1:
My soul is weary of my life, I will let go my speech against myself, I will speak in the bitterness of my soul.
2:
I will say to God: Do not condemn me: tell me why thou judgest me so.
3:
Doth it seem good to thee that thou shouldst calumniate me, and oppress me, the work of thy own hands, and help the counsel of the wicked?
4:
Hast thou eyes of flesh: or, shalt thou see as man seeth?
5:
Are thy days as the days of man, and are thy years as the times of men:
6:
That thou shouldst inquire after my iniquity, and search after my sin?
7:
And shouldst know that I have done no wicked thing, whereas there is no man that can deliver out of thy hand.
8:
Thy hands have made me, and fashioned me wholly round about, and dost thou thus cast me down headlong on a sudden?
9:
Remember, I beseech thee, that thou hast made me as the clay, and thou wilt bring me into dust again.
10:
Hast thou not milked me as milk, and curdled me like cheese?
11:
Thou hast clothed me with skin and flesh: thou hast put me together with bones and sinews:
12:
Thou hast granted me life and mercy, and thy visitation hath preserved my spirit.
13:
Although thou conceal these things in thy heart, yet I know that thou rememberest all things.
14:
If I have sinned and thou hast spared me for an hour: why dost thou not suffer me to be clean from my iniquity?
15:
And if I be wicked, woe unto me: and if just, I shall not lift up my head, being filled with affliction and misery.
16:
And for pride thou wilt take me as a lioness, and returning thou tormentest me wonderfully.
17:
Thou renewest thy witnesses against me, and multipliest thy wrath upon me, and pains war against me.
18:
Why didst thou bring me forth out of the womb: O that I had been consumed that eye might not see me!
19:
I should have been as if I had not been, carried from the womb to the grave.
20:
Shall not the fewness of my days be ended shortly? suffer me, therefore, that I may lament my sorrow a little:
21:
Before I go, and return no more, to a land that is dark and covered with the mist of death:
22:
A land of misery and darkness, where the shadow of death, and no order, but everlasting horror dwelleth.