Job 17

₁‘I am broken, my life is over,

and my grave is waiting for me.

₂Everyone is mocking me.

I look at my enemies who are against me.

₃God, will You please pay

the price to set me free?

There is no one else who wants to help me.

₄You have closed the minds

of my friends so that they can not understand.

Please don't let them win.

₅If someone betrays his friends to get money,

his children will suffer. They will become blind.’

₆‘People use my name when they

want to humiliate each other,

and they spit in my face.

₇I am suffering so much

that I almost can not see.

My body is like a shadow.

₈Honest people become afraid

when they see me.

Innocent people rebel_against

people who don't want to serve God.

₉People who live in the right way

will keep on living in the right way,

and people who are pure

will become stronger and stronger.

₁₀All of you can try again

to say things that are right,

but I will never find wisdom among you.’

₁₁‘My life has gone by,

and I can not do the things that I wanted to do.

₁₂My friends say that my night is day

and the light is near.

They say my problems are over,

but I stay in darkness.

₁₃I hope that the grave

will soon be my home.

I will make my bed in the darkness.

₁₄I will say to the grave:

“You are my father,”

and I will say to the worms:

“You are my mother and my sisters,”

₁₅but then there is no hope for me.

There is no one who can help me

have hope again.

₁₆Everything that I have hoped for

will go with me to my grave,

and we will lie down in the dust together.’