1: Lo, mine eye hath seen all this, mine ear hath heard and understood it. 2: What ye know, the same do I know also: I am not inferior unto you. 3: Surely I would speak to the Almighty, and I desire to reason with God. 4: But ye are forgers of lies, ye are all physicians of no value. 5: O that ye would altogether hold your peace! and it should be your wisdom. 6: Hear now my reasoning, and hearken to the pleadings of my lips. 7: Will ye speak wickedly for God? and talk deceitfully for him? 8: Will ye accept his person? will ye contend for God? 9: Is it good that he should search you out? or as one man mocketh another, do ye so mock him? 10: He will surely reprove you, if ye do secretly accept persons. 11: Shall not his excellency make you afraid? and his dread fall upon you? 12: Your remembrances are like unto ashes, your bodies to bodies of clay. 13: Hold your peace, let me alone, that I may speak, and let come on me what will. 14: Wherefore do I take my flesh in my teeth, and put my life in mine hand? 15: Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him: but I will maintain mine own ways before him. 16: He also shall be my salvation: for an hypocrite shall not come before him. 17: Hear diligently my speech, and my declaration with your ears. 18: Behold now, I have ordered my cause; I know that I shall be justified. 19: Who is he that will plead with me? for now, if I hold my tongue, I shall give up the ghost. 20: Only do not two things unto me: then will I not hide myself from thee. 21: Withdraw thine hand far from me: and let not thy dread make me afraid. 22: Then call thou, and I will answer: or let me speak, and answer thou me. 23: How many are mine iniquities and sins? make me to know my transgression and my sin. 24: Wherefore hidest thou thy face, and holdest me for thine enemy? 25: Wilt thou break a leaf driven to and fro? and wilt thou pursue the dry stubble? 26: For thou writest bitter things against me, and makest me to possess the iniquities of my youth. 27: Thou puttest my feet also in the stocks, and lookest narrowly unto all my paths; thou settest a print upon the heels of my feet. 28: And he, as a rotten thing, consumeth, as a garment that is moth eaten.
