17 to turn them from a deedand to smother human pride.
18 He keeps one from the pit,a life from perishing by the sword.
19 Or a person may be disciplined by painwhile in bed, bones ever aching
20 until a person loathes food,an appetite rejects a delicacy;
21 the flesh wastes away, no longer visible;the bones, once hidden, protrude.
22 A life approaches the pit;its very being draws near the death dealers.
23 Surely there’s a messenger for this person,a mediator, one out of a thousandto declare one’s integrity to another