Chapter 16

  And Job made answer and said,  

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  Such things have frequently come to my ears: you are comforters who only give trouble.  

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  May words which are like the wind be stopped? or what is troubling you to make answer to them?  

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  It would not be hard for me to say such things if your souls were in my soul's place; joining words together against you, and shaking my head at you:  

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  I might give you strength with my mouth, and not keep back the comfort of my lips.  

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  If I say what is in my mind, my pain becomes no less: and if I keep quiet, how much of it goes from me?  

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  But now he has overcome me with weariness and fear, and I am in the grip of all my trouble.  

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  It has come up as a witness against me, and the wasting of my flesh makes answer to my face.  

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  I am broken by his wrath, and his hate has gone after me; he has made his teeth sharp against me: my haters are looking on me with cruel eyes;  

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  Their mouths are open wide against me; the blows of his bitter words are falling on my face; all of them come together in a mass against me.  

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  God gives me over to the power of sinners, sending me violently into the hands of evil-doers.  

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  I was in comfort, but I have been broken up by his hands; he has taken me by the neck, shaking me to bits; he has put me up as a mark for his arrows.  

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  His bowmen come round about me; their arrows go through my body without mercy; my life is drained out on the earth.  

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  I am broken with wound after wound; he comes rushing on me like a man of war.  

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  I have made haircloth the clothing of my skin, and my horn is rolled in the dust.  

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  My face is red with weeping, and my eyes are becoming dark;  

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  Though my hands have done no violent acts, and my prayer is clean.  

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  O earth, let not my blood be covered, and let my cry have no resting-place!  

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  Even now my witness is in heaven, and the supporter of my cause is on high.  

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  My friends make sport of me; to God my eyes are weeping,  

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  So that he may give decision for a man in his cause with God, and between a son of man and his neighbour.  

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  For in a short time I will take the journey from which I will not come back.  

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