on the dust w at last. x y

26 Even after my skin has been destroyed, z

yet I will see God in a my flesh. b

27 I will see Him myself;

my eyes will look at Him, and not as a stranger. c

My heart longs d within me. e

28 If you say, “How will we pursue him,

since the root of the problem lies with him?” f

29 then be afraid of the sword,

because wrath brings punishment by the sword, g

so that you may know there is a judgment.