Job's Honor Turned into Contempt

1But now [they that are] younger than I have me in derision, whose fathers I would have disdained to have set with the dogs of my flock.

2Yea, whereto [might] the strength of their hands [profit] me, in whom old age was perished?

3For want and famine [they were] solitary; fleeing into the wilderness in former time desolate and waste.

4Who cut up mallows by the bushes, and juniper roots [for] their meat.

5They were driven forth from among [men], (they cried after them as [after] a thief; )

6To dwell in the clifts of the valleys, [in] caves of the earth, and [in] the rocks.

7Among the bushes they brayed; under the nettles they were gathered together.

8[They were] children of fools, yea, children of base men: they were viler than the earth.

9And now am I their song, yea, I am their byword.

10They abhor me, they flee far from me, and spare not to spit in my face.

11Because he hath loosed my cord, and afflicted me, they have also let loose the bridle before me.

12Upon [my] right [hand] rise the youth; they push away my feet, and they raise up against me the ways of their destruction.

13They mar my path, they set forward my calamity, they have no helper.

14They came [upon me] as a wide breaking in [of waters]: in the desolation they rolled themselves [upon me].

Job's Prosperity Becomes Calamity

15Terrors are turned upon me: they pursue my soul as the wind: and my welfare passeth away as a cloud.

16And now my soul is poured out upon me; the days of affliction have taken hold upon me.

17My bones are pierced in me in the night season: and my sinews take no rest.

18By the great force [of my disease] is my garment changed: it bindeth me about as the collar of my coat.

19He hath cast me into the mire, and I am become like dust and ashes.

20I cry unto thee, and thou dost not hear me: I stand up, and thou regardest me [not].

21Thou art become cruel to me: with thy strong hand thou opposest thyself against me.

22Thou liftest me up to the wind; thou causest me to ride [upon it], and dissolvest my substance.

23For I know [that] thou wilt bring me [to] death, and [to] the house appointed for all living.

24Howbeit he will not stretch out [his] hand to the grave, though they cry in his destruction.

25Did not I weep for him that was in trouble? was [not] my soul grieved for the poor?

26When I looked for good, then evil came [unto me]: and when I waited for light, there came darkness.

27My bowels boiled, and rested not: the days of affliction prevented me.

28I went mourning without the sun: I stood up, [and] I cried in the congregation.

29I am a brother to dragons, and a companion to owls.

30My skin is black upon me, and my bones are burned with heat.

31My harp also is [turned] to mourning, and my organ into the voice of them that weep.