Job 30

¹ But now they that are younger than I have me in derision, Whose fathers I disdained to set with the dogs of my flock. ² Yea, the strength of their hands, whereto should it profit me? Men in whom ripe age is perished. ³ They are gaunt with want and famine; They gnaw the dry ground, in the gloom of wasteness and desolation. ⁴ They pluck salt-wort with wormwood; And the roots of the broom are their food. ⁵ They are driven forth from the midst of men; They cry after them as after a thief. ⁶ In the clefts of the valleys must they dwell, In holes of the earth and of the rocks. ⁷ Among the bushes they bray; Under the nettles they are gathered together. ⁸ They are children of churls, yea, children of ignoble men; They were scourged out of the land. ⁹ And now I am become their song, Yea, I am a byword unto them. ¹⁰ They abhor me, they flee far from me, And spare not to spit in my face. ¹¹ For He hath loosed my cord, and afflicted me, And they have cast off the bridle before me. ¹² Upon my right hand rise the brood; They entangle my feet, And they cast up against me their ways of destruction. ¹³ They break up my path, They further my calamity, Even men that have no helper. ¹⁴ As through a wide breach they come; In the midst of the ruin they roll themselves upon me. ¹⁵ Terrors are turned upon me, They chase mine honour as the wind; And my welfare is passed away as a cloud. ¹⁶ And now my soul is poured out within me; Days of affliction have taken hold upon me. ¹⁷ In the night my bones are pierced, and fall from me, And my sinews take no rest. ¹⁸ By the great force [of my disease] is my garment disfigured; It bindeth me about as the collar of my coat. ¹⁹ He hath cast me into the mire, And I am become like dust and ashes. ²⁰ I cry unto Thee, and Thou dost not answer me; I stand up, and Thou lookest at me. ²¹ Thou art turned to be cruel to me; With the might of Thy hand Thou hatest me. ²² Thou liftest me up to the wind, Thou causest me to ride upon it; And Thou dissolvest my substance. ²³ For I know that Thou wilt bring me to death, And to the house appointed for all living. ²⁴ Surely none shall put forth his hand to a ruinous heap, Neither because of these things shall help come in one's calamity, ²⁵ If I have not wept for him that was in trouble, And if my soul grieved not for the needy. ²⁶ Yet, when I looked for good, there came evil; And when I waited for light, there came darkness. ²⁷ Mine inwards boil, and rest not; Days of affliction are come upon me. ²⁸ I go mourning without the sun; I stand up in the assembly, and cry for help. ²⁹ I am become a brother to jackals, And a companion to ostriches. ³⁰ My skin is black, and falleth from me, And my bones are burned with heat. ³¹ Therefore is my harp turned to mourning, And my pipe into the voice of them that weep.