² If one tries to answer you, will you be annoyed?
    But who can hold words back?
³ Look, you’ve instructed many
    and given strength to drooping hands.
⁴ Your words have raised up the falling;
    you’ve steadied failing knees.
⁵ But now it comes to you, and you are dismayed;
    it has struck you, and you are frightened.
⁶ Isn’t your religion the source of^[a] your confidence;
    the integrity of your conduct, the source of your hope?

⁷ Think! What innocent person has ever perished?
    When have those who do the right thing been destroyed?
⁸ As I’ve observed, those who plow sin
    and sow trouble will harvest it.
⁹ When God breathes deeply, they perish;
    by a breath of his nostril they are annihilated.
¹⁰ The roar of a lion and snarl of the king of beasts—
    yet the teeth of lions are shattered;
¹¹         the lion perishes without prey,
            and its cubs are scattered.

¹² But a word sneaked up on me;
    my ears caught a hint of it.
¹³ In profound thoughts, visions of night,
    when deep sleep falls on people,
¹⁴         fear and dread struck me;
            all of my bones shook.
¹⁵ A breeze swept by my face;
    the hair of my skin bristled.
¹⁶ It stopped. I didn’t recognize its visible form,
    although a figure was in front of my eyes.
Silence! Then I heard a voice:
¹⁷     “Can a human be more righteous than God,
        a person purer than their maker?”

¹⁸ If he doesn’t trust his servants
        and levels a charge against his messengers,
¹⁹     how much less those who dwell in houses of clay,
        whose foundations are in dust,
        and who are crushed like a moth?
²⁰ They are smashed between morning and evening;
    they perish forever without anyone knowing.
²¹ Isn’t their tent cord pulled up?
    They die without wisdom.^[b]