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Job 6
Only the sufferer knows his own grief
1 Job spoke next. He said:
2 If only my misery could be weighed, and all my ills be put on the scales!
3 But they outweigh the sands of the seas: what wonder then if my words are wild?
4 The arrows of Shaddai stick fast in me, my spirit absorbs their poison, God’s terrors stand against me in array.
5 Does a wild donkey bray when it finds soft grass, or an ox ever low when its fodder is in reach?
6 Can tasteless food be taken without salt, or is there flavour in the white of an egg?
7 The very dishes which I cannot stomach, these are my diet in my sickness.
8 Oh may my prayer find fulfilment, may God grant me my hope!
9 May it please God to crush me, to give his hand free play and do away with me!
10 This thought, at least, would give me comfort (a thrill of joy in unrelenting pain), that I had not denied the Holy One’s decrees.
11 But have I the strength to go on waiting? What use is life to me, when doomed to certain death?
12 Is mine the strength of stone, or is my flesh bronze?
13 Can any power be found within myself, has not all help deserted me?
14 Grudge pity to a neighbour, and you forsake the fear of Shaddai.
15 My brothers have been fickle as a torrent, as the course of a seasonal stream.
16 Ice is the food of their dark waters, they swell with the thawing of the snow;
17 but in the hot season they dry up, with summer’s heat they vanish.
18 Caravans leave the trail to find them, go deep into desert, and are lost.
19 The caravans of Tema look to them, and on them Sheba’s convoys build their hopes.
20 Their trust proves vain, they reach them only to be thwarted.
21 So, at this time, do you behave to me: one sight of me, and then you flee in fright.
22 Have I said to you, ‘Give me this or that, bribe someone for me at your own cost,
23 snatch me from the clutches of an enemy, or ransom me from a tyrant’s hand’?
24 Put me right, and I will say no more; show me where I have been at fault.
25 Fair comment can be borne without resentment, but what is the basis for your strictures?
26 Do you think mere words deserve censure, desperate speech that the wind blows away?
27 Soon you will be casting lots for an orphan, and selling your friend at bargain prices!
28 Come, I beg you, look at me: as man to man, I will not lie.
29 Relent, and grant me justice; relent, my case is not yet tried.
30 Is falsehood to be found on my lips? Cannot my palate tell the taste of misfortune?