Chapter 30

¹ But now they that are younger than I have me in derision, whose fathers I would have disdained to have set with the dogs of my flock.

² Yea, whereto might the strength of their hands profit me, in whom old age was perished?

³ For want and famine they were solitary; fleeing into the wilderness in former time desolate and waste.

⁴ Who cut up mallows by the bushes, and juniper roots for their meat.

⁵ They were driven forth from among men, (they cried after them as after a thief;)

⁶ To dwell in the clifts of the valleys, in caves of the earth, and in the rocks.

⁷ Among the bushes they brayed; under the nettles they were gathered together.

⁸ They were children of fools, yea, children of base men: they were viler than the earth.

⁹ And now am I their song, yea, I am their byword.

¹⁰ They abhor me, they flee far from me, and spare not to spit in my face.

¹¹ Because he hath loosed my cord, and afflicted me, they have also let loose the bridle before me.

¹² Upon my right hand rise the youth; they push away my feet, and they raise up against me the ways of their destruction.

¹³ They mar my path, they set forward my calamity, they have no helper.

¹⁴ They came upon me as a wide breaking in of waters: in the desolation they rolled themselves upon me.

¹⁵ Terrors are turned upon me: they pursue my soul as the wind: and my welfare passeth away as a cloud.

¹⁶ And now my soul is poured out upon me; the days of affliction have taken hold upon me.

¹⁷ My bones are pierced in me in the night season: and my sinews take no rest.

¹⁸ By the great force of my disease is my garment changed: it bindeth me about as the collar of my coat.

¹⁹ He hath cast me into the mire, and I am become like dust and ashes.

²⁰ I cry unto thee, and thou dost not hear me: I stand up, and thou regardest me not.

²¹ Thou art become cruel to me: with thy strong hand thou opposest thyself against me.

²² Thou liftest me up to the wind; thou causest me to ride upon it, and dissolvest my substance.

²³ For I know that thou wilt bring me to death, and to the house appointed for all living.

²⁴ Howbeit he will not stretch out his hand to the grave, though they cry in his destruction.

²⁵ Did not I weep for him that was in trouble? was not my soul grieved for the poor?

²⁶ When I looked for good, then evil came unto me: and when I waited for light, there came darkness.

²⁷ My bowels boiled, and rested not: the days of affliction prevented me.

²⁸ I went mourning without the sun: I stood up, and I cried in the congregation.

²⁹ I am a brother to dragons, and a companion to owls.

³⁰ My skin is black upon me, and my bones are burned with heat.

³¹ My harp also is turned to mourning, and my organ into the voice of them that weep.