| 1 | Then Job answered, |
| 2 | "How long will you torment me, and crush me with words? |
| 3 | You have reproached me ten times. You aren't ashamed that you attack me. |
| 4 | If it is true that I have erred, my error remains with myself. |
| 5 | If indeed you will magnify yourselves against me, and plead against me my reproach; |
| 6 | know now that God has subverted me, and has surrounded me with his net. |
| 7 | "Behold, I cry out of wrong, but I am not heard. I cry for help, but there is no justice. |
| 8 | He has walled up my way so that I can't pass, and has set darkness in my paths. |
| 9 | He has stripped me of my glory, and taken the crown from my head. |
| 10 | He has broken me down on every side, and I am gone. My hope he has plucked up like a tree. |
| 11 | He has also kindled his wrath against me. He counts me among his adversaries. |
| 12 | His troops come on together, build a siege ramp against me, and encamp around my tent. |
| 13 | "He has put my brothers far from me. My acquaintances are wholly estranged from me. |
| 14 | My relatives have gone away. My familiar friends have forgotten me. |
| 15 | Those who dwell in my house, and my maids, count me for a stranger. I am an alien in their sight. |
| 16 | I call to my servant, and he gives me no answer. I beg him with my mouth. |
| 17 | My breath is offensive to my wife. I am loathsome to the children of my own mother. |
| 18 | Even young children despise me. If I arise, they speak against me. |
| 19 | All my familiar friends abhor me. They whom I loved have turned against me. |
| 20 | My bones stick to my skin and to my flesh. I have escaped by the skin of my teeth. |
| 21 | "Have pity on me, have pity on me, you my friends; for the hand of God has touched me. |
| 22 | Why do you persecute me as God, and are not satisfied with my flesh? |
| 23 | "Oh that my words were now written! Oh that they were inscribed in a book! |
| 24 | That with an iron pen and lead they were engraved in the rock forever! |
| 25 | But as for me, I know that my Redeemer lives. In the end, he will stand upon the earth. |
| 26 | After my skin is destroyed, then in my flesh shall I see God, |
| 27 | Whom I, even I, shall see on my side. My eyes shall see, and not as a stranger. "My heart is consumed within me. |
| 28 | If you say, 'How we will persecute him!' because the root of the matter is found in me, |
| 29 | be afraid of the sword, for wrath brings the punishments of the sword, that you may know there is a judgment." |
