Job 30

“But now they mock me,
    men younger than I,
whose fathers I would have disdained
    to put with my sheep dogs.

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

Of what use was the strength of their hands to me,
    since their vigor had gone from them?

Yea, whereto might the strength of their hands profit me, in whom old age was perished?

Haggard from want and hunger,
    they roamed^[a] the parched land
    in desolate wastelands at night.

For want and famine they were solitary; fleeing into the wilderness in former time desolate and waste.

In the brush they gathered salt herbs,
    and their food^[b] was the root of the broom bush.

Who cut up mallows by the bushes, and juniper roots for their meat.

They were banished from human society,
    shouted at as if they were thieves.

They were driven forth from among men, (they cried after them as after a thief;)

They were forced to live in the dry stream beds,
    among the rocks and in holes in the ground.

To dwell in the cliffs of the valleys, in caves of the earth, and in the rocks.

They brayed among the bushes
    and huddled in the undergrowth.

Among the bushes they brayed; under the nettles they were gathered together.

A base and nameless brood,
    they were driven out of the land.

They were children of fools, yea, children of base men: they were viler than the earth.

“And now those young men mock me in song;
    I have become a byword among them.

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

They detest me and keep their distance;
    they do not hesitate to spit in my face.

They abhor me, they flee far from me, and spare not to spit in my face.

Now that God has unstrung my bow and afflicted me,
    they throw off restraint in my presence.

Because he hath loosed my cord, and afflicted me, they have also let loose the bridle before me.

On my right the tribe^[c] attacks;
    they lay snares for my feet,
    they build their siege ramps against me.

Upon my right hand rise the youth; they push away my feet, and they raise up against me the ways of their destruction.

They break up my road;
    they succeed in destroying me.
    ‘No one can help him,’ they say.

They mar my path, they set forward my calamity, they have no helper.

They advance as through a gaping breach;
    amid the ruins they come rolling in.

They came upon me as a wide breaking in of waters: in the desolation they rolled themselves upon me.

Terrors overwhelm me;
    my dignity is driven away as by the wind,
    my safety vanishes like a cloud.

Terrors are turned upon me: they pursue my soul as the wind: and my welfare passeth away as a cloud.

“And now my life ebbs away;
    days of suffering grip me.

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

Night pierces my bones;
    my gnawing pains never rest.

My bones are pierced in me in the night season: and my sinews take no rest.

In his great power God becomes like clothing to me^[d];
    he binds me like the neck of my garment.

By the great force of my disease is my garment changed: it bindeth me about as the collar of my coat.

He throws me into the mud,
    and I am reduced to dust and ashes.

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

“I cry out to you, God, but you do not answer;
    I stand up, but you merely look at me.

I cry unto thee, and thou dost not hear me: I stand up, and thou regardest me not.

You turn on me ruthlessly;
    with the might of your hand you attack me.

Thou art become cruel to me: with thy strong hand thou opposest thyself against me.

You snatch me up and drive me before the wind;
    you toss me about in the storm.

Thou liftest me up to the wind; thou causest me to ride upon it, and dissolvest my substance.

I know you will bring me down to death,
    to the place appointed for all the living.

For I know that thou wilt bring me to death, and to the house appointed for all living.

“Surely no one lays a hand on a broken man
    when he cries for help in his distress.

Howbeit he will not stretch out his hand to the grave, though they cry in his destruction.

Have I not wept for those in trouble?
    Has not my soul grieved for the poor?

Did not I weep for him that was in trouble? was not my soul grieved for the poor?

Yet when I hoped for good, evil came;
    when I looked for light, then came darkness.

When I looked for good, then evil came unto me: and when I waited for light, there came darkness.

The churning inside me never stops;
    days of suffering confront me.

My bowels boiled, and rested not: the days of affliction prevented me.

I go about blackened, but not by the sun;
    I stand up in the assembly and cry for help.

I went mourning without the sun: I stood up, and I cried in the congregation.

I have become a brother of jackals,
    a companion of owls.

I am a brother to dragons, and a companion to owls.

My skin grows black and peels;
    my body burns with fever.

My skin is black upon me, and my bones are burned with heat.

My lyre is tuned to mourning,
    and my pipe to the sound of wailing.