Job 16-19

Job 16

¹Then Job answered and said,

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

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

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

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

⁶Though I speak, my grief is not assuaged: and though I forbear, what am I eased?

⁷But now he hath made me weary: thou hast made desolate all my company.

⁸And thou hast laid fast hold on me, which is a witness against me: and my leanness riseth up against me, it testifieth to my face.

⁹He hath torn me in his wrath, and persecuted me; he hath gnashed upon me with his teeth: mine adversary sharpeneth his eyes upon me.

¹⁰They have gaped upon me with their mouth; they have smitten me upon the cheek reproachfully: they gather themselves together against me.

¹¹God delivereth me to the ungodly, and casteth me into the hands of the wicked.

¹²I was at ease, and he brake me asunder; yea, he hath taken me by the neck, and dashed me to pieces: he hath also set me up for his mark.

¹³His archers compass 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 giant.

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

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

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

¹⁸O earth, cover not thou my blood, and let my cry have no resting place.

¹⁹Even now, behold, my witness is in heaven, and he that coucheth for me is on high.

²⁰My friends scorn me: but mine eye poureth out tears unto God;

²¹That he would maintain the right of a man with God, and of a son of man with his neighbour!

²²For when a few years are come, I shall go the way whence I shall not return.

Job 17

¹My spirit is consumed, my days are extinct, the grave is ready for me.

²Surely there are mockers with me, and mine eye abideth in their provocation.

³Give now a pledge, be surety for me with thyself; who is there that will strike hands with me?

⁴For thou hast hid their heart from understanding: therefore shalt thou not exalt them.

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

⁶He hath made me also a byword of the people; and I am become an open abhorring.

⁷Mine eye also is dim by reason of sorrow, and all my members are as a shadow.

⁸Upright men shall be astonied at this, and the innocent shall stir up himself against the godless.

⁹Yet shall the righteous hold on his way, and he that hath clean hands shall wax stronger and stronger.

¹⁰But return ye, all of you, and come now: and I shall not find a wise man among you.

¹¹My days are past, my purposes are broken off, even the droughts of my heart.

¹²They change the night into a day: the fight, say they, is near unto the darkness.

¹³If I look for Sheol as mine house; if I have spread my couch in the darkness;

¹⁴If I have said to corruption, Thou art my father; to the worm, Thou art my mother, and my sister;

¹⁵Where then is my hope? and as for my hope, who shall see it?

¹⁶It shall go down to the bars of Sheol, when once there is rest in the dust.

Job 18

¹Then answered Bildad the Shuhite, and said,

²How long will ye lay snares for words? consider, and afterwards we will speak.

³Wherefore are we counted as beasts, and are become unclean in your sight?

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

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

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

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

⁸For he is cast into a net by his own feet, and he walketh upon the toils.

⁹A gin shall take him by the heel, and a snare shall lay hold on him.

¹⁰A noose is hid for him in the ground, and a trap for him in the way.

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

¹²His strength shall be hunger-bitten and calamity shall be ready for his halting.

¹³It shall devour the members of his body, yea, the firstborn of death shall devour his members.

¹⁴He shall be rooted out of his tent wherein he trusteth; and he shall be brought to the king of terrors.

¹⁵There shall dwell in his tent that which is none of his: brimstone shall be scattered 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 in the street.

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

¹⁹He shall have neither son nor son’s son among his people, nor any remaining where he sojourned.

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

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

Job 19

¹Then Job answered and said,

²How long will ye vex my soul and break me in pieces with words?

³These ten times have ye reproached me: ye are not ashamed that ye deal hardly with me.

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

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

⁶Know now that God hath subverted me in my cause, and hath compassed me with his net.

⁷Behold, I cry out of wrong, but I am not heard: I cry for help, but there is no judgment.

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

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

¹⁰He hath broken me down on every side, and I am gone: and mine hope hath he plucked up like a tree.

¹¹He hath also kindled his wrath against me, and he counteth me unto him as one of his adversaries.

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

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

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

¹⁵They that dwell in mine house, and my maids, count me for a stranger: I am an alien in their sight.

¹⁶I call unto my servant, and he giveth me no answer, though I entreat him with my mouth.

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

¹⁸Even young children despise me; if I arise, they speak against me.

¹⁹All my inward friends abhor me: and they whom I loved are turned against me.

²⁰My bone cleaveth 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, O 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 that my words were now written! oh that they were inscribed in a book!

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

²⁵But I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand up at the last upon the earth:

²⁶And after my skin hath been thus destroyed, yet from 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 we will persecute him! seeing that the root of the matter is found in me;

²⁹Be ye afraid of the sword: for wrath bringeth the punishments of the sword, that ye may know there is a judgment.