Job 19  Common English Bible

² How long will you harass me
    and crush me with words?
³ These ten times you’ve humiliated me;
    shamelessly you insult me.
⁴ Have I really gone astray?
    If so, my error remains hidden inside me.
⁵ If you look down on me
        and use my disgrace to criticize me,
⁶     know then that God has wronged me
        and enclosed his net over me.

⁷ If I cry “Violence!” I’m not answered;
    I shout—but there is no justice.
⁸ He walled up my path so I can’t pass
        and put darkness on my trail,
⁹     stripped my honor from me,
        removed the crown from my head,
¹⁰     tore me down completely so that I’ll die, and uprooted my hope like a tree.
¹¹ His anger burns against me;
    he considers me his enemy.
¹² His troops come as one
    and construct their siege ramp^[a] against me;
    they camp around my tent.

¹³ He has distanced my family from me;
    my acquaintances are also alienated from me.
¹⁴ My visitors have ceased;
    those who know me have forgotten me.
¹⁵ My guests and female servants think me a stranger;
    I’m a foreigner in their sight.
¹⁶ I call my servant, and he doesn’t answer;
    I myself must beg him.
¹⁷ My breath stinks to my wife;
    I am odious to my children.
¹⁸ Even the young despise me;
    I get up, and they rail against me.
¹⁹ All my closest friends despise me;
    the ones I have loved turn against me.

²⁰ My bones cling to my skin and flesh;
    I have escaped by the skin of my teeth.
²¹ Pity me. Pity me. You’re my friends.
    God’s hand has truly struck me.
²² Why do you pursue me like God does,
    always hungry for my flesh?

²³ Oh, that my words were written down,
        inscribed on a scroll
²⁴     with an iron instrument and lead,
        forever engraved on stone.
²⁵ But I know that my redeemer^[b] is alive
        and afterward he’ll rise upon the dust.
²⁶ After my skin has been torn apart this way—
    then from my flesh^[c] I’ll see God,
²⁷         whom I’ll see myself—
        my eyes see,^[d] and not a stranger’s.
    I am utterly dejected.

²⁸ You say, “How will we pursue him
    so that the root of the matter can be found in him?”^[e]
29 You ought to fear the sword yourselves,
    for wrath brings punishment by the sword.
    You should know that there is judgment.