Job 30 :: Amplified Bible (AMP)

“Indeed, how could the strength of their hands profit me?

Vigor had perished from them.

“They are gaunt with want and famine;

They gnaw the dry and barren ground by night in [the gloom of] waste and desolation.

“They pluck [and eat] [fn]saltwort (mallows) among the bushes,

And their food is the root of the broom shrub.

“They are driven from the community;

They shout after them as after a thief.

“They must dwell on the slopes of [fn]wadis

And in holes in the ground and in rocks.

“Among the bushes they cry out [like wild animals];

Beneath the prickly scrub they gather and huddle together.

“They are the sons of [worthless and nameless] fools,

They have been driven out of the land.

“And now I have become [the subject of] their taunting;

Yes, I am a [fn]byword and a laughingstock to them.

“They hate me, they stand aloof from me,

And do not refrain from spitting in my face.

“For God has loosed His bowstring [attacking me] and [He has] afflicted and humbled me;

They have cast off the bridle [of restraint] before me.

“On my right the [rabble] brood rises;

They push my feet away, and they build up their ways of destruction against me [like an advancing army].

“They break up and clutter my path [upsetting my plans],

They profit from my destruction;

No one restrains them.

“As through a wide breach they come,

Amid the crash [of falling walls] they roll on [over me].

“Terrors are turned upon me;

They chase away my honor and reputation like the wind,

And my prosperity has passed away like a cloud.

“And now my soul is poured out within me;

The days of affliction have seized me.

“My bones are pierced [with aching] in the night season,

And the pains that gnaw me take no rest.

“By the great force [of my disease] my garment (skin) is disfigured and blemished;

It binds about me [choking me] like the collar of my coat.

“God has cast me into the mire [a swampland of crisis],

And I have become [worthless] like dust and ashes.

“I cry to You for help, [Lord,] but You do not answer me;

I stand up, but You [only] gaze [indifferently] at me.

“You have become harsh and cruel to me;

With the might of Your hand You [keep me alive only to] persecute me.

“You lift me up on the wind and cause me to ride [upon it];

And You toss me about in the tempest and dissolve me in the storm.

“For I know that You will bring me to death

And to the house of meeting [appointed] for all the living.

“However, does not one falling in a heap of ruins stretch out his hand?

Or in his disaster [will he not] therefore cry out for help?

“Did I not weep for one whose life was hard and filled with trouble?

Was not my heart grieved for the needy?

“When I expected good, then came evil [to me];

And when I waited for light, then came darkness.

“I am seething within and my heart is troubled and cannot rest;

Days of affliction come to meet me.

“I go about mourning without comfort [my skin blackened by disease, not by the heat of the sun];

I stand up in the assembly and cry out for help.

“I am a brother to [howling] jackals,

And a companion to ostriches [which scream dismally].

“My skin falls from me in blackened flakes,

And my bones are burned with fever.

“Therefore my lyre (harp) is used for [the sound of] mourning,

And my flute for the [sound of the] voices of those who weep.