¹³ “Therefore I will also ^(A)make you sick by striking you,
By making you desolate because of your sins.

⁴ “The^(A) Lord God has given Me
The tongue of the learned,
That I should know how to speak
A word in season to him who is ^(B)weary.
He awakens Me morning by morning,
He awakens My ear
To hear as the learned.

^11 (A)My son, do not despise the chastening of the Lord,
Nor detest His correction;
¹² For whom the Lord loves He corrects,
^(B)Just as a father the son in whom he delights.

⁶ I am weary with my groaning;
^[a]All night I make my bed swim;
I drench my couch with my tears.
^7 (A)My eye wastes away because of grief;
It grows old because of all my enemies.

⁷ “When I went out to the gate by the city,
When I took my seat in the open square,
⁸ The young men saw me and hid,
And the aged arose and stood;
⁹ The princes refrained from talking,
And ^(C)put their hand on their mouth;
¹⁰ The voice of nobles was hushed,
And their ^(D)tongue stuck to the roof of their mouth.
¹¹ When the ear heard, then it blessed me,
And when the eye saw, then it approved me;
¹² Because ^(E)I delivered the poor who cried out,
The fatherless and the one who had no helper.
¹³ The blessing of a perishing man came upon me,
And I caused the widow’s heart to sing for joy.
^14 (F)I put on righteousness, and it clothed me;
My justice was like a robe and a turban.
¹⁵ I was ^(G)eyes to the blind,
And I was feet to the lame.
¹⁶ I was a father to the poor,
And ^(H)I searched out the case that I did not know.
¹⁷ I broke ^(I)the fangs of the wicked,
And plucked the victim from his teeth.

¹⁸ “Then I said, ^(J)‘I shall die in my nest,
And multiply my days as the sand.
^19 (K)My root is spread out ^(L)to the waters,
And the dew lies all night on my branch.
²⁰ My glory is fresh within me,
And my ^(M)bow is renewed in my hand.’

²¹ “Men listened to me and waited,
And kept silence for my counsel.
²² After my words they did not speak again,
And my speech settled on them as dew.
²³ They waited for me as for the rain,
And they opened their mouth wide as for ^(N)the spring rain.
²⁴ If I mocked at them, they did not believe it,
And the light of my countenance they did not cast down.
²⁵ I chose the way for them, and sat as chief;
So I dwelt as a king in the army,
As one who comforts mourners.