Job 16
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New Living TranslationHolman Christian Standard Bible
1Then Job spoke again:1Then Job answered:
2“I have heard all this before. What miserable comforters you are!2I have heard many things like these. You are all miserable comforters.
3Won’t you ever stop blowing hot air? What makes you keep on talking?3Is there no end to your empty words? What provokes you that you continue testifying?
4I could say the same things if you were in my place. I could spout off criticism and shake my head at you.4If you were in my place I could also talk like you. I could string words together against you and shake my head at you.
5But if it were me, I would encourage you. I would try to take away your grief.5Instead, I would encourage you with my mouth, and the consolation from my lips would bring relief.
6Instead, I suffer if I defend myself, and I suffer no less if I refuse to speak.6Even if I speak, my suffering is not relieved, and if I hold back, what have I lost?
7“O God, you have ground me down and devastated my family.7Surely He has now exhausted me. You have devastated my entire family.
8As if to prove I have sinned, you’ve reduced me to skin and bones. My gaunt flesh testifies against me.8You have shriveled me up--it has become a witness; My frailty rises up against me and testifies to my face.
9God hates me and angrily tears me apart. He snaps his teeth at me and pierces me with his eyes.9His anger tears at me, and He harasses me. He gnashes His teeth at me. My enemy pierces me with His eyes.
10People jeer and laugh at me. They slap my cheek in contempt. A mob gathers against me.10They open their mouths against me and strike my cheeks with contempt; they join themselves together against me.
11God has handed me over to sinners. He has tossed me into the hands of the wicked.11God hands me over to unjust men; He throws me into the hands of the wicked.
12“I was living quietly until he shattered me. He took me by the neck and broke me in pieces. Then he set me up as his target,12I was at ease, but He shattered me; He seized me by the scruff of the neck and smashed me to pieces. He set me up as His target;
13and now his archers surround me. His arrows pierce me without mercy. The ground is wet with my blood.13His archers surround me. He pierces my kidneys without mercy and pours my bile on the ground.
14Again and again he smashes against me, charging at me like a warrior.14He breaks through my defenses again and again; He charges at me like a warrior.
15I wear burlap to show my grief. My pride lies in the dust.15I have sewn sackcloth over my skin; I have buried my strength in the dust.
16My eyes are red with weeping; dark shadows circle my eyes.16My face has grown red with weeping, and darkness covers my eyes,
17Yet I have done no wrong, and my prayer is pure.17although my hands are free from violence and my prayer is pure.
18“O earth, do not conceal my blood. Let it cry out on my behalf.18Earth, do not cover my blood; may my cry for help find no resting place.
19Even now my witness is in heaven. My advocate is there on high.19Even now my witness is in heaven, and my advocate is in the heights!
20My friends scorn me, but I pour out my tears to God.20My friends scoff at me as I weep before God.
21I need someone to mediate between God and me, as a person mediates between friends.21I wish that someone might arbitrate between a man and God just as a man pleads for his friend.
22For soon I must go down that road from which I will never return.22For only a few years will pass before I go the way of no return.
Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.Holman Christian Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1999, 2000, 2002, 2003, 2009 by Holman Bible Publishers. Used by permission.
Job 15
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