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Job spoke next. He said:
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How much longer are you going to torment me and crush me by your speeches?
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You have insulted me ten times already: have you no shame at maltreating me?
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Even if I had gone astray, my error would still be my own affair.
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But, whereas you take this superior attitude and claim that my disgrace is my own fault,
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I tell you that God has wronged me and enveloped me in his net.
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If I protest against such violence, I am not heard, if I appeal against it, judgement is never given.
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He has built an impassable wall across my path and covered my way with darkness.
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He has deprived me of my glory and taken the crown from my head.
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He assails me from all directions to make me vanish; he uproots my hope as he might a tree.
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Inflamed with anger against me, he regards me as his foe.
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His troops have come in force, directing their line of advance towards me, they are now encamped round my tent.
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He has alienated my brothers from me, my relatives take care to avoid me,
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my intimate friends have gone away and the guests in my house have forgotten me.
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My slave-girls regard me as an intruder, a stranger as far as they are concerned.
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My servant does not answer when I call him, I am obliged to beg favours from him!
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My breath is unbearable to my wife, my stench to my own brothers.
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Even the children look down on me, whenever I stand up, they start jeering at me.
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All my dearest friends recoil from me in horror: those I loved best have turned against me.
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My flesh is rotting under my skin, my bones are sticking out like teeth.
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Pity me, pity me, my friends, since I have been struck by the hand of God.
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Must you persecute me just as God does, and give my body no peace?
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Will no one let my words be recorded, inscribed on some monument
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with iron chisel and engraving tool, cut into the rock for ever?
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I know that I have a living Defender and that he will rise up last, on the dust of the earth.
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After my awakening, he will set me close to him, and from my flesh I shall look on God.
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He whom I shall see will take my part: my eyes will be gazing on no stranger. My heart sinks within me.
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When you say, 'How can we confound him? What pretext can we discover against him?'
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You yourselves had best beware the sword, since the wrath bursts into flame at wicked deeds and then you will learn that there is indeed a judgement!
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