Job 16

New International Version

• 1. Then Job replied:
• 2. "I have heard many things like these; miserable comforters are you all!
• 3. Will your long-winded speeches never end? What ails you that you keep on arguing?
• 4. I also could speak like you, if you were in my place; I could make fine speeches against you and shake my head at you.
• 5. But my mouth would encourage you; comfort from my lips would bring you relief.
• 6. "Yet if I speak, my pain is not relieved; and if I refrain, it does not go away.
• 7. Surely, O God, you have worn me out; you have devastated my entire household.
• 8. You have bound me-and it has become a witness; my gauntness rises up and testifies against me.
• 9. God assails me and tears me in his anger and gnashes his teeth at me; my opponent fastens on me his piercing eyes.
• 10. Men open their mouths to jeer at me; they strike my cheek in scorn and unite together against me.
• 11. God has turned me over to evil men and thrown me into the clutches of the wicked.
• 12. All was well with me, but he shattered me; he seized me by the neck and crushed me. He has made me his target;
• 13. his archers surround me. Without pity, he pierces my kidneys and spills my gall on the ground.
• 14. Again and again he bursts upon me; he rushes at me like a warrior.
• 15. "I have sewed sackcloth over my skin and buried my brow in the dust.
• 16. My face is red with weeping, deep shadows ring my eyes;
• 17. yet my hands have been free of violence and my prayer is pure.
• 18. "O earth, do not cover my blood; may my cry never be laid to rest!
• 19. Even now my witness is in heaven; my advocate is on high.
• 20. My intercessor is my friend as my eyes pour out tears to God;
• 21. on behalf of a man he pleads with God as a man pleads for his friend.
• 22. "Only a few years will pass before I go on the journey of no return.

New International Version