New International Version NIV
Good News Translation GNT
1 My spirit is broken, my days are cut short, the grave awaits me.
1
The end of my life is near. I can hardly breathe; there is nothing left for me but the grave.
2 Surely mockers surround me; my eyes must dwell on their hostility.
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I watch how bitterly everyone mocks me.
3 “Give me, O God, the pledge you demand. Who else will put up security for me?
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I am being honest, God. Accept my word. There is no one else to support what I say.
4 You have closed their minds to understanding; therefore you will not let them triumph.
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You have closed their minds to reason; don't let them triumph over me now.
5 If anyone denounces their friends for reward, the eyes of their children will fail.
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In the old proverb someone betrays his friends for money, and his children suffer for it.
6 “God has made me a byword to everyone, a man in whose face people spit.
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And now people use this proverb against me; they come and spit in my face.
7 My eyes have grown dim with grief; my whole frame is but a shadow.
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My grief has almost made me blind; my arms and legs are as thin as shadows.
8 The upright are appalled at this; the innocent are aroused against the ungodly.
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Those who claim to be honest are shocked, and they all condemn me as godless.
9 Nevertheless, the righteous will hold to their ways, and those with clean hands will grow stronger.
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Those who claim to be respectable are more and more convinced they are right.
10 “But come on, all of you, try again! I will not find a wise man among you.
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But if all of them came and stood before me, I would not find even one of them wise.
11 My days have passed, my plans are shattered. Yet the desires of my heart
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My days have passed; my plans have failed; my hope is gone.
12 turn night into day; in the face of the darkness light is near.
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But my friends say night is daylight; they say that light is near, but I know I remain in darkness.
13 If the only home I hope for is the grave, if I spread out my bed in the realm of darkness,
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My only hope is the world of the dead, where I will lie down to sleep in the dark.
14 if I say to corruption, ‘You are my father,’ and to the worm, ‘My mother’ or ‘My sister,’
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I will call the grave my father, and the worms that eat me I will call my mother and my sisters.
15 where then is my hope— who can see any hope for me?
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Where is there any hope for me? Who sees any?
16 Will it go down to the gates of death? Will we descend together into the dust?”
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Hope will not go with me when I go down to the world of the dead.
Scripture quoted by permission. Quotations designated (NIV) are from THE HOLY BIBLE: NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica. All rights reserved worldwide.
Scripture taken from the Good News Translation - Second Edition, Copyright 1992 by American Bible Society. Used by Permission.