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."
