Job 17
1 My spirit is consumed, my days are extinct, the grave is ready for me.
My spirit is crushed; my life is extinguished; the grave is ready for me.
2 Surely there are mockers with me, and mine eye abideth in their provocation.
Mockers surround me. I see how bitterly they ridicule me.
3 Give now a pledge, be surety for me with Thyself; who else is there that will strike hands with me?
God, you need to put down a pledge for me with yourself, for who else will be my guarantor?
4 For Thou hast hid their heart from understanding; therefore shalt Thou not exalt them.
You have closed their minds to understanding, so do not let them win!
5 He that denounceth his friends for the sake of flattery, even the eyes of his children shall fail.
They betray friends to gain benefit for themselves and their children suffer for it.
6 He hath made me also a byword of the people; and I am become one in whose face they spit.
He has made me a proverb of ridicule among the people; they spit in my face.
7 Mine eye also is dimmed by reason of vexation, and all my members are as a shadow.
My eyes are worn out from crying and my body is a shadow of its former self.
8 Upright men are astonished at this, and the innocent stirreth up himself against the godless.
People who think they are good are shocked to see me. Those who are innocent are troubled by the godless.
9 Yet the righteous holdeth on his way, and he that hath clean hands waxeth stronger and stronger.
Those who are right keep going, and those whose hands are clean grow stronger and stronger.
10 But as for you all, do ye return, and come now; and I shall not find a wise man among you.
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!
11 My days are past, my purposes are broken off, even the thoughts of my heart.
My life is over. My plans are gone. My heart is broken.
12 They change the night into day; the light is short because of darkness.
They turn night into day, and say that daylight is close to darkness.
13 If I look for the nether-world as my house; if I have spread my couch in the darkness; (Sheol h7585)
What am I looking for? To make my home in Sheol, to make my bed in darkness? (Sheol h7585)
14 If I have said to corruption: 'Thou art my father', to the worm: 'Thou art my mother, and my sister';
Should I call the grave my father, and the maggot my mother or my sister?
15 Where then is my hope? And as for my hope, who shall see it?
So then where is my hope? Can anyone see any hope for me?
