Day 223 of 730

¹Then Job answered,

²"Truly I know that it is so, but how can man be just with God?

³If he is pleased to contend with him, he can't answer him one time in a thousand.

⁴God who is wise in heart, and mighty in strength: who has hardened himself against him, and prospered?

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

⁶He shakes the earth out of its place. Its pillars tremble.

⁷He commands the sun, and it doesn't rise, and seals up the stars.

⁸He alone stretches out the heavens, and treads on the waves of the sea.

⁹He makes the Bear, Orion, and the Pleiades, and the chambers of the south.

¹⁰He does great things past finding out; yes, marvelous things without number.

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

¹²Behold, he snatches away. Who can hinder him? Who will ask him, 'What are you doing?'

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

¹⁴How much less shall I answer him, And choose my words to argue with him?

¹⁵Though I were righteous, yet I wouldn't answer him. I would make supplication to my judge.

¹⁶If I had called, and he had answered me, yet I wouldn't believe that he listened to my voice.

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

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

¹⁹If it is a matter of strength, behold, he is mighty! If of justice, 'Who,' says he, 'will summon me?'

²⁰Though I am righteous, my own mouth shall condemn me. Though I am blameless, it shall prove me perverse.

²¹I am blameless. I do not regard myself. I despise my life.

²²"It is all the same. Therefore I say he destroys the blameless and the wicked.

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

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

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

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

²⁷If I say, 'I will forget my complaint, I will put off my sad face, and cheer up;'

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

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

³⁰If I wash myself with snow, and cleanse my hands with lye,

³¹yet you will plunge me in the ditch. My own clothes shall abhor me.

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

³³There is no umpire between us, that might lay his hand on us both.

³⁴Let him take his rod away from me. Let his terror not make me afraid;

³⁵then I would speak, and not fear him, for I am not so in myself.

¹"My soul is weary of my life. I will give free course to my complaint. I will speak in the bitterness of my soul.

²I will tell God, 'Do not condemn me. Show me why you contend with me.

³Is it good to you that you should oppress, that you should despise the work of your hands, and smile on the counsel of the wicked?

⁴Do you have eyes of flesh? Or do you see as man sees?

⁵Are your days as the days of mortals, or your years as man's years,

⁶that you inquire after my iniquity, and search after my sin?

⁷Although you know that I am not wicked, there is no one who can deliver out of your hand.

⁸"'Your hands have framed me and fashioned me altogether, yet you destroy me.

⁹Remember, I beg you, that you have fashioned me as clay. Will you bring me into dust again?

¹⁰Haven't you poured me out like milk, and curdled me like cheese?

¹¹You have clothed me with skin and flesh, and knit me together with bones and sinews.

¹²You have granted me life and loving kindness. Your visitation has preserved my spirit.

¹³Yet you hid these things in your heart. I know that this is with you:

¹⁴if I sin, then you mark me. You will not acquit me from my iniquity.

¹⁵If I am wicked, woe to me. If I am righteous, I still shall not lift up my head, being filled with disgrace, and conscious of my affliction.

¹⁶If my head is held high, you hunt me like a lion. Again you show yourself powerful to me.

¹⁷You renew your witnesses against me, and increase your indignation on me. Changes and warfare are with me.

¹⁸"'Why, then, have you brought me forth out of the womb? I wish I had given up the spirit, and no eye had seen me.

¹⁹I should have been as though I had not been. I should have been carried from the womb to the grave.

²⁰Aren't my days few? Cease then. Leave me alone, that I may find a little comfort,

²¹before I go where I shall not return from, to the land of darkness and of the shadow of death;

²²the land dark as midnight, of the shadow of death, without any order, where the light is as midnight.'"

¹Surely God is good to Israel, to those who are pure in heart.

²But as for me, my feet were almost gone. My steps had nearly slipped.

³For I was envious of the arrogant, when I saw the prosperity of the wicked.

⁴For there are no struggles in their death, but their strength is firm.

⁵They are free from burdens of men, neither are they plagued like other men.

⁶Therefore pride is like a chain around their neck. Violence covers them like a garment.

⁷Their eyes bulge with fat. Their minds pass the limits of conceit.

⁸They scoff and speak with malice. In arrogance, they threaten oppression.

⁹They have set their mouth in the heavens. Their tongue walks through the earth.

¹⁰Therefore their people return to them, and they drink up waters of abundance.

¹¹They say, "How does God know? Is there knowledge in the Most High?"

¹²Behold, these are the wicked. Being always at ease, they increase in riches.

¹³Surely in vain I have cleansed my heart, and washed my hands in innocence,

¹⁴For all day long have I been plagued, and punished every morning.

¹⁵If I had said, "I will speak thus;" behold, I would have betrayed the generation of your children.

¹⁶When I tried to understand this, it was too painful for me;

¹⁷Until I entered God's sanctuary, and considered their latter end.

¹⁸Surely you set them in slippery places. You throw them down to destruction.

¹⁹How they are suddenly destroyed! They are completely swept away with terrors.

²⁰As a dream when one wakes up, so, Lord, when you awake, you will despise their fantasies.

²¹For my soul was grieved. I was embittered in my heart.

²²I was so senseless and ignorant. I was a brute beast before you.

²³Nevertheless, I am continually with you. You have held my right hand.

²⁴You will guide me with your counsel, and afterward receive me to glory.

²⁵Who do I have in heaven? There is no one on earth who I desire besides you.

²⁶My flesh and my heart fails, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.

²⁷For, behold, those who are far from you shall perish. You have destroyed all those who are unfaithful to you.

²⁸But it is good for me to come close to God. I have made the Lord God my refuge, that I may tell of all your works.

¹My son, if you have become collateral for your neighbor, if you have struck your hands in pledge for a stranger;

²You are trapped by the words of your mouth. You are ensnared with the words of your mouth.

³Do this now, my son, and deliver yourself, seeing you have come into the hand of your neighbor. Go, humble yourself. Press your plea with your neighbor.

⁴Give no sleep to your eyes, nor slumber to your eyelids.

⁵Free yourself, like a gazelle from the hand of the hunter, like a bird from the snare of the fowler.

⁶Go to the ant, you sluggard. Consider her ways, and be wise;

⁷which having no chief, overseer, or ruler,

⁸provides her bread in the summer, and gathers her food in the harvest.

⁹How long will you sleep, sluggard? When will you arise out of your sleep?

¹⁰A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep:

¹¹so your poverty will come as a robber, and your scarcity as an armed man.

¹²A worthless person, a man of iniquity, is he who walks with a perverse mouth;

¹³who winks with his eyes, who signals with his feet, who motions with his fingers;

¹⁴in whose heart is perverseness, who devises evil continually, who always sows discord.

¹⁵Therefore his calamity will come suddenly. He will be broken suddenly, and that without remedy.

¹⁶There are six things which the Lord hates; yes, seven which are an abomination to him:

¹⁷haughty eyes, a lying tongue, hands that shed innocent blood;

¹⁸a heart that devises wicked schemes, feet that are swift in running to mischief,

¹⁹a false witness who utters lies, and he who sows discord among brothers.

²⁰My son, keep your father's commandment, and do not forsake your mother's teaching.

²¹Bind them continually on your heart. Tie them around your neck.

²²When you walk, it will lead you. When you sleep, it will watch over you. When you awake, it will talk with you.

²³For the commandment is a lamp, and the Law is light. Reproofs of instruction are the way of life,

²⁴to keep you from the immoral woman, from the flattery of the wayward wife's tongue.

²⁵Do not lust after her beauty in your heart, neither let her captivate you with her eyelids.

²⁶For a prostitute reduces you to a piece of bread. The adulteress hunts for your precious life.

²⁷Can a man scoop fire into his lap, and his clothes not be burned?

²⁸Or can one walk on hot coals, and his feet not be scorched?

²⁹So is he who goes in to his neighbor's wife. Whoever touches her will not be unpunished.

³⁰Men do not despise a thief, if he steals to satisfy himself when he is hungry:

³¹but if he is found, he shall restore seven times. He shall give all the wealth of his house.

³²He who commits adultery with a woman is void of understanding. He who does it destroys his own soul.

³³He will get wounds and dishonor. His reproach will not be wiped away.

³⁴For jealousy arouses the fury of the husband. He won't spare in the day of vengeance.

³⁵He won't regard any ransom, neither will he rest content, though you give many gifts.