Job 10

10 ¹ I am sick of my own life. I will give free rein to my complaint; I will speak out of the bitterness of my soul. ² I will say to God: Do not condemn me; let me know why you contend with me. ³ Does it please you to oppress, to despise the work of your hands while you smile on the schemes of the wicked? ⁴ Do you have eyes of flesh? Do you see as a mortal sees? ⁵ Are your days like the days of a mortal, or your years like the years of a man, ⁶ that you must search out my guilt and hunt down my sin, ⁷ though you know that I am not guilty, and there is no one who can rescue me from your hand?

⁸ Your hands shaped me and made me, every part of me, and now you turn and destroy me. ⁹ Remember that you molded me like clay. Will you now return me to the dust? ¹⁰ Did you not pour me out like milk and curdle me like cheese, ¹¹ clothe me with skin and flesh, and weave me together with bones and sinews? ¹² You granted me life and covenant love, and your care has watched over my spirit.

¹³ Yet you hid this in your heart, and I know this was your purpose: ¹⁴ if I sinned, you would be watching me and would not clear me of my guilt. ¹⁵ If I am guilty, woe to me! And even if I am innocent, I cannot lift my head—I am so full of shame, drenched in my affliction. ¹⁶ If I hold my head high, you hunt me like a lion and again work wonders against me. ¹⁷ You bring fresh witnesses against me and pour out more of your anger on me; wave after wave of trouble assaults me.

¹⁸ Why then did you bring me out of the womb? I wish I had died before any eye saw me. ¹⁹ I would have been as though I never existed, carried straight from the womb to the grave. ²⁰ Are not my days few? Turn away from me, let me alone, so I may have a moment of comfort ²¹ before I go to the place of no return, to the land of darkness and deep shadow, ²² to the land of gloom like deepest night, of deep shadow and disorder, where even the light is like darkness.