﻿Job.
Chapter 16.
Then Job answered and said, 
I have heard many such things: miserable comforters are ye all. 
Shall vain words have an end? or what emboldeneth thee that thou answerest? 
I also could speak as ye do : if your soul were in my soul's stead, I could heap up words against you, and shake my head at you. 
But I would strengthen you with my mouth and the moving of my lips should assuage your grief . 
Though I speak, my grief is not assuaged: and though I forbear, what am I eased? 
But now he hath made me weary: thou hast made desolate all my company. 
And thou hast filled me with wrinkles, which is a witness against me : and my leanness rising up in me beareth witness to my face. 
He teareth me in his wrath, who hateth me: he gnasheth upon me with his teeth; my enemy sharpeneth his eyes upon me. 
They have gaped upon me with their mouth; they have smitten me upon the cheek reproachfully; they have gathered themselves against me. 
God hath delivered me to the ungodly, and turned me over into the hands of the wicked. 
I was at ease, but he hath broken me asunder: he hath also taken me by my neck, and shaken me to pieces, and set me up for his mark. 
His archers encompass me; he cleaveth my reins asunder, and doth not spare; he poureth out my gall upon the ground. 
He breaketh me with breach upon breach, he runneth upon me like a giant. 
I have sewed sackcloth upon my skin, and defiled my horn in the dust. 
My face is foul with weeping, and on my eyelids are the shades of death; 
Not for any injustice in my hands: also my prayer is pure. 
O earth, cover not thou my blood, and let my cry have no place. 
Also now, behold, my witness is in heaven, and my record is on high. 
My friends scorn me: but my eye poureth out tears to God. 
O that one might plead for a man with God, as a man pleadeth for his neighbor! 
When a few years are come, then I shall go the way whence I shall not return. 
