1. “Behold, my eye has seen all this, my ear has heard and understood it.
2. What you know, I also know; I am not inferior to you.
3. But I would speak to the Almighty, and I desire to argue my case with God.
4. As for you, you whitewash with lies; worthless physicians are you all.
5. Oh that you would keep silent, and it would be your wisdom!
6. Hear now my argument and listen to the pleadings of my lips.
7. Will you speak falsely for God and speak deceitfully for him?
8. Will you show partiality toward him? Will you plead the case for God?
9. Will it be well with you when he searches you out? Or can you deceive him, as one deceives a man?
10. He will surely rebuke you if in secret you show partiality.
11. Will not his majesty terrify you, and the dread of him fall upon you?
12. Your maxims are proverbs of ashes; your defenses are defenses of clay.
13. “Let me have silence, and I will speak, and let come on me what may.
14. Why should I take my flesh in my teeth and put my life in my hand?
15. Though he slay me, I will hope in him; yet I will argue my ways to his face.
16. This will be my salvation, that the godless shall not come before him.
17. Keep listening to my words, and let my declaration be in your ears.
18. Behold, I have prepared my case; I know that I shall be in the right.
19. Who is there who will contend with me? For then I would be silent and die.
20. Only grant me two things, then I will not hide myself from your face:
21. withdraw your hand far from me, and let not dread of you terrify me.
22. Then call, and I will answer; or let me speak, and you reply to me.
23. How many are my iniquities and my sins? Make me know my transgression and my sin.
24. Why do you hide your face and count me as your enemy?
25. Will you frighten a driven leaf and pursue dry chaff?
26. For you write bitter things against me and make me inherit the iniquities of my youth.
27. You put my feet in the stocks and watch all my paths; you set a limit for the soles of my feet.
28. Man wastes away like a rotten thing, like a garment that is moth-eaten.
1. “Man who is born of a woman is few of days and full of trouble.
2. He comes out like a flower and withers; he flees like a shadow and continues not.
3. And do you open your eyes on such a one and bring me into judgment with you?
4. Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean? There is not one.
5. Since his days are determined, and the number of his months is with you, and you have appointed his limits that he cannot pass,
6. look away from him and leave him alone, that he may enjoy, like a hired hand, his day.
7. “For there is hope for a tree, if it be cut down, that it will sprout again, and that its shoots will not cease.
8. Though its root grow old in the earth, and its stump die in the soil,
9. yet at the scent of water it will bud and put out branches like a young plant.
10. But a man dies and is laid low; man breathes his last, and where is he?
11. As waters fail from a lake and a river wastes away and dries up,
12. so a man lies down and rises not again; till the heavens are no more he will not awake or be roused out of his sleep.
13. Oh that you would hide me in Sheol, that you would conceal me until your wrath be past, that you would appoint me a set time, and remember me!
14. If a man dies, shall he live again? All the days of my service I would wait, till my renewal should come.
15. You would call, and I would answer you; you would long for the work of your hands.
16. For then you would number my steps; you would not keep watch over my sin;
17. my transgression would be sealed up in a bag, and you would cover over my iniquity.
18. “But the mountain falls and crumbles away, and the rock is removed from its place;
19. the waters wear away the stones; the torrents wash away the soil of the earth; so you destroy the hope of man.
20. You prevail forever against him, and he passes; you change his countenance, and send him away.
21. His sons come to honor, and he does not know it; they are brought low, and he perceives it not.
22. He feels only the pain of his own body, and he mourns only for himself.”