4“I too could speak like you,
         If I were in your place.
         I could compose words against you
         And shake my head at you.

5“I could strengthen you with my mouth,
         And the solace of my lips could lessen your pain.

Job Says God Shattered Him

6“If I speak, my pain is not lessened,
         And if I hold back, what has left me?

7“But now He has exhausted me;
         You have laid waste all my company.

8“You have shriveled me up,
         It has become a witness;
         And my leanness rises up against me,
         It testifies to my face.

9“His anger has torn me and hunted me down,
         He has gnashed at me with His teeth;
         My adversary glares at me.

10“They have gaped at me with their mouth,
         They have slapped me on the cheek with contempt;
         They have massed themselves against me.

11“God hands me over to ruffians
         And tosses me into the hands of the wicked.

12“I was at ease, but He shattered me,
         And He has grasped me by the neck and shaken me to pieces;
         He has also set me up as His target.

13“His arrows surround me.
         Without mercy He splits my kidneys open;
         He pours out my gall on the ground.

14“He breaks through me with breach after breach;
         He runs at me like a warrior.

15“I have sewed sackcloth over my skin
         And thrust my horn in the dust.

16“My face is flushed from weeping,
         And deep darkness is on my eyelids,

17Although there is no violence in my hands,
         And my prayer is pure.

18“O earth, do not cover my blood,
         And let there be no resting place for my cry.

19“Even now, behold, my witness is in heaven,
         And my advocate is on high.

20“My friends are my scoffers;
         My eye weeps to God.

21“O that a man might plead with God
         As a man with his neighbor!

22“For when a few years are past,
         I shall go the way of no return.

NASB ©1995