Job 16-19

Job 16

¹And Job answered and said,

²I have heard many such things: grievous comforters are ye all.

³Shall words of wind have an end? or what provoketh thee that thou answerest?

⁴I also could speak as ye: if your soul were in my soul's stead, I could join together words against you, and shake my head at you;

⁵But I would encourage you with my mouth, and the solace of my lips should assuage your pain.

⁶If I speak, my pain is not assuaged; and if I forbear, what am I eased?

⁷But now he hath made me weary; ... thou hast made desolate all my family;

⁸Thou hast shrivelled me up! it is become a witness; and my leanness riseth up against me, it beareth witness to my face.

⁹His anger teareth and pursueth me; he gnasheth with his teeth against me; as mine adversary he sharpeneth his eyes at me.

¹⁰They gape upon me with their mouth; they smite my cheeks reproachfully; they range themselves together against me.

¹¹God hath delivered me over to the iniquitous man, and hurled me into the hands of the wicked.

¹²I was at rest, but he hath shattered me; he hath taken me by the neck and shaken me to pieces, and set me up for his mark.

¹³His arrows encompass me round about, he cleaveth my reins asunder and doth not spare; he poureth out my gall upon the ground.

¹⁴He breaketh me with breach upon breach; he runneth upon me like a mighty man.

¹⁵I have sewed sackcloth upon my skin, and rolled my horn in the dust.

¹⁶My face is red with weeping, and on my eyelids is the shadow of death;

¹⁷Although there is no violence in my hands, and my prayer is pure.

¹⁸O earth, cover not my blood, and let there be no place for my cry!

¹⁹Even now, behold, my Witness is in the heavens, and he that voucheth for me is in the heights.

²⁰My friends are my mockers; mine eye poureth out tears unto +God.

²¹Oh that there were arbitration for a man with +God, as a son of man for his friend!

²²For years few in number shall pass, -- and I shall go the way whence I shall not return.

Job 17

¹My breath is corrupt, my days are extinct, the graves are mine.

²Are there not mockers around me? and doth not mine eye abide in their provocation?

³Lay down now a pledge, be thou surety for me with thyself: who is he that striketh hands with me?

⁴For thou hast hidden their heart from understanding; therefore thou wilt not exalt them.

⁵He that betrayeth friends for a prey -- even the eyes of his children shall fail.

⁶And he hath made me a proverb of the peoples; and I am become one to be spit on in the face.

⁷And mine eye is dim by reason of grief, and all my members are as a shadow.

⁸Upright men shall be astonished at this, and the innocent shall be stirred up against the ungodly;

⁹But the righteous shall hold on his way, and he that hath clean hands shall increase in strength.

¹⁰But as for you all, pray come on again; and I shall not find one wise man among you.

¹¹My days are past, my purposes are broken off, the cherished thoughts of my heart.

¹²They change the night into day; the light they imagine near in presence of the darkness.

¹³If I wait, Sheol is my house; I spread my bed in the darkness:

¹⁴I cry to the grave, Thou art my father! to the worm, My mother, and my sister!

¹⁵And where is then my hope? yea, my hope, who shall see it?

¹⁶It shall go down to the bars of Sheol, when our rest shall be together in the dust.

Job 18

¹And Bildad the Shuhite answered and said,

²How long will ye hunt for words? Be intelligent, and then we will speak.

³Wherefore are we counted as beasts, and reputed stupid in your sight?

⁴Thou that tearest thyself in thine anger, shall the earth be forsaken for thee? and shall the rock be removed out of its place?

⁵Yea, the light of the wicked shall be put out, and the flame of his fire shall not shine.

⁶The light shall become dark in his tent, and his lamp over him shall be put out.

⁷The steps of his strength shall be straitened, and his own counsel shall cast him down.

⁸For he is sent into the net by his own feet, and he walketh on the meshes;

⁹The gin taketh him by the heel, the snare layeth hold on him;

¹⁰A cord is hidden for him in the ground, and his trap in the way.

¹¹Terrors make him afraid on every side, and chase him at his footsteps.

¹²His strength is hunger-bitten, and calamity is ready at his side.

¹³The firstborn of death devoureth the members of his body; it will devour his members.

¹⁴His confidence shall be rooted out of his tent, and it shall lead him away to the king of terrors:

¹⁵They who are none of his shall dwell in his tent; brimstone shall be showered upon his habitation:

¹⁶His roots shall be dried up beneath, and above shall his branch be cut off;

¹⁷His remembrance shall perish from the earth, and he shall have no name on the pasture-grounds.

¹⁸He is driven from light into darkness, and chased out of the world.

¹⁹He hath neither son nor grandson among his people, nor any remaining in the places of his sojourn.

²⁰They that come after shall be astonished at his day, as they that went before them were affrighted.

²¹Surely, such are the dwellings of the unrighteous man, and such the place of him that knoweth not God.

Job 19

¹And Job answered and said,

²How long will ye vex my soul, and crush me with words?

³These ten times have ye reproached me; ye are not ashamed to stupefy me.

⁴And be it that I have erred, mine error remaineth with myself.

⁵If indeed ye will magnify yourselves against me, and prove against me my reproach,

⁶Know now that +God hath overthrown me, and hath surrounded me with his net.

⁷Behold, I cry out of wrong, and I am not heard; I cry aloud, but there is no judgment.

⁸He hath hedged up my way that I cannot pass, and he hath set darkness in my paths.

⁹He hath stripped me of my glory, and taken the crown from my head.

¹⁰He breaketh me down on every side, and I am gone; and my hope hath he torn up as a tree.

¹¹And he hath kindled his anger against me, and hath counted me unto him as one of his enemies.

¹²His troops have come together and cast up their way against me, and have encamped round about my tent.

¹³He hath put my brethren far from me, and mine acquaintance are quite estranged from me.

¹⁴My kinsfolk have failed, and my known friends have forgotten me.

¹⁵The sojourners in my house and my maids count me as a stranger; I am an alien in their sight.

¹⁶I called my servant, and he answered not; I entreated him with my mouth.

¹⁷My breath is strange to my wife, and my entreaties to the children of my mother's womb.

¹⁸Even young children despise me; I rise up, and they speak against me.

¹⁹All my intimate friends abhor me, and they whom I loved are turned against me.

²⁰My bones cleave to my skin and to my flesh, and I am escaped with the skin of my teeth.

²¹Have pity upon me, have pity upon me, ye my friends; for the hand of +God hath touched me.

²²Why do ye persecute me as God, and are not satisfied with my flesh?

²³Oh would that my words were written! oh that they were inscribed in a book!

²⁴That with an iron style and lead they were graven in the rock for ever!

²⁵And as for me, I know that my Redeemer liveth, and the Last, he shall stand upon the earth;

²⁶And if after my skin this shall be destroyed, yet from out of my flesh shall I see +God;

²⁷Whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not another: -- my reins are consumed within me.

²⁸If ye say, How shall we persecute him? when the root of the matter is found in me,

²⁹Be ye yourselves afraid of the sword! for the sword is fury against misdeeds, that ye may know there is a judgment.