The Book of Job

⭑ Catholic Public Domain :: World English Bible Catholic ⭑

- Chapter 10 -

Job: I want to ask God for forgiveness

My soul is weary of my life. I will release my words against myself. I will speak in the bitterness of my soul.

I will say to God: Do not be willing to condemn me. Reveal to me why you judge me this way.

Does it seem good to you, if you find fault with me and oppress me, the work of your own hands, and assist the counsel of the impious?

Do you have bodily eyes? Or, just as man sees, will you see?

Are your days just like the days of man, and are your years as the times of humans,

so that you would inquire about my iniquity and examine my sin?

And you know that I have done nothing impious, yet there is no one who can deliver from your hand.

Your hands have made me and formed me all around, and, in this way, do you suddenly throw me away?

Remember, I ask you, that you have fashioned me like clay, and you will reduce me to dust.

Have you not extracted me like milk and curdled me like cheese?

You have clothed me with skin and flesh. You have put me together with bones and nerves.

You have assigned to me life and mercy, and your visitation has preserved my spirit.

Though you may conceal this in your heart, yet I know that you remember everything.

If I have sinned, and you have spared me for an hour, why do you not endure me to be clean from my iniquity?

And if I should be impious, woe to me, and if I should be just, I will not lift up my head, being drenched with affliction and misery.

And because of pride, you will seize me like a lioness, and having returned, you torment me to an extraordinary degree.(a)

You renew your testimony against me, and you multiply your wrath against me, and these punishments make war within me.

Why did you lead me out of the womb? If only I had been consumed, so that no eye would ever see me!

I should have been as if I had not been: transferred from the womb to the tomb.

Will not my few days be completed soon? Release me, therefore, so that I may lament my sorrows a little,

before I depart and return no more to a land that is dark and covered with the fog of death,

a land of misery and darkness, where the shadow of death, and nothing else but everlasting horror, dwells.

Footnotes

(a)10:16 The word ‘mirabile’ (upon which the word ‘mirabiliter’ is based) usually is translated as wonders or even miracles. It refers to something extraordinary. Thus, ‘mirabiliter’ means ‘to an extraordinary degree,’ but, when applied to God, it can also imply supernatural intervention. In other words, God sometimes punishes by supernatural means.(Conte)

Job: I want to ask God for forgiveness

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

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

Is 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?

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

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

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

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

“‘Your hands have framed me and fashioned me altogether, yet you destroy me.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

“‘Why, then, have you brought me out of the womb? I wish I had given up the spirit, and no eye had seen me.

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

Aren’t my days few? Stop! Leave me alone, that I may find a little comfort,

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

the land dark as midnight, of the shadow of death, without any order, where the light is as midnight.’”