"But he has made me a byword of the people. They spit in my face.

Yet shall the righteous hold on his way. He who has clean hands shall grow stronger and stronger.

But as for you all, come on now again; I shall not find a wise man among you.

They change the night into day, saying 'The light is near' in the presence of darkness.

If I look for Sheol as my house, if I have spread my couch in the darkness,

Why are we counted as animals, which have become unclean in your sight?

You who tear yourself in your anger, shall the earth be forsaken for you? Or shall the rock be removed out of its place?

The light shall be dark in his tent. His lamp above him shall be put out.

The steps of his strength shall be shortened. His own counsel shall cast him down.

For he is cast into a net by his own feet, and he wanders into its mesh.

A noose is hidden for him in the ground, a trap for him in the way.

Terrors shall make him afraid on every side, and shall chase him at his heels.

There shall dwell in his tent that which is none of his. Sulfur shall be scattered on his habitation.

His memory shall perish from the earth. He shall have no name in the street.

He has walled up my way so that I can't pass, and has set darkness in my paths.

He has broken me down on every side, and I am gone. My hope he has plucked up like a tree.

His troops come on together, build a siege ramp against me, and encamp around my tent.

Those who dwell in my house, and my maids, count me for a stranger. I am a foreigner in their sight.

My breath is offensive to my wife. I am loathsome to the children of my own mother.

"Have pity on me, have pity on me, you my friends; for the hand of God has touched me.

"Oh that my words were now written. Oh that they were inscribed in a book.

That with an iron pen and lead they were engraved in the rock forever.

But as for me, I know that my Redeemer lives. In the end, he will stand upon the earth.

After my skin is destroyed, then in my flesh shall I see God,

Whom I, even I, shall see on my side. My eyes shall see, and not as a stranger. "My heart is consumed within me.

If you say, 'How we will persecute him.' because the root of the matter is found in me,

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

Do you not know this from old time, since man was placed on earth,

yet he shall perish forever like his own dung. Those who have seen him shall say, 'Where is he?'

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

"Though wickedness is sweet in his mouth, though he hide it under his tongue,

yet his food in his bowels is turned. It is cobra venom within him.

"Because he knew no quietness within him, he shall not save anything of that in which he delights.

In the fullness of his sufficiency, distress shall overtake him. The hand of everyone who is in misery shall come on him.

When he is about to fill his belly, God will cast the fierceness of his wrath on him. It will rain on him while he is eating.

He draws it forth, and it comes out of his body. Yes, the glittering point comes out of his liver. Terrors are on him.

All darkness is laid up for his treasures. An unfanned fire shall devour him. It shall consume that which is left in his tent.

The increase of his house shall depart. They shall rush away in the day of his wrath.

Allow me, and I also will speak; After I have spoken, mock on.

Look at me, and be astonished. Lay your hand on your mouth.

When I remember, I am troubled. Horror takes hold of my flesh.

"Why do the wicked live, become old, yes, and grow mighty in power?

Their child is established with them in their sight, their offspring before their eyes.

They spend their days in prosperity. In an instant they go down to Sheol.

Behold, their prosperity is not in their hand. The counsel of the wicked is far from me.

"How often is it that the lamp of the wicked is put out, that their calamity comes on them, that God distributes sorrows in his anger?

Let his own eyes see his destruction. Let him drink of the wrath of Shaddai.

For what does he care for his house after him, when the number of his months is cut off?

One dies in his full strength, being wholly at ease and quiet.

Another dies in bitterness of soul, and never tastes of good.

They lie down alike in the dust. The worm covers them.

For you say, 'Where is the house of the prince? Where is the tent in which the wicked lived?'

So how can you comfort me with nonsense, seeing that in your answers there remains only falsehood?"

But as for the mighty man, he had the earth. The honorable man, he lived in it.

"Isn't God in the heights of heaven? See the height of the stars, how high they are.

Thick clouds are a covering to him, so that he doesn't see. He walks on the vault of the sky.'

Please receive instruction from his mouth, and lay up his words in your heart.

Lay your treasure in the dust, the gold of Ophir among the stones of the brooks.

For then you will delight yourself in Shaddai, and shall lift up your face to God.

You shall also decree a thing, and it shall be established for you, and light shall shine on your ways.

When they cast down, you shall say, 'be lifted up.' He will save the humble person.

"Even today my complaint is rebellious. His hand is heavy in spite of my groaning.

I would set my cause in order before him, and fill my mouth with arguments.

Would he contend with me in the greatness of his power? No, but he would listen to me.

But he knows the way that I take. When he has tried me, I shall come forth like gold.

Therefore I am terrified at his presence. When I consider, I am afraid of him.

Behold, as wild donkeys in the desert, they go forth to their work, seeking diligently for food. The wilderness yields them bread for their children.

They cut their provender in the field. They glean the vineyard of the wicked.

They lie all night naked without clothing, and have no covering in the cold.

They make oil within the walls of these men. They tread wine presses, and suffer thirst.

"These are of those who rebel against the light. They do not know its ways, nor abide in its paths.

The murderer rises with the light. He kills the poor and needy. In the night he is like a thief.

In the dark they dig through houses. They shut themselves up in the daytime. They do not know the light.

"They are foam on the surface of the waters. Their portion is cursed in the earth. They do not turn into the way of the vineyards.

The womb shall forget him. The worm shall feed sweetly on him. He shall be no more remembered. Unrighteousness shall be broken as a tree.

God gives them security, and they rest in it. His eyes are on their ways.

"Dominion and fear are with him. He makes peace in his high places.

Can his armies be counted? On whom does his light not arise?

Behold, even the moon has no brightness, and the stars are not pure in his sight;

"Those who are deceased tremble, those beneath the waters and all that live in them.

He stretches out the north over empty space, and hangs the earth on nothing.

He binds up the waters in his thick clouds, and the cloud is not burst under them.

He encloses the face of his throne, and spreads his cloud on it.

He has described a boundary on the surface of the waters, and to the confines of light and darkness.

(For the length of my life is still in me, and the spirit of God is in my nostrils);

For what is the hope of the godless, when he is cut off, when God takes away his life?

Will God hear his cry when trouble comes on him?

Will he delight himself in Shaddai, and call on God at all times?

Those who remain of him shall be buried in death. His widows shall make no lamentation.

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

Terrors overtake him like waters. A storm steals him away in the night.

Man sets an end to darkness, and searches out, to the furthest bound, the stones of obscurity and of thick darkness.

He puts forth his hand on the flinty rock, and he overturns the mountains by the roots.

Man doesn't know its price; Neither is it found in the land of the living.

The deep says, 'It isn't in me.' The sea says, 'It isn't with me.'

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

"Oh that I were as in the months of old, as in the days when God watched over me;

when his lamp shone on my head, and by his light I walked through darkness,

as I was in the ripeness of my days, when the friendship of God was in my tent,

when Shaddai was yet with me, and my children were around me,