⁴ As for me, is my complaint for human beings?
And if so, why cannot I be impatient?
⁵ Turn to me and be appalled,
and place your hand on your mouth.
⁶ And when I think of it, I am horrified,^[a]
and shuddering seizes my flesh.
⁷ “Why do the wicked live,
grow old, even grow mighty in power?
⁸ With them their offspring are established before them,^[b]
and their descendants before their eyes.
⁹ Their houses are safe without fear,
and the rod of God is not upon them.
¹⁰ His bull breeds and does not fail;
his cow calves and does not miscarry.
¹¹ They send out their little ones like the flock,
and their children dance around.
¹² They sing^[c] to the tambourine and lyre,
and they rejoice to the sound of the long flute.
¹³ They spend their days in prosperity,
and in peace they go down to Sheol.
¹⁴ And they say to God, ‘Turn away from us,
for^[d] we do not desire to know your ways.
¹⁵ Who is Shaddai that we should serve him,
or^[e] what would we benefit when we plead with him?’
¹⁶ Look, their prosperity is not in their hands;
the schemes of the wicked are repugnant^[f] to me.
¹⁷ “How often is the lamp of the wicked put out,
and their disaster comes upon them?
He^[g] distributes pains in his anger.
¹⁸ How often are they like straw before^[h] the wind,
and like chaff that the storm carries away?