To them alone the earth was given, and a stranger passed not in the midst of them.

The wicked man travaileth with pain all his days, and the number of years is hidden to the oppressor.

A sound of terrors is in his ears; In prosperity the destroyer shall come upon him.

He believeth not that he shall return out of darkness, and he is waited for of the sword.

He wandereth abroad for bread, saying, Where is it? he knoweth that the day of darkness is ready at his hand.

He is greatly in fear of the dark day, trouble and pain overcome him:

Because his hand is stretched out against God, and his heart is lifted up against the Ruler of all,

He runneth upon him, even on his neck, upon the thick bosses of his bucklers:

Because he covereth his face with his fatness, and maketh collops of fat on his flanks.

And he inhabiteth cities cut off, houses not dwelt in, That have been ready to become heaps.

He does not get wealth for himself, and is unable to keep what he has got; the heads of his grain are not bent down to the earth.

He shall not depart out of darkness; the flame shall dry up his branches, and by the breath of his mouth shall he go away.

His branch is cut off before its time, and his leaf is no longer green.

He shall shake off his unripe grape as the vine, and shall cast off his flower as the olive.

For the congregation of hypocrites shall be desolate, and fire shall consume the tabernacles of bribery.

Evil has made them with child, and they give birth to trouble; and the fruit of their body is shame for themselves.

"I have heard many [things] like these; all of you [are] {miserable comforters}.

Shall words of wind have an end? or what provoketh thee that thou answerest?

I also could speak as ye do: if your soul were in my soul's stead, I could heap up words against you, and shake mine head at you.

But I would strengthen you with my mouth, and the moving of my lips should asswage your grief.

If I speak, my pain is not assuaged; and if I forbear, what am I eased?

But now he has overcome me with weariness and fear, and I am in the grip of all my trouble.

“You have taken a firm hold on me and have shriveled me up,
It has become a witness [against me];
And my leanness [and infirmity] rises up [as evidence] against me,
It testifies to my face [about my guilt].

“They have gaped at me with their mouths,
With contempt they have struck me on the cheek;
They massed themselves together [and conspired] against me.

God hath delivered me to the ungodly, and turned me over into the hands of the wicked.

I was at ease, but He shattered me;
He seized me by the scruff of the neck
and smashed me to pieces.
He set me up as His target;

I am broken with wound after wound; he comes rushing on me like a man of war.

“I have sewed sackcloth over my skin [as a sign of mourning]
And have defiled my horn (symbol of strength) in the dust.

My face is foul with weeping, and on my eyelids is the shadow of death;

Even now my witness is in heaven, and the supporter of my cause is on high.

My friends make sport of me; to God my eyes are weeping,

That he would maintain the right of a man with God, And of a son of man with his neighbor!

For only a few years will pass
before I go the way of no return.

>

If not -- mockeries are with me. And in their provocations mine eye lodgeth.

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

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

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

The upright are surprised at this, and he who has done no wrong is troubled because of the evil-doers.

And the righteous layeth hold on his way, And the clean of hands addeth strength, And -- dumb are they all.

“But as for all of you, come back again,
Even though I do not find a wise man among you.

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

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

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

If I have said to corruption, Thou art my father; To the worm, Thou art my mother, and my sister;

Where now is my hope?
And who regards or considers or is even concerned about my hope?

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

How long will it be ere ye make an end of words? mark, and afterwards we will speak.

“Why are we regarded as beasts,
As if [we are] stupid (senseless) in your eyes?

He teareth himself in his anger: shall the earth be forsaken for thee? and shall the rock be removed out of his place?

Yea, the light of the wicked shall be put out, and the spark of his fire shall not shine.

The steps of his strength shall be straitened, and his own counsel shall cast him down.

A trap seizes [him] by [the] heel; a snare takes hold of him.

“The strength [of the wicked] is famished and weakened,
And disaster is ready at his side [if he stops].

It shall devour the strength of his skin: even the firstborn of death shall devour his strength.

His confidence shall be rooted out of his tabernacle, and it shall bring him to the king of terrors.

It shall dwell in his tabernacle, because it is none of his: brimstone shall be scattered upon his habitation.

His roots shall be dried up beneath, and above shall his branch be cut off.

All memory of him perishes from the earth;
he has no name anywhere.

He shall be driven from light into darkness, and chased out of the world.

He hath neither son nor grandson among his people, nor any remaining in the places of his sojourn.

“Those in the west are astonished and appalled at his fate,
And those in the east are seized with horror.

Surely such are the dwellings of the wicked, and this is the place of him that knoweth not God.

Ten times now you have made sport of me; it gives you no sense of shame to do me wrong.

“And if it were true that I have erred,
My error would remain with me [and I would be conscious of it].

If indeed ye will magnify yourselves against me, and plead against me my reproach:

then at least you must know that God has accused me of wrong, and trapped me with his net."

Behold, I cry out of wrong, but I am not heard: I cry aloud, but there is no judgment.

He hath stripped me of my glory, and taken the crown from my head.

He hath also kindled his wrath against me, and he counteth me unto him as one of his enemies.

His men of war came together, which made their way over me, and besieged my dwelling round about.

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

My relations and my near friends have given me up, and those living in my house have put me out of their minds.

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

I call for my servant, but he does not answer,
even if I beg him with my own mouth.

My breath is strange to my wife, though I intreated for the children's sake of mine own body.

Even young children despise me; If I arise, they speak against me.

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

My bone cleaveth to my skin and to my flesh, and I am escaped with the skin of my teeth.

Have pity upon me, have pity upon me, O ye my friends; for the hand of God hath touched me.

“Why do you persecute me as God does?
Why are you not satisfied with my flesh (anguish)?

“Oh, that the words I now speak were written!
Oh, that they were recorded in a scroll!

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

"For I am sure that my redeemer liveth, and that I shall rise out of the earth in the latter day:

And if after my skin this shall be destroyed, yet from out of my flesh shall I see +God;

Whom, I myself, shall see, on my side, and, mine own eyes, shall have looked upon, and not those of a stranger. Exhausted are my deepest desires in my bosom!

But ye should say, Why persecute we him, seeing the root of the matter is found in me?

Be ye afraid of the sword: for wrath bringeth the punishments of the sword, that ye may know there is a judgment.

Therefore do my thoughts give answer to me, Even by reason of my haste that is in me.

I have heard the check of my reproach, and the spirit of my understanding causeth me to answer.

Knowest thou not this of old, since man was placed upon earth,

That the triumphing of the wicked is short, and the joy of the hypocrite but for a moment?

If his elevation shall go up to the heavens, and his head shall reach to the cloud;

He shall fly away as a dream, and shall not be found: yea, he shall be chased away as a vision of the night.

The eye which saw him sees him no longer; and his place has no more knowledge of him.

His children shall seek the favor of the poor, And his hands shall give back his wealth.

His bones are full of the sin of his youth, which shall lie down with him in the dust.

"If evil is sweet in his mouth and he hides it under his tongue,

Hath pity on it, and doth not forsake it, And keep it back in the midst of his palate,

Yet his meat in his bowels is turned, it is the gall of asps within him.

He hath swallowed down riches, and he shall vomit them up again: God shall cast them out of his belly.