Job 17, side by side

¹“My spirit is broken; my days are extinguished; the grave awaits me.

¹My breath is corrupt, my days are extinct, the graves are ready for me.

²Surely mockers surround me, and my eyes must gaze at their rebellion.

²Are there not mockers with me? and doth not mine eye continue in their provocation?

³Give me, I pray, the pledge You demand. Who else will be my guarantor?

³Lay down now, put me in a surety with thee; who is he that will strike hands with me?

⁴You have closed their minds to understanding; therefore You will not exalt them.

⁴For thou hast hid their heart from understanding: therefore shalt thou not exalt them.

⁵If a man denounces his friends for a price, the eyes of his children will fail.

⁵He that speaketh flattery to his friends, even the eyes of his children shall fail.

⁶He has made me a byword among the people, a man in whose face they spit.

⁶He hath made me also a byword of the people; and aforetime I was as a tabret.

⁷My eyes have grown dim with grief, and my whole body is but a shadow.

⁷Mine eye also is dim by reason of sorrow, and all my members are as a shadow.

⁸The upright are appalled at this, and the innocent are stirred against the godless.

⁸Upright men shall be astonied at this, and the innocent shall stir up himself against the hypocrite.

⁹Yet a righteous one holds to his way, and the one with clean hands grows stronger.

⁹The righteous also shall hold on his way, and he that hath clean hands shall be stronger and stronger.

¹⁰But come back and try again, all of you. For I will not find a wise man among you.

¹⁰But as for you all, do ye return, and come now: for I cannot find one wise man among you.

¹¹My days have passed; my plans are broken off— even the desires of my heart.

¹¹My days are past, my purposes are broken off, even the thoughts of my heart.

¹²They have turned night into day, making light seem near in the face of darkness.

¹²They change the night into day: the light is short because of darkness.

¹³If I look for Sheol as my home, if I spread out my bed in darkness,

¹³If I wait, the grave is mine house: I have made my bed in the darkness.

¹⁴and say to corruption, ‘You are my father,’ and to the worm, ‘My mother,’ or ‘My sister,’

¹⁴I have said to corruption, Thou art my father: to the worm, Thou art my mother, and my sister.

¹⁵where then is my hope? Who can see any hope for me?

¹⁵And where is now my hope? as for my hope, who shall see it?

¹⁶Will it go down to the gates of Sheol? Will we go down together into the dust?”

¹⁶They shall go down to the bars of the pit, when our rest together is in the dust.