Job 29-30

Job 29

¹And Job continued his parable and said,

²Oh that I were as in months past, as in the days when +God preserved me;

³When his lamp shone over my head, and by his light I walked through darkness;

⁴As I was in the days of my youth, when the secret counsel of +God was over my tent,

⁵When the Almighty was yet with me, my young men round about me;

⁶When my steps were bathed in milk, and the rock poured out beside me rivers of oil! ...

⁷When I went out to the gate by the city, when I prepared my seat on the broadway,

⁸The young men saw me, and hid themselves; and the aged arose and stood up;

⁹Princes refrained from talking, and laid the hand on their mouth;

¹⁰The voice of the nobles was hushed, and their tongue cleaved to their palate.

¹¹When the ear heard me, then it blessed me, and when the eye saw me, it gave witness to me;

¹²For I delivered the afflicted that cried, and the fatherless who had no helper.

¹³The blessing of him that was perishing came upon me, and I caused the widow's heart to sing for joy.

¹⁴I put on righteousness, and it clothed me; my justice was as a mantle and a turban.

¹⁵I was eyes to the blind, and feet was I to the lame;

¹⁶I was a father to the needy, and the cause which I knew not I searched out;

¹⁷And I broke the jaws of the unrighteous, and plucked the spoil out of his teeth.

¹⁸And I said, I shall die in my nest, and multiply my days as the sand;

¹⁹My root shall be spread out to the waters, and the dew will lie all night on my branch;

²⁰My glory shall be fresh in me, and my bow be renewed in my hand.

²¹Unto me they listened, and waited, and kept silence for my counsel:

²²After my words they spoke not again, and my speech dropped upon them;

²³And they waited for me as for the rain, and they opened their mouth wide as for the latter rain.

²⁴If I laughed on them, they believed it not; and they troubled not the serenity of my countenance.

²⁵I chose their way, and sat as chief, and dwelt as a king in the army, as one that comforteth mourners.

Job 30

¹But now they that are younger than I have me in derision, whose fathers I would have disdained to set with the dogs of my flock.

²Yea, whereto should the strength of their hands profit me, men in whom vigour hath perished?

³Withered up through want and hunger, they flee into waste places long since desolate and desert:

⁴They gather the salt-wort among the bushes, and the roots of the broom for their food.

⁵They are driven forth from among men -- they cry after them as after a thief --

⁶To dwell in gloomy gorges, in caves of the earth and the rocks:

⁷They bray among the bushes; under the brambles they are gathered together:

⁸Sons of fools, and sons of nameless sires, they are driven out of the land.

⁹And now I am their song, yea, I am their byword.

¹⁰They abhor me, they stand aloof from me, yea, they spare not to spit in my face.

¹¹For he hath loosed my cord and afflicted me; so they cast off the bridle before me.

¹²At my right hand rise the young brood; they push away my feet, and raise up against me their pernicious ways;

¹³They mar my path, they set forward my calamity, without any to help them;

¹⁴They come in as through a wide breach: amid the confusion they roll themselves onward.

¹⁵Terrors are turned against me; they pursue mine honour as the wind; and my welfare is passed away like a cloud.

¹⁶And now my soul is poured out in me; days of affliction have taken hold upon me.

¹⁷The night pierceth through my bones and detacheth them from me, and my gnawing pains take no rest:

¹⁸By their great force they have become my raiment; they bind me about as the collar of my coat.

¹⁹He hath cast me into the mire, and I have become like dust and ashes.

²⁰I cry unto thee, and thou answerest me not; I stand up, and thou lookest at me.

²¹Thou art changed to a cruel one to me; with the strength of thy hand thou pursuest me.

²²Thou liftest me up to the wind; thou causest me to be borne away, and dissolvest my substance.

²³For I know that thou wilt bring me to death, and into the house of assemblage for all living.

²⁴Indeed, no prayer availeth when he stretcheth out his hand: though they cry when he destroyeth.

²⁵Did not I weep for him whose days were hard? was not my soul grieved for the needy?

²⁶For I expected good, and there came evil; and I waited for light, but there came darkness.

²⁷My bowels well up, and rest not; days of affliction have confronted me.

²⁸I go about blackened, but not by the sun; I stand up, I cry in the congregation.

²⁹I am become a brother to jackals, and a companion of ostriches.

³⁰My skin is become black and falleth off me, and my bones are parched with heat.

³¹My harp also is turned to mourning, and my pipe into the voice of weepers.