1Then Job answered and said,
2How long will ye vex my soul, and break me in pieces with words?
3These ten times have ye reproached me: ye are not ashamed that ye make yourselves strange to me.
4And be it indeed that I have erred, my error remaineth with myself.
5If indeed ye will magnify yourselves against me, and plead against me my reproach:
6Know now that God hath overthrown me, and hath encompassed me with his net.
7Behold, I cry out of wrong, but I am not heard: I cry aloud, but there is no judgment.
8He hath fenced 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 hath destroyed me on every side, and I am gone: and my hope hath he removed like a tree.
11He hath also kindled his wrath against me, and he counteth me to him as one of his enemies.
12His troops come together, and raise up their way against me, and encamp around my tabernacle.
13He hath put my brethren far from me, and my acquaintance are verily estranged from me.
14My kinsmen have failed, and my familiar friends have forgotten me.
15They that dwell in my house, and my maids, count me for a stranger: I am an alien in their sight.
16I called my servant, and he gave me no answer; I entreated him with my mouth.
17My breath is strange to my wife, though I entreated for the children's sake of my own body.
18Yes, young children despised me; I arose, and they spoke against me.
19All my intimate friends abhorred me: and they whom I loved are turned against me.
20My bone cleaveth to my skin and to my flesh, and I have escaped with the skin of my teeth.
21Have pity upon me, have pity upon me, O 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 that my words were now written! oh that they were printed in a book!
24That they were graven with an iron pen in lead, in the rock for ever!
25For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he will stand at the latter day upon the earth:
26And though after my skin worms destroy this body , yet in my flesh shall I see God:
27Whom I shall see for myself, and my eyes shall behold, and not another; though my reins be consumed within me.
28But ye would say, Why persecute we him, seeing the root of the matter is found in me?
29Be ye afraid of the sword: for wrath bringeth the punishments of the sword, that ye may know there is a judgment.