| English Standard Version | New Living Translation |
| 1“My spirit is broken; my days are extinct; the graveyard is ready for me. | 1“My spirit is crushed, and my life is nearly snuffed out. The grave is ready to receive me. |
| 2Surely there are mockers about me, and my eye dwells on their provocation. | 2I am surrounded by mockers. I watch how bitterly they taunt me. |
| 3“Lay down a pledge for me with you; who is there who will put up security for me? | 3“You must defend my innocence, O God, since no one else will stand up for me. |
| 4Since you have closed their hearts to understanding, therefore you will not let them triumph. | 4You have closed their minds to understanding, but do not let them triumph. |
| 5He who informs against his friends to get a share of their property— the eyes of his children will fail. | 5They betray their friends for their own advantage, so let their children faint with hunger. |
| 6“He has made me a byword of the peoples, and I am one before whom men spit. | 6“God has made a mockery of me among the people; they spit in my face. |
| 7My eye has grown dim from vexation, and all my members are like a shadow. | 7My eyes are swollen with weeping, and I am but a shadow of my former self. |
| 8The upright are appalled at this, and the innocent stirs himself up against the godless. | 8The virtuous are horrified when they see me. The innocent rise up against the ungodly. |
| 9Yet the righteous holds to his way, and he who has clean hands grows stronger and stronger. | 9The righteous keep moving forward, and those with clean hands become stronger and stronger. |
| 10But you, come on again, all of you, and I shall not find a wise man among you. | 10“As for all of you, come back with a better argument, though I still won’t find a wise man among you. |
| 11My days are past; my plans are broken off, the desires of my heart. | 11My days are over. My hopes have disappeared. My heart’s desires are broken. |
| 12They make night into day: ‘The light,’ they say, ‘is near to the darkness.’ | 12These men say that night is day; they claim that the darkness is light. |
| 13If I hope for Sheol as my house, if I make my bed in darkness, | 13What if I go to the grave and make my bed in darkness? |
| 14if I say to the pit, ‘You are my father,’ and to the worm, ‘My mother,’ or ‘My sister,’ | 14What if I call the grave my father, and the maggot my mother or my sister? |
| 15where then is my hope? Who will see my hope? | 15Where then is my hope? Can anyone find it? |
| 16Will it go down to the bars of Sheol? Shall we descend together into the dust?” | 16No, my hope will go down with me to the grave. We will rest together in the dust!” |
| ESV Text Edition: 2016. The ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®) copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. The ESV® text has been reproduced in cooperation with and by permission of Good News Publishers. Unauthorized reproduction of this publication is prohibited. All rights reserved. | Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved. |
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