Job, 17

¹ “My very spirit^*1 has been broken, my own days have been extinguished; The graveyard is for me.

² Certainly there is mockery at me, And amid their rebellious behavior my eye lodges.

³ Please, do put my security with yourself. Who else is there that will shake hands with me in pledge?

⁴ For their heart you have closed to discretion. That is why you do not exalt them.

⁵ He may tell companions to take their shares, But the very eyes of his sons will fail.

⁶ And he has set me forth as a proverbial saying of peoples, So that I become someone into whose face to spit.

⁷ And from vexation my eye grows dimmer And my members are all of them like the shadow.

⁸ Upright people stare in amazement at this, And even the innocent one gets excited over the apostate.

⁹ The righteous one keeps holding fast to his way, And the one with clean hands keeps increasing in strength.

¹⁰ However, YOU men may all of YOU resume. So come on, please, As I do not find anyone wise among YOU.

¹¹ My own days have passed along, my own plans have been torn apart, The wishes of my heart.

¹² Night they keep putting for day: ‘Light is near on account of darkness.’

¹³ If I keep waiting, Sheʹol is my house; In the darkness I shall have to spread out my lounge.

¹⁴ To the pit I shall have to call out, ‘You are my father!’ To the maggot, ‘My mother and my sister!’

¹⁵ So where, then, is my hope? And my hope—who is it that beholds it?

¹⁶ To the bars of Sheʹol^*1 they^*2 will go down, When we, all together, must descend to the very dust.”