17:1  “My spirit is broken,
My days are extinguished,
The grave is ready for me.

17:2  Are not mockers with me?
And does not my eye dwell on their provocation?

17:3  “Now put down a pledge for me with Yourself.
Who is he who will shake hands with me?

17:4  For You have hidden their heart from understanding;
Therefore You will not exalt them.

17:5  He who speaks flattery to his friends,
Even the eyes of his children will fail.

17:6  “But He has made me a byword of the people,
And I have become one in whose face men spit.

17:7  My eye has also grown dim because of sorrow,
And all my members are like shadows.

17:8  Upright men are astonished at this,
And the innocent stirs himself up against the hypocrite.

17:9  Yet the righteous will hold to his way,
And he who has clean hands will be stronger and stronger.

17:10  “But please, come back again, all of you,
For I shall not find one wise man among you.

17:11  My days are past,
My purposes are broken off,
Even the thoughts of my heart.

17:12  They change the night into day;
‘The light is near,’ they say, in the face of darkness.

17:13  If I wait for the grave as my house,
If I make my bed in the darkness,

17:14  If I say to corruption, ‘You are my father,’
And to the worm, ‘You are my mother and my sister,’

17:15  Where then is my hope?
As for my hope, who can see it?

17:16  Will they go down to the gates of Sheol?
Shall we have rest together in the dust?”