² How long will you harass me
    and crush me with words?
³ These ten times you’ve humiliated me;
    shamelessly you insult me.
⁴ Have I really gone astray?
    If so, my error remains hidden inside me.
⁵ If you look down on me
        and use my disgrace to criticize me,
⁶     know then that God has wronged me
        and enclosed his net over me.

⁷ If I cry “Violence!” I’m not answered;
    I shout—but there is no justice.

¹⁴ My visitors have ceased;
    those who know me have forgotten me.
¹⁵ My guests and female servants think me a stranger;
    I’m a foreigner in their sight.
¹⁶ I call my servant, and he doesn’t answer;
    I myself must beg him.
¹⁷ My breath stinks to my wife;
    I am odious to my children.
¹⁸ Even the young despise me;
    I get up, and they rail against me.
¹⁹ All my closest friends despise me;
    the ones I have loved turn against me.

²⁰ My bones cling to my skin and flesh;
    I have escaped by the skin of my teeth.
²¹ Pity me. Pity me. You’re my friends.
    God’s hand has truly struck me.
²² Why do you pursue me like God does,
    always hungry for my flesh?

²³ Oh, that my words were written down,
        inscribed on a scroll
²⁴     with an iron instrument and lead,
        forever engraved on stone.
²⁵ But I know that my redeemer^[a] is alive
        and afterward he’ll rise upon the dust.
²⁶ After my skin has been torn apart this way—
    then from my flesh^[b] I’ll see God,
²⁷         whom I’ll see myself—
        my eyes see,^[c] and not a stranger’s.
    I am utterly dejected.