¹“My spirit is consumed.

My days are extinct

and the grave is ready for me .

²Surely there are mockers with me .

My eye dwells on their provocation .

³“Now give a pledge. Be collateral for me with yourself .

Who is there who will strike hands with me ?

⁴For you have hidden their heart from understanding ,

therefore you will not exalt them .

⁵He who denounces his friends for plunder,

even the eyes of his children will fail .

⁶“But he has made me a byword of the people .

They spit in my face .

⁷My eye also is dim by reason of sorrow .

All my members are as a shadow .

⁸Upright men will be astonished at this .

The innocent will stir himself up against the godless .

⁹Yet the righteous will hold to his way .

He who has clean hands will grow stronger and stronger.

¹⁰But as for you all , come back .

I will not find a wise man amongst you .

¹¹My days are past .

My plans are broken off ,

as are the thoughts of my heart .

¹²They change the night into day ,

saying ‘The light is near ’ in the presence of darkness .

¹³If I look for Sheol as my house ,[#17:13 Sheol is the place of the dead.]

if I have spread my couch in the darkness ,

¹⁴if I have said to corruption , ‘You are my father,’

and to the worm , ‘My mother,’ and ‘My sister,’

¹⁵where then is my hope ?

As for my hope , who will see it?

¹⁶Shall it go down with me to the gates of Sheol ,[#17:16 Sheol is the place of the dead.]

or descend together into the dust ?”