17 My spirit is blighted,
my days are snuffed out,
graves are mine.
2 Decidedly I have triflers about me
and my eyes grow tired resting on their ungovernableness.
3 Give yourself bail for me;
who would there be to strike into my hand?
4 For you have kept their hearts closeted from sense;
therefore you will not set them on high.
5 He notifies friends for a share,
and his sons’ eyes are worn out with looking and longing.
6 But you have set me up for a byword of peoples,
and I am a phenomenon before them,
7 And my eyes are dim with vexation
and my figure dissolves like a shadow.
8 Upright men will stand aghast at this,
and an innocent man be stirred up against an ungodly;
9 But a right-doer will hold his course
and a cleanhanded man grow increasingly resolute.
10 But you may all come again
and I shall not find a wise man among you.
11 My days have gone past; I am annihilated;
my heartstrings are snapped.
12 They make night into day,
‘light is near, coming away from darkness.’
13 If I hope, the realm of death is my house;
I have made up my couch in the darkness;
14 I have called decay my father,
the maggot my mother and sister,—
15 And where is hope of mine?
and who is to behold good fortune of mine?
16 Will they go down with me to the realm of death?
or shall we go underground together?”