Job 19

Job Replies: My Redeemer Lives

1Then Job answered and said:

2 “How long will you torment me
and break me in pieces with words?
3These ^aten times you have cast reproach upon me;
are you not ashamed to wrong me?
4And even if it be true that I have erred,
my error remains with myself.
5If indeed you ^bmagnify yourselves against me
and make my disgrace an argument against me,
6know then that God has ^cput me in the wrong
and closed his net about me.
7Behold, I ^dcry out, ‘Violence!’ but I am not answered;
I call for help, but there is no justice.
8He has ^ewalled up my way, so that I cannot pass,
and he has set darkness upon my paths.
9He has ^fstripped from me my glory
and taken the ^gcrown from my head.
10He breaks me down on every side, and I ^ham gone,
and my hope has he pulled up like a tree.
11He has kindled his wrath against me
and ⁱcounts me as his adversary.
12His ^jtroops come on together;
they have ^kcast up their siege ramp ▼

▼Hebrew  their way

against me
and encamp around my tent.
13 “He has put my ^mbrothers far from me,
and ⁿthose who knew me are wholly estranged from me.
14My relatives ^ohave failed me,
my close ^pfriends have forgotten me.
15The guests ^qin my house and my maidservants count me as a stranger;
I have become a foreigner in their eyes.
16I call to my servant, but he gives me no answer;
I must plead with him with my mouth for mercy.
17My breath is strange to my ^rwife,
and I am a stench to the children of ^smy own mother.
18Even young ^tchildren despise me;
when I rise they talk against me.
19All my ^uintimate friends abhor me,
and those whom I loved have turned against me.
20My ^vbones stick to my skin and to my flesh,
and I have escaped by the skin of my teeth.
21Have mercy on me, have mercy on me, O you my friends,
for the hand of God has ^wtouched me!
22Why do you, like God, ^xpursue me?
Why are you not satisfied with my flesh?
23 “Oh that my words were written!
Oh that they were ^yinscribed in a book!
24Oh that with an iron ^zpen and lead
they were engraved in the rock forever!
25For I ^aaknow that my ^abRedeemer lives,
and at the last he will stand upon the ^acearth. ▼

▼Hebrew dust

26And after my skin has been thus destroyed,
yet in ▼

▼Or without

my flesh I shall ^afsee God,
27whom I shall see for myself,
and my eyes shall behold, and not ^aganother.
My heart ^ahfaints within me!
28If you say, ‘How we will ^aipursue him!’
and, ‘The root of the matter is found in him,’
29be afraid of the sword,
for wrath brings the punishment of the sword,
that you may know there is ^aja judgment.”