1And Job answereth and saith: —

2Till when do ye afflict my soul, And bruise me with words?

3These ten times ye put me to shame, ye blush not. Ye make yourselves strange to me —

4And also — truly, I have erred, With me doth my error remain.

5If, truly, over me ye magnify yourselves, And decide against me my reproach;

6Know now, that God turned me upside down, And His net against me hath set round,

7Lo, I cry out — violence, and am not answered, I cry aloud, and there is no judgment.

8My way He hedged up, and I pass not over, And on my paths darkness He placeth.

9Mine honour from off me He hath stripped, And He turneth the crown from my head.

10He breaketh me down round about, and I go, And removeth like a tree my hope.

11And He kindleth against me His anger, And reckoneth me to Him as His adversaries.

12Come in do His troops together, And they raise up against me their way, And encamp round about my tent.

13My brethren from me He hath put far off, And mine acquaintances surely Have been estranged from me.

14Ceased have my neighbours And my familiar friends have forgotten me,

15Sojourners of my house and my maids, For a stranger reckon me: An alien I have been in their eyes.

16To my servant I have called, And he doth not answer, With my mouth I make supplication to him.

17My spirit is strange to my wife, And my favours to the sons of my [mother's] womb.

18Also sucklings have despised me, I rise, and they speak against me.

19Abominate me do all the men of my counsel, And those I have loved, Have been turned against me.

20To my skin and to my flesh Cleaved hath my bone, And I deliver myself with the skin of my teeth.

21Pity me, pity me, ye my friends, For the hand of God hath stricken against me.

22Why do you pursue me as God? And with my flesh are not satisfied?

23Who doth grant now, That my words may be written? Who doth grant that in a book they may be graven?

24With a pen of iron and lead — For ever in a rock they may be hewn.

25That — I have known my Redeemer, The Living and the Last, For the dust he doth rise.

26And after my skin hath compassed this [body], Then from my flesh I see God:

27Whom I — I see on my side, And mine eyes have beheld, and not a stranger, Consumed have been my reins in my bosom.

28But ye say, 'Why do we pursue after him?' And the root of the matter hath been found in me.

29Be ye afraid because of the sword, For furious [are] the punishments of the sword, That ye may know that [there is] a judgment.