Job 17-20 (Darby Translation)

Job 17

 ¹My breath is corrupt, my days are extinct, the graves are mine.

 ²Are there not mockers around me? and doth [not] mine eye abide in their provocation?

 ³Lay down now [a pledge], be thou surety for me with thyself: who is he that striketh hands with me?

 ⁴For thou hast hidden their heart from understanding; therefore thou wilt not exalt [them].

 ⁵He that betrayeth friends for a prey -- even the eyes of his children shall fail.

 ⁶And he hath made me a proverb of the peoples; and I am become one to be spit on in the face.

 ⁷And mine eye is dim by reason of grief, and all my members are as a shadow.

 ⁸Upright men [shall be] astonished at this, and the innocent shall be stirred up against the ungodly;

 ⁹But the righteous shall hold on his way, and he that hath clean hands shall increase in strength.

 ¹⁰But as for you all, pray come on again; and I shall not find one wise man among you.

 ¹¹My days are past, my purposes are broken off, the cherished thoughts of my heart.

 ¹²They change the night into day; the light [they imagine] near in presence of the darkness.

 ¹³If I wait, Sheol is my house; I spread my bed in the darkness:

 ¹⁴I cry to the grave, Thou art my father! to the worm, My mother, and my sister!

 ¹⁵And where is then my hope? yea, my hope, who shall see it?

 ¹⁶It shall go down to the bars of Sheol, when [our] rest shall be together in the dust.

Job 18

 ¹And Bildad the Shuhite answered and said,

 ²How long will ye hunt for words? Be intelligent, and then we will speak.

 ³Wherefore are we counted as beasts, and reputed stupid in your sight?

 ⁴Thou that tearest thyself in thine anger, shall the earth be forsaken for thee? and shall the rock be removed out of its place?

 ⁵Yea, the light of the wicked shall be put out, and the flame of his fire shall not shine.

 ⁶The light shall become dark in his tent, and his lamp over him shall be put out.

 ⁷The steps of his strength shall be straitened, and his own counsel shall cast him down.

 ⁸For he is sent into the net by his own feet, and he walketh on the meshes;

 ⁹The gin taketh [him] by the heel, the snare layeth hold on him;

 ¹⁰A cord is hidden for him in the ground, and his trap in the way.

 ¹¹Terrors make him afraid on every side, and chase him at his footsteps.

 ¹²His strength is hunger-bitten, and calamity is ready at his side.

 ¹³The firstborn of death devoureth the members of his body; it will devour his members.

 ¹⁴His confidence shall be rooted out of his tent, and it shall lead him away to the king of terrors:

 ¹⁵They who are none of his shall dwell in his tent; brimstone shall be showered upon his habitation:

 ¹⁶His roots shall be dried up beneath, and above shall his branch be cut off;

 ¹⁷His remembrance shall perish from the earth, and he shall have no name on the pasture-grounds.

 ¹⁸He is driven from light into darkness, and chased out of the world.

 ¹⁹He hath neither son nor grandson among his people, nor any remaining in the places of his sojourn.

 ²⁰They that come after shall be astonished at his day, as they that went before [them] were affrighted.

 ²¹Surely, such are the dwellings of the unrighteous man, and such the place of him that knoweth not ùGod.

Job 19

 ¹And Job answered and said,

 ²How long will ye vex my soul, and crush me with words?

 ³These ten times have ye reproached me; ye are not ashamed to stupefy me.

 ⁴And be it [that] I have erred, mine error remaineth with myself.

 ⁵If indeed ye will magnify yourselves against me, and prove against me my reproach,

 ⁶Know now that +God hath overthrown me, and hath surrounded me with his net.

 ⁷Behold, I cry out of wrong, and I am not heard; I cry aloud, but there is no judgment.

 ⁸He hath hedged up my way that I cannot pass, and he hath set darkness in my paths.

 ⁹He hath stripped me of my glory, and taken the crown from my head.

 ¹⁰He breaketh me down on every side, and I am gone; and my hope hath he torn up as a tree.

 ¹¹And he hath kindled his anger against me, and hath counted me unto him as one of his enemies.

 ¹²His troops have come together and cast up their way against me, and have encamped round about my tent.

 ¹³He hath put my brethren far from me, and mine acquaintance are quite estranged from me.

 ¹⁴My kinsfolk have failed, and my known friends have forgotten me.

 ¹⁵The sojourners in my house and my maids count me as a stranger; I am an alien in their sight.

 ¹⁶I called my servant, and he answered not; I entreated him with my mouth.

 ¹⁷My breath is strange to my wife, and my entreaties to the children of my [mother's] womb.

 ¹⁸Even young children despise me; I rise up, and they speak against me.

 ¹⁹All my intimate friends abhor me, and they whom I loved are turned against me.

 ²⁰My bones cleave to my skin and to my flesh, and I am escaped with the skin of my teeth.

 ²¹Have pity upon me, have pity upon me, ye my friends; for the hand of +God hath touched me.

 ²²Why do ye persecute me as ùGod, and are not satisfied with my flesh?

 ²³Oh would that my words were written! oh that they were inscribed in a book!

 ²⁴That with an iron style and lead they were graven in the rock for ever!

 ²⁵And [as for] me, I know that my Redeemer liveth, and the Last, he shall stand upon the earth;

 ²⁶And [if] after my skin this shall be destroyed, yet from out of my flesh shall I see +God;

 ²⁷Whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not another: -- my reins are consumed within me.

 ²⁸If ye say, How shall we persecute him? when the root of the matter is found in me,

 ²⁹Be ye yourselves afraid of the sword! for the sword is fury against misdeeds, that ye may know there is a judgment.

Job 20

 ¹And Zophar the Naamathite answered and said,

 ²Therefore do my thoughts give me an answer, and for this is my haste within me.

 ³I hear a reproof putting me to shame; and [my] spirit answereth me by mine understanding.

 ⁴Knowest thou [not] this, that of old, since man was placed upon earth,

 ⁵The exultation of the wicked is short, and the joy of the ungodly man but for a moment?

 ⁶Though his height mount up to the heavens, and his head reach unto the clouds,

 ⁷Like his own dung doth he perish for ever; they which have seen him shall say, Where is he?

 ⁸He flieth away as a dream, and is not found; and is chased away as a vision of the night.

 ⁹The eye which saw him shall [see him] not again; and his place beholdeth him no more.

 ¹⁰His children shall seek the favour of the poor, and his hands restore his wealth.

 ¹¹His bones were full of his youthful strength; but it shall lie down with him in the dust.

 ¹²Though wickedness be sweet in his mouth [and] he hide it under his tongue,

 ¹³[Though] he spare it, and forsake it not, but keep it within his mouth,

 ¹⁴His food is turned in his bowels; it is the gall of asps within him.

 ¹⁵He hath swallowed down riches, but he shall vomit them up again: ùGod shall cast them out of his belly.

 ¹⁶He shall suck the poison of asps; the viper's tongue shall kill him.

 ¹⁷He shall not see streams, rivers, brooks of honey and butter.

 ¹⁸That which he laboured for shall he restore, and not swallow down; its restitution shall be according to the value, and he shall not rejoice [therein].

 ¹⁹For he hath oppressed, hath forsaken the poor; he hath violently taken away a house that he did not build.

 ²⁰Because he knew no rest in his craving, he shall save nought of what he most desired.

 ²¹Nothing escaped his greediness; therefore his prosperity shall not endure.

 ²²In the fulness of his sufficiency he shall be in straits; every hand of the wretched shall come upon him.

 ²³It shall be that, to fill his belly, he will cast his fierce anger upon him, and will rain it upon him into his flesh.

 ²⁴If he have fled from the iron weapon, the bow of brass shall strike him through.

 ²⁵He draweth it forth; it cometh out of his body, and the glittering point out of his gall: terrors are upon him.

 ²⁶All darkness is laid up for his treasures: a fire not blown shall devour him; it shall feed upon what is left in his tent.

 ²⁷The heavens shall reveal his iniquity, and the earth shall rise up against him.

 ²⁸The increase of his house shall depart, flowing away in the day of his anger.

 ²⁹This is the portion of the wicked man from God, and the heritage appointed to him by ùGod.