“Far be it from me that I should admit you are right [in your accusations against me];
Until I die, I will not remove my integrity from me.

My righteousness I hold fast, and will not let it go: my heart reproacheth me not one of my days.

Let mine enemy be a veritably lawless one! And, he that lifteth himself up against me, one veritably perverse!

For what is the hope of the hypocrite, though he hath gained, when God taketh away his soul?

Will God hear his cry when trouble cometh upon him?

Will he delight himself in the Almighty? will he always call upon God?

I will give you teaching about the hand of God; I will not keep secret from you what is in the mind of the Ruler of all.

Look, you all have seen, and {why in the world} {have you become altogether vain}?

This the portion of an unjust man with God, and the inheritance of the terrible they shall take from the Almighty.

If he has many children, their destiny is to die by the sword, and his descendants won't have enough food.

Those that remain of him shall be buried in death: and his widows shall not weep.

He may prepare it, but the just shall put it on, and the innocent shall divide the silver.

He lies down wealthy, but will do so no more;
when he opens his eyes, it is gone.

Terrors take hold on him as waters, a tempest stealeth him away in the night.

Take him up doth an east wind, and he goeth, And it frighteneth him from his place,

“For it will hurl [thunderbolts of God’s wrath] at him unsparingly and without compassion;
He flees in haste from its power.

“People will clap their hands at him [to mock and ridicule him]
And hiss him out of his place.

He setteth an end to darkness, and searcheth out all perfection: the stones of darkness, and the shadow of death.

“He breaks open (mine) shafts far away from where people live,
[In places] forgotten by the [human] foot;
They dangle [in the mines] and hang away from men.

“[As for] the earth, out of it comes food,
But underneath [its surface, down deep] it is turned over as fire.

A path -- not known it hath a ravenous fowl, Nor scorched it hath an eye of the kite,

{Proud wild animals} have not trodden it; [the] lion in its prime has not prowled over it.

He puts his hand on the hard rock; he overturns mountains by [the] roots.

He cutteth out channels in the rocks, and his eye seeth every precious thing.

"But from where will wisdom be found? And {where in the world} [is the] place of understanding?

Man knoweth not the price thereof; neither is it found in the land of the living.

The depth saith, It is not in me: and the sea saith, It is not with me.

"Refined gold cannot be gotten in its place, and silver cannot be weighed out [as] its price.

It is not set in the balance with gold of Ophir, with the precious onyx, and the sapphire.

Gold and glass cannot be compared with it, and its substitution [cannot be] an ornament of refined gold.

The topaz of Ethiopia shall not be compared to it, neither shall it be set in the balance with pure gold.

Indeed, from where does wisdom come? And {where in the world} [is the] place of understanding?

It has been concealed from the sight of every living creature and hidden even from the birds in the skies.

In making a weight for the wind, and meting out the waters by measure,

When he made a decree for the rain, and a way for the lightning of the thunder:

Then He saw wisdom and declared it;
He established it and searched it out.

So Job proceeded and went forth in his communication, saying,

Oh that I were as in months past, as in the days when God preserved me;

When his candle shined upon my head, and when by his light I walked through darkness;

As I was in the days of my youth, when the secret of God was upon my tabernacle;

When the Almighty was yet with me, when my children were about me;

When I washed my steps with butter, and the rock poured me out rivers of oil;

When I went out to the gate through the city, when I prepared my seat in the street!

When the young men, as soon as they saw me, hid themselves, and when the aged arose, and stood up unto me;

The princes refrained talking, and laid their hand on their mouth.

The voices of the commanders-in-chief were hushed, and their tongues would cling to the roofs of their mouths."

When the ear heard me, then it blessed me; and when the eye saw me, it gave witness to me:

For I rescued the poor man who cried out for help,
and the fatherless child who had no one to support him.

The blessing of the perishing cometh on me, And the heart of the widow I cause to sing.

I put on righteousness, and it clothed me: my judgment was as a robe and a diadem.

I was an eye unto the blind, and a foot to the lame;

I was a father unto the poor, and when I knew not their cause, I sought it out diligently.

And I broke [the] evil one's jaw bones, and I made [his] prey drop from his teeth.

Then I said, I shall die in my nest, and I shall multiply my days as the sand.

My root shall be spread out to the waters, and the dew will lie all night on my branch;

My glory was fresh in me, and my bow was renewed in my hand.

"They listened and waited for me, as they remained in silence for my counsel.

After my word they change not, And on them doth my speech drop,

They waited for me as one waits for rain, as one opens his mouth to drink in a spring rain shower.

If I laughed on them, they believed it not; and the light of my countenance they cast not down.

I chose out their way, and sat chief, and dwelt as a king in the army, as one that comforteth the mourners.

But now they that are younger than I have me in derision, whose fathers I would have disdained to have set with the dogs of my flock.

Yea, whereto might the strength of their hands profit me, in whom old age was perished?

For want and famine they were solitary; fleeing into the wilderness in former time desolate and waste.

And when they were driven forth, men cried after them, as it had been after a thief.

To dwell in the clifts of the valleys, in caves of the earth, and in the rocks.

The sons of the foolish one, also the sons of no name: they were beaten from the land.

Now I am mocked by their songs;
I have become an object of scorn to them.

They abhor me, they flee far from me, and spare not to spit in my face.

because he has loosened his bowstring and humbled me, and they have thrown off restraint {in my presence}.

On the right hand doth a brood arise, My feet they have cast away, And they raise up against me, Their paths of calamity.

“They break up and clutter my path [upsetting my plans],
They profit from my destruction;
No one restrains them.

They came upon me as a wide breaking in of waters: in the desolation they rolled themselves upon me.

Terrors have turned on me. They chase my honor as the wind. My welfare has passed away as a cloud.

And now my soul is poured out in me; days of affliction have taken hold upon me.

My bones are pierced in me in the night season: and my sinews take no rest.

I cry out to You for help, but You do not answer me;
when I stand up, You merely look at me.

Thou art changed to a cruel one to me; with the strength of thy hand thou pursuest me.

Thou liftest me up to the wind, thou causest me to ride upon it ; And thou dissolvest me in the storm.

For I know that, unto death, thou wilt bring me back, even unto the house of meeting for every one living.

Howbeit he will not stretch out his hand to the grave, though they cry in his destruction.

Did not I weep for him that was in trouble? was not my soul grieved for the poor?

When I looked for good, then evil came unto me: and when I waited for light, there came darkness.

My bowels are in turmoil, and they are not still; days of misery come to confront me.

I went mourning without the sun: I stood up, and I cried in the congregation.

I have become a brother to the jackals, and go about in the company of ostriches.

“My skin falls from me in blackened flakes,
And my bones are burned with fever.

But my harp is in mourning; my flute plays only songs for those who are weeping."

“I have made a covenant (agreement) with my eyes;
How then could I gaze [lustfully] at a virgin?

For what portion of God is there from above? and what inheritance of the Almighty from on high?

Is not disaster for [the] evil one and ruin for [the] workers of mischief?

He watches my life, observing every one of my actions, does he not?"

If I have walked in falsehood
or my foot has rushed to deceit,

Let me be weighed in an even balance, that God may know mine integrity.

If my steps have been turned out of the way, or if my heart went after my eyes, or if the property of another is in my hands;

Let me put seed in the earth for another to have the fruit of it, and let my produce be uprooted.

"If my heart has been enticed by a woman, and at my neighbor's doorway I have lain in wait,

let my own wife grind grain for another man,
and let other men sleep with her.

For this is an heinous crime; yea, it is an iniquity to be punished by the judges.

If I did despise the cause of my manservant or of my maidservant, when they contended with me;