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Job Says to God: I Hate My Life

10 “I hate my life.
    I will freely express my complaint.
    I will speak as bitterly as I feel.
I will say to Eloah,
    ‘Don’t condemn me.
        Let me know why you are quarreling with me.
            What do you gain by mistreating me,
                by rejecting the work of your hands
                    while you favor the plans of the wicked?
Do you actually have human eyes?
    Do you see as a mortal sees?
        Are your days like a mortal’s days?
        Are your years like a human’s years?
            Is that why you look for guilt in me
                and search for sin in me?
You know I’m not guilty,
    but there is no one to rescue me from your hands.

“‘Your hands formed me and made every part of me,
    then you turned to destroy me.[a]
Please remember that you made me out of clay
    and that you will return me to the dust again.
10 Didn’t you pour me out like milk
    and curdle me like cheese?
11 Didn’t you dress me in skin and flesh
    and weave me together with bones and tendons?
12 You gave me life and mercy.
    Your watchfulness has preserved my spirit.
13 But in your heart you hid these things.
    I know this is what you did.

14 “‘If I sin, you watch me
    and will not free me from my guilt.
15 How terrible it will be for me if I’m guilty!
    Even if I’m righteous, I dare not lift up my head.
    I am filled with disgrace
        while I look on my misery.
16 Like a proud, ferocious lion you hunt me down.
    You keep working your miracles against me.[b]
17 You keep finding new witnesses against me.
    You keep increasing your anger toward me.
        You keep bringing new armies against me.

18 “‘Why did you take me out of the womb?
    I wish I had breathed my last breath
        before anyone had laid eyes on me.
19 Then it would be as if I had never existed,
    as if I had been carried from the womb to the tomb.

20 “‘Isn’t my life short enough?
    So stop this, and leave me alone.
        Let me smile a little
21 before I go away
    to a land of darkness and gloom,
22 to a dismal land of long shadows and confusion
    where light is as bright as darkness.
    I’ll never return.’”

Footnotes

  1. Job 10:8 Hebrew meaning of this line uncertain.
  2. Job 10:16 Hebrew meaning of this verse uncertain.

10 My soul is weary of my life; I will leave my complaint upon myself; I will speak in the bitterness of my soul.

I will say unto God, Do not condemn me; shew me wherefore thou contendest with me.

Is it good unto thee that thou shouldest oppress, that thou shouldest despise the work of thine hands, and shine upon the counsel of the wicked?

Hast thou eyes of flesh? or seest thou as man seeth?

Are thy days as the days of man? are thy years as man's days,

That thou enquirest after mine iniquity, and searchest after my sin?

Thou knowest that I am not wicked; and there is none that can deliver out of thine hand.

Thine hands have made me and fashioned me together round about; yet thou dost destroy me.

Remember, I beseech thee, that thou hast made me as the clay; and wilt thou bring me into dust again?

10 Hast thou not poured me out as milk, and curdled me like cheese?

11 Thou hast clothed me with skin and flesh, and hast fenced me with bones and sinews.

12 Thou hast granted me life and favour, and thy visitation hath preserved my spirit.

13 And these things hast thou hid in thine heart: I know that this is with thee.

14 If I sin, then thou markest me, and thou wilt not acquit me from mine iniquity.

15 If I be wicked, woe unto me; and if I be righteous, yet will I not lift up my head. I am full of confusion; therefore see thou mine affliction;

16 For it increaseth. Thou huntest me as a fierce lion: and again thou shewest thyself marvellous upon me.

17 Thou renewest thy witnesses against me, and increasest thine indignation upon me; changes and war are against me.

18 Wherefore then hast thou brought me forth out of the womb? Oh that I had given up the ghost, 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 Are not my days few? cease then, and let me alone, that I may take comfort a little,

21 Before I go whence I shall not return, even to the land of darkness and the shadow of death;

22 A land of darkness, as darkness itself; and of the shadow of death, without any order, and where the light is as darkness.