Job Finishes His Defence

29Job again took up his discourse and said:
²‘O that I were as in the months of old,
   as in the days when God watched over me;
³when his lamp shone over my head,
   and by his light I walked through darkness;
⁴when I was in my prime,
   when the friendship of God was upon my tent;
⁵when the Almighty^* was still with me,
   when my children were around me;
⁶when my steps were washed with milk,
   and the rock poured out for me streams of oil!
⁷When I went out to the gate of the city,
   when I took my seat in the square,
⁸the young men saw me and withdrew,
   and the aged rose up and stood;
⁹the nobles refrained from talking,
   and laid their hands on their mouths;
¹⁰the voices of princes were hushed,
   and their tongues stuck to the roof of their mouths.
¹¹When the ear heard, it commended me,
   and when the eye saw, it approved;
¹²because I delivered the poor who cried,
   and the orphan who had no helper.
¹³The blessing of the wretched came upon me,
   and I caused the widow’s heart to sing for joy.
¹⁴I put on righteousness, and it clothed me;
   my justice was like a robe and a turban.
¹⁵I was eyes to the blind,
   and feet to the lame.
¹⁶I was a father to the needy,
   and I championed the cause of the stranger.
¹⁷I broke the fangs of the unrighteous,
   and made them drop their prey from their teeth.
¹⁸Then I thought, “I shall die in my nest,
   and I shall multiply my days like the phoenix;^*
19my roots spread out to the waters,
   with the dew all night on my branches;
²⁰my glory was fresh with me,
   and my bow ever new in my hand.”