² “Listen carefully to my words,
    and let this be your consolation.
³ Bear with me, and I will speak;
    then after I have spoken, mock on.^(A)
4 As for me, is my complaint addressed to mortals?
    Why should I not be impatient?^(B)
5 Look at me and be appalled,
    and lay your hand upon your mouth.^(C)
6 When I think of it I am dismayed,
    and shuddering seizes my flesh.
⁷ Why do the wicked live on,
    reach old age, and grow mighty in power?^(D)
8 Their children are established in their presence
    and their offspring before their eyes.^(E)
9 Their houses are safe from fear,
    and no rod of God is upon them.^(F)
10 Their bull breeds without fail;
    their cow calves and never miscarries.^(G)
11 They send out their little ones like a flock,
    and their children dance around.
¹² They sing to the tambourine and the lyre
    and rejoice to the sound of the pipe.^(H)
13 They spend their days in prosperity,
    and in peace they go down to Sheol.^(I)
14 They say to God, ‘Leave us alone!
    We do not desire to know your ways.^(J)
15 What is the Almighty,^[a] that we should serve him?
    And what profit do we get if we pray to him?’^(K)
16 Is not their prosperity indeed their own achievement?^[b]
    The plans of the wicked are repugnant to me.^(L)

¹⁷ “How often is the lamp of the wicked put out?
    How often does calamity come upon them?
    How often does God^[c] distribute pains in his anger?^(M)
18 How often are they like straw before the wind
    and like chaff that the storm carries away?^(N)
19 You say, ‘God stores up their iniquity for their children.’
    Let it be paid back to them, so that they may know it.^(O)
20 Let their own eyes see their destruction,
    and let them drink of the wrath of the Almighty.^[d](P)
21 For what do they care for their household after them,
    when the number of their months is cut off?
²² Will any teach God knowledge,
    seeing that he judges those who are on high?^(Q)
23 One dies in full prosperity,
    being wholly at ease and secure,
²⁴ his loins full of milk
    and the marrow of his bones moist.
²⁵ Another dies in bitterness of soul,
    never having tasted of good.
²⁶ They lie down alike in the dust,
    and the worms cover them.^(R)

²⁷ “Oh, I know your thoughts
    and your schemes to wrong me.
²⁸ For you say, ‘Where is the house of the prince?
    Where is the tent in which the wicked lived?’^(S)
29 Have you not asked those who travel the roads,
    and do you not accept their testimony,
³⁰ that the wicked are spared in the day of calamity
    and are rescued in the day of wrath?^(T)
31 Who declares their way to their face,
    and who repays them for what they have done?
³² When they are carried to the grave,
    a watch is kept over their tomb.
³³ The clods of the valley are sweet to them;
    everyone will follow after,
    and those who went before are innumerable.^(U)
34 How then will you comfort me with empty nothings?
    There is nothing left of your answers but falsehood.”