Job 10

1 “My soul is weary of my life. I will give free course to my complaint. I will speak in the bitterness of my soul.

Weary in my soul, I will pour my words with groans upon him: I will speak being straitened in the bitterness of my soul.

2 I will tell God, ‘Do not condemn me. Show me why you contend with me.

And I will say to the Lord, Do not teach me to be impious; and therefore have you thus judged me?

3 Is it good to you that you should oppress, that you should despise the work of your hands, and smile on the counsel of the wicked?

Is it good before you if I be unrighteous? for you have disowned the work of your hands, and attended to the counsel of the ungodly.

4 Do you have eyes of flesh? Or do you see as man sees?

Or do you see as a mortal sees? or will you look as a man sees?

5 Are your days as the days of mortals, or your years as man’s years,

Or is your life human, or your years [the years] of a man,

6 that you enquire after my iniquity, and search after my sin?

that you have enquired into mine iniquity, and searched out my sins?

7 Although you know that I am not wicked, there is no one who can deliver out of your hand.

For you know that I have not committed iniquity: but who is he that can deliver out of your hands?

8 “‘Your hands have framed me and fashioned me altogether, yet you destroy me.

Your hands have formed me and made me; afterwards you did change [your mind], and strike me.

9 Remember, I beg you, that you have fashioned me as clay. Will you bring me into dust again?

Remember that you have made me [as] clay, and you do turn me again to earth.

10 Haven’t you poured me out like milk, and curdled me like cheese?

Hast you not poured me out like milk, and curdled me like cheese?

11 You have clothed me with skin and flesh, and knit me together with bones and sinews.

And you did clothe me with skin and flesh, and frame me with bones and sinews.

12 You have granted me life and loving kindness. Your visitation has preserved my spirit.

And you did bestow upon me life and mercy, and your oversight has preserved my spirit.

13 Yet you hid these things in your heart. I know that this is with you:

Having these things in yourself, I know that you can do all things; for nothing is impossible with you.

14 if I sin, then you mark me. You will not acquit me from my iniquity.

And if I should sin, you watch me; and you have not cleared me from iniquity.

15 If I am wicked, woe to me. If I am righteous, I still will not lift up my head, being filled with disgrace, and conscious of my affliction.

Or if I should be ungodly, woe is me: and if I should be righteous, I can’t lift myself up, for I am full of dishonour.

16 If my head is held high, you hunt me like a lion. Again you show yourself powerful to me.

For I am hunted like a lion for slaughter; for again you have changed and are terribly destroying me;

17 You renew your witnesses against me, and increase your indignation on me. Changes and warfare are with me.

renewing against me my torture: and you have dealt with me in great anger, and you have brought trials upon me.

18 “‘Why, then, have you brought me out of the womb? I wish I had given up the spirit, and no eye had seen me.

Why then did you bring me out of the womb? and why did I not die, and no eye see me,

19 I should have been as though I had not been. I should have been carried from the womb to the grave.

and I become as if I had not been? for why was I not carried from the womb to the grave?

20 Aren’t my days few? Stop! Leave me alone, that I may find a little comfort,

Is not the time of my life short? suffer me to rest a little,

21 before I go where I will not return from, to the land of darkness and of the shadow of death;

before I go whence I shall not return, to a land of darkness and gloominess;

22 the land dark as midnight, of the shadow of death, without any order, where the light is as midnight.’”

to a land of perpetual darkness, where there is no light, neither [can any one] see the life of mortals.