Job, starting at chapter 7
{7:1} "Isn't a man forced to labor on earth?
Aren't his days like the days of a hired hand?
{7:2} As a servant who earnestly desires the shadow,
as a hireling who looks for his wages,
{7:3} so am I made to possess months of misery,
wearisome nights are appointed to me.
{7:4} When I lie down, I say,
'When shall I arise, and the night be gone?'
I toss and turn until the dawning of the day.
{7:5} My flesh is clothed with worms and clods of dust.
My skin closes up, and breaks out afresh.
{7:6} My days are swifter than a weaver's shuttle,
and are spent without hope.
{7:7} Oh remember that my life is a breath.
My eye shall no more see good.
{7:8} The eye of him who sees me shall see me no more.
Your eyes shall be on me, but I shall not be.
{7:9} As the cloud is consumed and vanishes away,
so he who goes down to Sheol shall come up no more.
{7:10} He shall return no more to his house,
neither shall his place know him any more.
{7:11} "Therefore I will not keep silent.
I will speak in the anguish of my spirit.
I will complain in the bitterness of my soul.
{7:12} Am I a sea, or a sea monster,
that you put a guard over me?
{7:13} When I say, 'My bed shall comfort me.
My couch shall ease my complaint;'
{7:14} then you scare me with dreams,
and terrify me through visions:
{7:15} so that my soul chooses strangling,
death rather than my bones.
{7:16} I loathe my life.
I don't want to live forever.
Leave me alone, for my days are but a breath.
{7:17} What is man, that you should magnify him,
that you should set your mind on him,
{7:18} that you should visit him every morning,
and test him every moment?
{7:19} How long will you not look away from me,
nor leave me alone until I swallow down my spittle?
{7:20} If I have sinned, what do I do to you, you watcher of men?
Why have you set me as a mark for you,
so that I am a burden to myself?
{7:21} Why do you not pardon my disobedience, and take away my
iniquity?
For now shall I lie down in the dust.
You will seek me diligently, but I shall not be."
{8:1} Then Bildad the Shuhite answered,
{8:2} "How long will you speak these things?
Shall the words of your mouth be a mighty wind?
{8:3} Does God pervert justice?
Or does the Almighty pervert righteousness?
{8:4} If your children have sinned against him,
He has delivered them into the hand of their disobedience.
{8:5} If you want to seek God diligently,
make your supplication to the Almighty.
{8:6} If you were pure and upright,
surely now he would awaken for you,
and make the habitation of your righteousness prosperous.
{8:7} Though your beginning was small,
yet your latter end would greatly increase.
{8:8} "Please inquire of past generations.
Find out about the learning of their fathers.
{8:9} (For we are but of yesterday, and know nothing,
because our days on earth are a shadow.)
{8:10} Shall they not teach you, tell you,
and utter words out of their heart?
{8:11} "Can the papyrus grow up without mire?
Can the rushes grow without water?
{8:12} While it is yet in its greenness, not cut down,
it withers before any other reed.
{8:13} So are the paths of all who forget God.
The hope of the godless man shall perish,
{8:14} Whose confidence shall break apart,
Whose trust is a spider's web.
{8:15} He shall lean on his house, but it shall not stand.
He shall cling to it, but it shall not endure.
{8:16} He is green before the sun.
His shoots go forth over his garden.
{8:17} His roots are wrapped around the rock pile.
He sees the place of stones.
{8:18} If he is destroyed from his place,
then it shall deny him, saying, 'I have not seen you.'
{8:19} Behold, this is the joy of his way:
out of the earth, others shall spring.
{8:20} "Behold, God will not cast away a blameless man,
neither will he uphold the evil-doers.
{8:21} He will still fill your mouth with laughter,
your lips with shouting.
{8:22} Those who hate you shall be clothed with shame.
The tent of the wicked shall be no more."
{9:1} Then Job answered,
{9:2} "Truly I know that it is so,
but how can man be just with God?
{9:3} If he is pleased to contend with him,
he can't answer him one time in a thousand.
{9:4} God who is wise in heart, and mighty in strength:
who has hardened himself against him, and prospered?
{9:5} He removes the mountains, and they don't know it,
when he overturns them in his anger.
{9:6} He shakes the earth out of its place.
Its pillars tremble.
{9:7} He commands the sun, and it doesn't rise,
and seals up the stars.
{9:8} He alone stretches out the heavens,
and treads on the waves of the sea.
{9:9} He makes the Bear, Orion, and the Pleiades,
and the chambers of the south.
{9:10} He does great things past finding out;
yes, marvelous things without number.
{9:11} Behold, he goes by me, and I don't see him.
He passes on also, but I don't perceive him.
{9:12} Behold, he snatches away.
Who can hinder him?
Who will ask him, 'What are you doing?'
{9:13} "God will not withdraw his anger.
The helpers of Rahab stoop under him.
{9:14} How much less shall I answer him,
And choose my words to argue with him?
{9:15} Though I were righteous, yet I wouldn't answer him.
I would make supplication to my judge.
{9:16} If I had called, and he had answered me,
yet I wouldn't believe that he listened to my voice.
{9:17} For he breaks me with a storm,
and multiplies my wounds without cause.
{9:18} He will not allow me to catch my breath,
but fills me with bitterness.
{9:19} If it is a matter of strength, behold, he is mighty!
If of justice, 'Who,' says he, 'will summon me?'
{9:20} Though I am righteous, my own mouth shall condemn me.
Though I am blameless, it shall prove me perverse.
{9:21} I am blameless.
I don't regard myself.
I despise my life.
{9:22} "It is all the same.
Therefore I say he destroys the blameless and the wicked.
{9:23} If the scourge kills suddenly,
he will mock at the trial of the innocent.
{9:24} The earth is given into the hand of the wicked.
He covers the faces of its judges.
If not he, then who is it?
{9:25} "Now my days are swifter than a runner.
They flee away, they see no good,
{9:26} They have passed away as the swift ships,
as the eagle that swoops on the prey.
{9:27} If I say, 'I will forget my complaint,
I will put off my sad face, and cheer up;'
{9:28} I am afraid of all my sorrows,
I know that you will not hold me innocent.
{9:29} I shall be condemned.
Why then do I labor in vain?
{9:30} If I wash myself with snow,
and cleanse my hands with lye,
{9:31} yet you will plunge me in the ditch.
My own clothes shall abhor me.
{9:32} For he is not a man, as I am, that I should answer him,
that we should come together in judgment.
{9:33} There is no umpire between us,
that might lay his hand on us both.
{9:34} Let him take his rod away from me.
Let his terror not make me afraid;
{9:35} then I would speak, and not fear him,
for I am not so in myself.
___
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