< Job 16 >
1 And Job answers and says:
2 “I have heard many such things, Miserable comforters [are] you all.
3 Is there an end to words of wind? Or what emboldens you that you answer?
4 I also, like you, might speak, If your soul were in my soul’s stead. I might join against you with words, And nod at you with my head.
5 I might harden you with my mouth, And the moving of my lips might be sparing.
6 If I speak, my pain is not restrained, And I cease—what goes from me?
7 Only, now, it has wearied me; You have desolated all my company,
8 And You loathe me, For it has been a witness, And my failure rises up against me, It testifies in my face.
9 His anger has torn, and He hates me, He has gnashed at me with His teeth, My adversary sharpens His eyes for me.
10 They have gaped on me with their mouth, In reproach they have struck my cheeks, Together they set themselves against me.
11 God shuts me up to the perverse, And turns me over to the hands of the wicked.
12 I have been at ease, and He breaks me, And He has laid hold on my neck, And He breaks me in pieces, And He raises me to Him for a mark.
13 His archers go around against me. He split my reins, and does not spare, He pours out my gall to the earth.
14 He breaks me—breach on breach, He runs on me as a mighty one.
15 I have sewed sackcloth on my skin, And have rolled my horn in the dust.
16 My face is foul with weeping, And on my eyelids [is] death-shade.
17 Not for violence in my hands, And my prayer [is] pure.
18 O earth, do not cover my blood! And let there not be a place for my cry.
19 Also, now, behold, my witness [is] in the heavens, And my testifier in the high places.
20 My interpreter [is] my friend, My eye has dropped to God;
21 And He reasons for a man with God, As a son of man for his friend.
22 When a few years come, Then I go [on] the path of no return.”