Job 17
1 My spirit is crushed; my life is extinguished; the grave is ready for me.
My spirit is consumed, and my days are over; the grave is ready for me.
2 Mockers surround me. I see how bitterly they ridicule me.
Surely there are mockers with me; my eye must always see their provocation.
3 God, you need to put down a pledge for me with yourself, for who else will be my guarantor?
Give now a pledge, be a guarantee for me with yourself; who else is there who will help me?
4 You have closed their minds to understanding, so do not let them win!
For you, God, have kept their hearts from understanding; therefore, you will not exalt them over me.
5 They betray friends to gain benefit for themselves and their children suffer for it.
He who denounces his friends for a reward, the eyes of his children will fail.
6 He has made me a proverb of ridicule among the people; they spit in my face.
But he has made me a byword of the people; they spit in my face.
7 My eyes are worn out from crying and my body is a shadow of its former self.
My eye is also dim because of sorrow; all my body parts are as thin as shadows.
8 People who think they are good are shocked to see me. Those who are innocent are troubled by the godless.
Upright men will be stunned by this; the innocent man will stir himself up against godless men.
9 Those who are right keep going, and those whose hands are clean grow stronger and stronger.
The righteous man will keep to his way; he who has clean hands will grow stronger and stronger.
10 Why don't you come back and repeat again what you've been saying?—yet I still won't find a wise man among you!
But as for you all, come on now; I will not find a wise man among you.
11 My life is over. My plans are gone. My heart is broken.
My days are past; my plans are shattered, and so are the desires of my heart.
12 They turn night into day, and say that daylight is close to darkness.
These people, these mockers, change the night into day; light is near to darkness.
If the only home I hope for is Sheol; and if I have spread my couch in the darkness; (Sheol h7585)
14 Should I call the grave my father, and the maggot my mother or my sister?
and if I have said to the pit, 'You are my father,' and to the worm, 'You are my mother or my sister,'
15 So then where is my hope? Can anyone see any hope for me?
where then is my hope? As for my hope, who can see any?
