1: Lo, my eye hath seen all [this], my ear hath heard and understood it. 2: What ye know, [the same] do I know also: I [am] not inferior to 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 would 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 excellence make you afraid? and his dread fall upon you? 12: Your remembrances [are] like to 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: Why do I take my flesh in my teeth, and put my life in my hand? 15: Though he shall slay me, yet will I trust in him: but I will maintain my own ways before him. 16: He also [shall be] my salvation: for a 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 expire. 20: Only do not two [things] to me: then will I not hide myself from thee. 21: Withdraw thy 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] my iniquities and sins? make me to know my transgression and my sin. 24: Why hidest thou thy face, and holdest me for thy 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 to 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.
