Job 17
Job Continues: Where Then Is My Hope?
[1] “My spirit is broken; my days are extinct;
the graveyard is ready for me.
[2] Surely there are mockers about me,
and my eye dwells on their provocation.
[3] “Lay down a pledge for me with you;
who is there who will put up security for me?
[4] Since you have closed their hearts to understanding,
therefore you will not let them triumph.
[5] He who informs against his friends to get a share of their property—
the eyes of his children will fail.
[6] “He has made me a byword of the peoples,
and I am one before whom men spit.
[7] My eye has grown dim from vexation,
and all my members are like a shadow.
[8] The upright are appalled at this,
and the innocent stirs himself up against the godless.
[9] Yet the righteous holds to his way,
and he who has clean hands grows stronger and stronger.
[10] But you, come on again, all of you,
and I shall not find a wise man among you.
[11] My days are past; my plans are broken off,
the desires of my heart.
[12] They make night into day:
‘The light,’ they say, ‘is near to the darkness.’
[13] If I hope for Sheol as my house,
if I make my bed in darkness,
[14] if I say to the pit, ‘You are my father,’
and to the worm, ‘My mother,’ or ‘My sister,’
[15] where then is my hope?
Who will see my hope?
[16] Will it go down to the bars of Sheol?
Shall we descend together into the dust?” (ESV)
