Job 7 — The Holy Bible

My Life Is Vain

“Is not the life of a man on earth an ordeal?

Is not his life also like the life of a hired man working by the day,

Or like a servant who fears his master,

Or like one who grasps for a shadow,

Or like a hired man who eagerly looks for his wages?

So I have been enduring months of futility,

And agonizing nights have been appointed for me.

When I lie down, I say, ‘When will it be day?’

When I arise, I say, ‘When will it be evening?’

I am full of pains from evening to morning.

My body is covered with loathsome worms,

And I am wasting away

As I scrape off clods of dust from my eruption.

“My life is lighter than speech

And perishes with an empty hope.

Remember then, my life is a breath,

And my eye will no longer return to see good.

The eye of him who sees me will not see me again;

Your eyes are on me, I am no more.

I am like the cloud that cleared away from the sky,

For if a man goes down to Hades, he shall not come up again.

He shall not return to his own house,

Nor shall his place know him anymore.

“Now then, neither will I restrain my mouth.

I will speak by necessity,

Because I will disclose the bitterness of my soul

When I am oppressed.

Am I a sea, or a serpent,

That You set a guard over me?

I said, ‘My bed will comfort me,

And on my couch I will counsel privately with myself.’

You scare me with dreams and terrify me with visions.

You will separate life from my spirit,

Yet keep my bones from death.

For I will not live forever, that I should patiently endure.

Let me alone, for my life is vain.

“What is man, that You should exalt him,

Or that You should set Your heart on him,

Or that You should visit him every morning

And judge him till the time of rest?

How long will You neither let me alone,

Nor let me go until I swallow my saliva in grief?

If I have sinned, what can I do to You,

O You who understand the heart of men?

Why have You set me as Your accuser?

Why am I a burden to You?

Why then have You not forgotten my lawlessness

And purged my sin?

But now I will depart into the earth,

And in the morning I will no longer be here.”