My Spirit Is Broken
Job's spirit is broken and the grave feels made up like a bed. He asks who will stand as his guarantor, since not one friend has wisdom to offer. If he must call the pit his father and the worm his mother, where is his hope?
17 1"My spirit is broken, my days are snuffed out, the grave is ready for me. 2Surely mockers surround me, and my eyes cannot look away from their taunting.
3"Put up a pledge for me with yourself; who else will give their word as my guarantor? 4For you have closed their minds to understanding; therefore you will not let them triumph. 5One who denounces friends for personal gain—the eyes of his children will fail.
6"He has made me a byword among the peoples, someone they spit in the face. 7My eye has grown dim from grief, and all my limbs are like a shadow. 8The upright are appalled at this, and the innocent is roused against the godless. 9Yet the righteous holds to his way, and the one with clean hands grows stronger and stronger.
10"But come back, all of you, come now—I find not one wise man among you. 11My days are past, my plans are broken off, and with them the desires of my heart. 12They turn night into day; 'light,' they say, 'is near'—in the face of darkness. 13If I hope for the grave as my house, if I spread my bed in the darkness, 14if I call to the pit, 'You are my father,' and to the worm, 'My mother' and 'My sister,' 15where then is my hope? Who can see any hope for me? 16Will it go down to the gates of the grave? Will we descend together into the dust?"
