| 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. |
| 2 | I will tell God, 'Do not condemn me. Show me why you contend with 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? |
| 4 | Do you have eyes of flesh? Or do you see as man sees? |
| 5 | Are your days as the days of mortals, or your years as man's years, |
| 6 | that you inquire after my iniquity, and search after my sin? |
| 7 | Although you know that I am not wicked, there is no one who can deliver out of your hand. |
| 8 | "'Your hands have framed me and fashioned me altogether, yet you destroy me. |
| 9 | Remember, I beg you, that you have fashioned me as clay. Will you bring me into dust again? |
| 10 | Haven't you 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. |
| 12 | You have granted me life and loving kindness. Your visitation has preserved my spirit. |
| 13 | Yet you hid these things in your heart. I know that this is with you: |
| 14 | if I sin, then you mark me. You will not acquit me from my iniquity. |
| 15 | If I am wicked, woe to me. If I am righteous, I still shall not lift up my head, being filled with disgrace, and conscious of my affliction. |
| 16 | If my head is held high, you hunt me like a lion. Again you show yourself powerful to me. |
| 17 | You renew your witnesses against me, and increase your indignation on me. Changes and warfare are with me. |
| 18 | "'Why, then, have you brought me forth out of the womb? I wish I had given up the spirit, and no eye had seen me. |
| 19 | I should have been as though I had not been. I should have been carried from the womb to the grave. |
| 20 | Aren't my days few? Cease then. Leave me alone, that I may find a little comfort, |
| 21 | before I go where I shall not return from, to the land of darkness and of the shadow of death; |
| 22 | the land dark as midnight, of the shadow of death, without any order, where the light is as midnight.'" |
