1. My soul quarrels with my life; I will leave my speech with me; I will speak with the bitterness of my life.
2. I will say to God, 'do not condemn me; let me know why You quarrel with me.
3. Is it good to You that You should oppress, that You should reject the toil of Your hands, and shine upon the counsel of the wicked?
4. Do You have eyes of flesh, or do You see as a man sees?
5. Are Your days like the days of a mortal, or are Your years like the days of a man,
6. that You should search for my iniquity and seek my sin?
7. It is in Your knowledge that I will not be condemned, but no one can save [me] from Your hand.
8. Your hands shaped me and made me; [Your hosts are] together round about, and You destroy me.
9. Remember now that You made me like clay, and You will return me to dust.
10. Did You not pour me like milk and curdle me like cheese?
11. Clothe me with skin and flesh and cover me with bones and sinews?
12. You have granted me life and kindness, and Your providence watched my spirit.
13. But You hid these in Your heart; I knew that it was with You.
14. If I sinned, You watched me, and would not cleanse me of my iniquity,
15. If I dealt wickedly, woe is to me; and if I am righteous I will not raise my head, sated with disgrace and seeing my affliction.
16. And it is so great that You hunt me like a lion, and You repeatedly pronounce a verdict upon me.
17. You renew Your witnesses against me, and You increase Your anger with me; shifts with set times are with me.
18. Now why did You take me out of the womb? Would that I had died and no eye had seen me.
19. Then I would have been as though I had not existed; would that I was brought from the womb to the grave.
20. Are not my days few? So desist and withdraw from me, and I will strengthen myself a little,
21. before I go and do not return, to a land of darkness and the shadow of death,
22. a land of darkness like darkness itself; the shadow of death without orders, and where the light is as darkness.' "
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