Failed friendship

¹Then Job responded:

²How long will you harass me

and crush me with words?

³These ten times you’ve humiliated me;

shamelessly you insult me.

⁴Have I really gone astray?

If so, my error remains hidden inside me.

⁵If you look down on me

⁶know then that God has wronged me

God’s treatment of Job

⁷If I cry “Violence!” I’m not answered;

I shout—but there is no justice.

⁸He walled up my path so I can’t pass

⁹stripped my honor from me,

¹⁰tore me down completely so that I’ll die, and uprooted my hope like a tree.

¹¹His anger burns against me;

he considers me his enemy.

¹²His troops come as one

and construct their siege ramp against me;

they camp around my tent.

Social ostracism

¹³He has distanced my family from me;

my acquaintances are also alienated from me.

¹⁴My visitors have ceased;

those who know me have forgotten me.

¹⁵My guests and female servants think me a stranger;

I’m a foreigner in their sight.

¹⁶I call my servant, and he doesn’t answer;

I myself must beg him.

¹⁷My breath stinks to my wife;

I am odious to my children.

¹⁸Even the young despise me;

I get up, and they rail against me.

¹⁹All my closest friends despise me;

the ones I have loved turn against me.

Misery

²⁰My bones cling to my skin and flesh;

I have escaped by the skin of my teeth.

²¹Pity me. Pity me. You’re my friends.

God’s hand has truly struck me.

²²Why do you pursue me like God does,

always hungry for my flesh?

Brief hope

²³Oh, that my words were written down,

²⁴with an iron instrument and lead,

²⁵But I know that my redeemer is alive[#19.25 Or avenger]

²⁶After my skin has been torn apart this way—

then from my flesh I’ll see God,

I am utterly dejected.

Warning

²⁸You say, “How will we pursue him

so that the root of the matter can be found in him?”

²⁹You ought to fear the sword yourselves,

for wrath brings punishment by the sword.

You should know that there is judgment.