Job Reproaches His Pitiless Friends
Then Job answered and said:
2 “I have heard many such things;
aMiserable comforters are you all!
3 Shall words of wind have an end?
Or what provokes you that you answer?
4 I also could speak as you do,
If your soul were in my soul’s place.
I could heap up words against you,
And ashake my head at you;
5 But I would strengthen you with my mouth,
And the comfort of my lips would relieve your grief.
6 “Though I speak, my grief is not relieved;
And if I remain silent, how am I eased?
7 But now He has aworn me out;
You bhave made desolate all my company.
8 You have shriveled me up,
And it is a awitness against me;
My leanness rises up against me
And bears witness to my face.
9 aHe tears me in His wrath, and hates me;
He gnashes at me with His teeth;
bMy adversary sharpens His gaze on me.
10 They agape at me with their mouth,
They bstrike me reproachfully on the cheek,
They gather together against me.
11 God ahas delivered me to the ungodly,
And turned me over to the hands of the wicked.
12 I was at ease, but He has ashattered me;
He also has taken me by my neck, and shaken me to pieces;
He has bset me up for His target,
13 His archers surround me.
He pierces my heart and does not pity;
He pours out my gall on the ground.
14 He breaks me with wound upon wound;
He runs at me like a warrior.
15 “I have sewn sackcloth over my skin,
And alaid my head in the dust.
16 My face is flushed from weeping,
And on my eyelids is the shadow of death;
17 Although no violence is in my hands,
And my prayer is pure.
18 “O earth, do not cover my blood,
And alet my cry have no resting place!
19 Surely even now amy witness is in heaven,
And my evidence is on high.
20 My friends scorn me;
My eyes pour out tears to God.
21 aOh, that one might plead for a man with God,
As a man pleads for his neighbor!
22 For when a few years are finished,
I shall ago the way of no return.
The Holy Bible, New King James Version, Copyright © 1982 Thomas Nelson.
All rights reserved.