Job 19-20

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 God, 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,

¹³Though 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: God 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 God.