> [[job-15|← Previous]] | [[job-00|TOC]] | [[job-17|Next →]] --- # Job, Chapter 16 ## Chapter 16 **Job’s Fourth Reply.** 1 Then Job answered and said: ^job-16-1 2 I have heard this sort of thing many times. ^job-16-2 Troublesome comforters, all of you! 3 Is there no end to windy words? ^job-16-3 What sickness makes you rattle on? 4 I also could talk as you do, ^job-16-4 were you in my place. I could declaim over you, or wag my head at you; 5 I could strengthen you with talk, ^job-16-5 with mere chatter give relief. 6 If I speak, my pain is not relieved; ^job-16-6 if I stop speaking, nothing changes. 7 But now he has exhausted me; ^job-16-7 you have stunned all my companions. 8 You have shriveled me up; it is a witness, ^job-16-8 my gauntness rises up to testify against me; 9 His wrath tears and assails me, ^job-16-9 he gnashes his teeth against me; My enemy looks daggers at me. 10 They gape at me with their mouths; ^job-16-10 They strike me on the cheek with insults; they are all enlisted against me. 11 God has given me over to the impious; ^job-16-11 into the hands of the wicked he has cast me. 12 I was in peace, but he dislodged me, ^job-16-12 seized me by the neck, dashed me to pieces. He has set me up for a target; 13 his arrows strike me from all directions. ^job-16-13 He pierces my sides without mercy, pours out my gall upon the ground. 14 He pierces me, thrust upon thrust, ^job-16-14 rushes at me like a warrior. 15 I have sewn sackcloth on my skin, ^job-16-15 laid my horn low in the dust. 16 My face is inflamed with weeping, ^job-16-16 darkness covers my eyes, 17 Although my hands are free from violence, ^job-16-17 and my prayer sincere. 18 O earth, do not cover my blood, ^job-16-18 nor let my outcry come to rest! 19 Even now my witness is in heaven, ^job-16-19 my advocate is on high. 20 My friends it is who wrong me; ^job-16-20 before God my eyes shed tears, 21 That justice may be done for a mortal with God: ^job-16-21 as for a man with his neighbor. 22 For my years are numbered, ^job-16-22 and I go the road of no return. --- \* (16:8) You: God. Job then describes in vv. [9] – [17] the savage treatment that he has received from God. \* (16:18) As the exposed blood of those who were unjustly slain cries to heaven for vengeance ([Gn 4:10]; [[ezekiel-24|Ez 24]]:6 – [9]), so Job’s sufferings demand redress. \* (16:19) Witness: refers perhaps to God (is Job appealing to God against God?), or to a mediator (cf. [9:33]), or to a personification of Job’s prayer. --- a. (16:2) [Jb 12:3]. --- _New American Bible, revised edition_ (2010, 1991, 1986, 1970) Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Washington, D.C. > [[job-15|← Previous]] | [[job-00|TOC]] | [[job-17|Next →]]