Job 30

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¹But now people much younger than me laugh at me; people whose fathers I would not put to work with my sheepdogs.

²They are too weak to be any use to me; they're all worn-out.

³Thin through hunger and want, they try to eat the dry ground in the dark, desolate wilderness.

⁴There they pick desert herbs and the leaves of bushes, and eat the roots of broom trees.

⁵They were driven out of the community.

⁶People shouted after them as if they were thieves. They have to live in dangerous ravines, in caves and among the rocks.

⁷They shout out like animals among the bushes; they huddle together in the weeds for shelter.

⁸They are foolish, nameless people that have been driven from the land.

⁹Yet now they mock me in their songs; I have become a joke to them!

¹⁰They despise and shun me; they don't hesitate to spit in my face.

¹¹God has made my bowstring loose and humbled me.

¹²The rabble rise up against me, they send me running; like a city under siege they devise ways to destroy me.

¹³They cut off my way of escape; they bring about my downfall and do this without anyone's help.

¹⁴They come in through a wide breach; they rush in as the wall comes tumbling down.

¹⁵Terrors overcome me; my honor is blown away by the wind; my salvation vanishes like a cloud.

¹⁶And now my life is ebbing away; every day despair grips me.

¹⁷At night my bones are in agony; the pain gnaws at me and never stops.

¹⁸God grabs me roughly by my clothes; he pulls me by the collar of my shirt.

¹⁹He has thrown me in the mud; he has humbled me like dust and ashes.

²⁰God, I cry to you but you don't answer; I stand before you, but you don't even notice me.

²¹You have turned cruel to me; you use your power to make me suffer.

²²You pick me up and blow me along in the wind; tossing me about in the whirlwind.

²³I know you're taking me to my death, to the place where all the living go.

²⁴Who would want to kick a man when he is down, when they cry for help in their time of trouble?

²⁵Didn't I weep for those having hard times? Didn't I grieve at what the poor suffered?

²⁶But when I looked for good, only evil came, and when I waited for the light, all that came was darkness.

²⁷Inside I am in turmoil, it never stops; I face days of despair.

²⁸I am so depressed; seeing the sun doesn't help. I stand up in the assembly and cry for help.

²⁹I am like a brother to the jackals, a companion to owls.

³⁰My skin turns black on me; and my bones burn within me.

³¹My lyre only plays sad songs, and my pipe is the voice of those who weep.