¹ Then Job answered and said,

² Of a truth I know that it is so. But how can man be just with God?

³ If he is pleased to contend with him, he cannot answer him one of a thousand.

⁴ He is wise in heart, and mighty in strength. Who has hardened himself against him, and prospered?

⁵ He who removes the mountains, and they do not know it when he overturns them in his anger,

⁶ who shakes the earth out of its place, and the pillars of it tremble,

⁷ who commands the sun, and it does not rise, and seals up the stars,

⁸ who alone stretches out the heavens, and treads upon the waves of the sea,

⁹ who makes the Bear, Orion, and the Pleiades, and the chambers of the south,

¹⁰ who does great things past finding out, yea, marvelous things without number.

¹¹ Lo, he goes by me, and I do not see him. He also passes on, but I do not perceive him.

¹² Behold, he seizes; who can hinder him? Who will say to him, What are thou doing?

¹³ God will not withdraw his anger. The helpers of Rahab stoop under him.

¹⁴ How much less shall I answer him, and choose out my words to reason with him?

¹⁵ Whom, though I were righteous, yet I would not answer. I would make supplication to my judge.

¹⁶ If I had called, and he had answered me, yet I would not believe that he hearkened to my voice.

¹⁷ For he breaks me with a tempest, and multiplies my wounds without cause.

¹⁸ He will not allow me to take my breath, but fills me with bitterness.

¹⁹ If of strength, lo, he is mighty! And if of justice, who will summon me?

²⁰ Though I be righteous, my own mouth shall condemn me. Though I be perfect, it shall prove me perverse.

²¹ Though I were perfect, I do not regard myself. I despise my life.

²² It is all one thing. Therefore I say, He destroys the perfect and the wicked.

²³ If the scourge kills suddenly, he will laugh at the trial of the innocent.

²⁴ The earth is given into the hand of the wicked. He covers the faces of the judges of it. If not he, who then is it?

²⁵ Now my days are swifter than a runner. They flee away. They see no good,

²⁶ They are passed away as the swift ships, as the eagle that swoops on the prey.

²⁷ If I say, I will forget my complaint. I will put off my sad countenance, and be of good cheer,

²⁸ I am afraid of all my sorrows. I know that thou will not hold me innocent.

²⁹ I shall be condemned. Why then do I labor in vain?

³⁰ If I wash myself with snow water, and make my hands ever so clean,

³¹ yet thou will plunge me in the ditch, and my own clothes shall abhor me.

³² For he is not a man, as I am, that I should answer him, that we should come together in judgment.

³³ There is no umpire between us who might lay his hand upon us both.

³⁴ Let him take his rod away from me, and let not his terror make me afraid.

³⁵ Then I would speak, and not be afraid of him, for I am not so in myself.