Job 16

¹Then Job answered and said, ²I have heard many such things: miserable comforters are ye all.³Shall vain words have an end? or what emboldeneth thee that thou answerest?⁴I also could speak as ye do: if your soul were in my soul’s stead, I could heap up words against you, and shake mine head at you. ⁵But I would strengthen you with my mouth, and the moving of my lips should asswage your grief.

⁶Though I speak, my grief is not asswaged: and though I forbear, what am I eased?⁷But now he hath made me weary: thou hast made desolate all my company. ⁸And thou hast filled me with wrinkles, which is a witness against me: and my leanness rising up in me beareth witness to my face. ⁹He teareth me in his wrath, who hateth me: he gnasheth upon me with his teeth; mine enemy sharpeneth his eyes upon me. ¹⁰They have gaped upon me with their mouth; they have smitten me upon the cheek reproachfully; they have gathered themselves together against me. ¹¹God hath delivered me to the ungodly, and turned me over into the hands of the wicked.¹²I was at ease, but he hath broken me asunder: he hath also taken me by my neck, and shaken me to pieces, and set me up for his mark. ¹³His archers compass me round about, he cleaveth my reins asunder, and doth not spare; he poureth out my gall upon the ground. ¹⁴He breaketh me with breach upon breach, he runneth upon me like a giant. ¹⁵I have sewed sackcloth upon my skin, and defiled my horn in the dust. ¹⁶My face is foul with weeping, and on my eyelids is the shadow of death;

¹⁷Not for any injustice in mine hands: also my prayer is pure. ¹⁸O earth, cover not thou my blood, and let my cry have no place. ¹⁹Also now, behold, my witness is in heaven, and my record is on high. ²⁰My friends scorn me: but mine eye poureth out tears unto God. ²¹O that one might plead for a man with God, as a man pleadeth for his neighbour! ²²When a few years are come, then I shall go the way whence I shall not return.