Job 17

NEW AMERICAN BIBLE	CATHOLIC PUBLIC DOMAIN
1 My spirit is broken, my lamp of life extinguished; my burial is at hand.	1 My spirit will be wasted, my days will be shortened, and only the grave will left for me.
2 I am indeed mocked, and, as their provocation mounts, my eyes grow dim.	2 I have not sinned, yet my eye remains in bitterness.
3 Grant me one to offer you a pledge on my behalf: who is there that will give surety for me?	3 Free me, O Lord, and set me beside you, and let the hand of anyone you wish fight against me.
4 You darken their minds to knowledge; therefore they do not understand.	4 You have set their heart far from discipline; therefore, they will not be praised.
5 My lot is described as evil,	5 He promises prey to his companions, but the eyes of his sons will grow faint.
6 and I am made a byword of the people; their object lesson I have become.	6 He has posted me like a proverb to the people, and I am an example in their presence.
7 My eye has grown blind with anguish, and all my frame is shrunken to a shadow.	7 My eyesight has been clouded by indignation, and my limbs have been reduced, as if to nothing.
8 Upright men are astonished at this, and the innocent aroused against the wicked.	8 The just will be astounded over this, and the innocent will be stirred up against the hypocrite.
9 Yet the righteous shall hold to his way, and he who has clean hands increase in strength.	9 And the just will cling to his way, and clean hands will increase strength.
10 But turn now, and come on again; for I shall not find a wise man among you!	10 Therefore, be converted, all of you, and approach, for I do not find in you any wisdom.
11 My days are passed away, my plans are at an end, the cherished purposes of my heart.	11 My days have passed away; my thoughts have been scattered, tormenting my heart.
12 Such men change the night into day; where there is darkness they talk of approaching light.	12 They have turned night into day, and I hope for light again after the darkness.
13 If I look for the nether world as my dwelling, if I spread my couch in the darkness,	13 If I should wait, the underworld is my house, and in darkness I have spread out my bed.
14 If I must call corruption "my father," and the maggot "my mother" and "my sister,"	14 I have said to decay and to worms: “You are my father, my mother, and my sister.”
15 Where then is my hope, and my prosperity, who shall see?	15 Therefore, where is my expectation now, and who is it that considers my patience?
16 Will they descend with me into the nether world? Shall we go down together into the dust?	16 Everything of mine will descend into the deepest underworld; do you think that, in that place at least, there will be rest for me?