Are God's encouragements inconsequential to you, even a word that has been spoken gently to you?

Why has your heart misled you,
and why do your eyes flash

For thou turnest against God thy spirit? And hast brought out words from thy mouth:

"The wicked person writhes in pain throughout his life, a number of years has been reserved for the ruthless.

He has no hope of coming safe out of the dark, and his fate will be the sword;

Because he has stretched out his hand against God, and behaves himself proudly against the Almighty;

"Because he has covered his face with his fat and has gathered fat upon [his] loins,

He has lived in desolate cities, in houses which no one inhabited, which were ready to become heaps.

He does not get wealth for himself, and is unable to keep what he has got; the heads of his grain are not bent down to the earth.

Evil has made them with child, and they give birth to trouble; and the fruit of their body is shame for themselves.

Shall not thy vain words come yet to an end? Or, hast thou yet any more to say?

“If I speak, my pain is not lessened,
And if I hold back, what has left me?

But now he has made me weary: you have made desolate all my company.

Thus you shriveled me up; it became a witness. And my leanness has risen up against me; it testifies to my face.

His wrath has torn, and he has been hostile toward me; he gnashed at me with his teeth. My foe sharpens his eyes against me.

God has delivered me to the ungodly, and turned me over into the hands of the wicked.

I was at ease, but he has broken me asunder: he has also taken me by my neck, and shaken me to pieces, and set me up for his mark.

My face has grown red with weeping,
and darkness covers my eyes,

"Listen, earth! Don't cover my blood, for my outcry has no place to rest.

For thou hast hidden their heart from understanding; therefore thou wilt not exalt them.

He has made me also a byword of the people; and I was as one before whom men spit.

And my eye has grown dim from grief, and the limbs of my body [are] all like a shadow.

The upright are surprised at this, and he who has done no wrong is troubled because of the evil-doers.

The righteous also shall hold to his way, and he that has clean hands shall be stronger and stronger.

For he has been thrown into a net by his feet and he wanders into a mesh.

All memory of him perishes from the earth;
he has no name anywhere.

He has no children or descendants among his people,
no survivor where he used to live.

Surely such is the residence of an evil man; and this is the place of one who has not known God.'"

Know now that God has overthrown me, and has compassed me with his net.

He has fenced up my way that I cannot pass, and he has set darkness in my paths.

He has stripped me of my glory, and taken the crown from my head.

He has destroyed me on every side, and I am gone: and my hope has he removed like a tree.

He has also kindled his wrath against me, and he counts me unto him as one of his enemies.

He has put my brethren far from me, and my acquaintances are wholly estranged from me.

All the men of my counsel detest me, even this one I loved has turned against me.

Have pity upon me, have pity upon me, O you my friends; for the hand of God has touched me.

Why are you chasing me, as God has been doing? Aren't you satisfied that I'm sick?

And after my skin has been thus destroyed, but from my flesh I will see God,

"Surely you know that it has been from old, ever since humankind was placed on the earth,

the joy of the wicked has been brief
and the happiness of the godless has lasted only a moment?

The eye which saw him sees him no longer; and his place has no more knowledge of him.

He has swallowed down riches, and he shall vomit them up again: God shall cast them out of his belly.

That for which he labored he shall restore, and shall not swallow it down. According to the substance that he has gotten, he shall not rejoice.

Because he has oppressed and has forsaken the poor; because he has violently taken away a house which he built not;

Because he has not known satisfaction in his stomach, {he lets nothing escape that he desires}.

{There is nothing left after he has eaten}; therefore his prosperity will not endure.

"It will come about that, when he has filled himself to the full, God will vent his burning anger on him; he will pour it out on him and on his body.

Total darkness waits to receive his treasures; a fire which has not been kindled will consume him and devour what is left in his tent.

For what pleasure has he in his house after him, when the number of his months is cut off in the midst?

Yet another dies with a bitter inner self and has not tasted prosperity.

How the evil man goes free in the day of trouble, and has salvation in the day of wrath?

Who shall declare his way to his face? and who shall repay him what he has done?

For thou hast taken a pledge of thy brother for nought, and stripped off the clothing of the naked.

Thou hast not given water to the fainting to drink, and thou hast withholden bread from the hungry.

Widows hast thou sent empty away, and the arms of the fatherless have been broken.

And thou hast said, 'What -- hath God known? Through thickness doth He judge?

Hast thou marked the old way which wicked men have trodden?

{Surely} our foe perishes, and fire has consumed their remainder.

Accept what he has to teach you, and treasure his words in your heart.

If only I knew where to find him, I would visit him where he has taken his seat.

But he knows the way that I take: when he has tested me, I shall come forth as gold.

My foot has held fast to his steps, his way have I kept, and not turned aside.

I haven't wandered away from the commands that he has spoken; I've treasured what he has said more than my own meals."

But he is unchangeable, and who can change him? Whatever he has desired, he does.

He will certainly accomplish what He has decreed for me,
and He has many more things like these in mind.

Indeed, God has made my heart faint, and Shaddai has terrified me.

Because I was not cut off before the darkness, neither has he covered the darkness from my face.

They send away the ass of him who has no father, they take the widow's ox for debt.

The public place of his town has no more knowledge of him, and his name has gone from the memory of men: he is rooted up like a dead tree.

He is not kind to the widow, and he has no pity for her child.

Yet God preserves the mighty by his power. He rises up who has no assurance of life.

Behold, even the moon has no brightness, and the stars are not pure in his sight;

How have you helped him that is without power? how save you the arm that has no strength?

How have you counseled him that has no wisdom? and how have you plentifully declared the thing as it is?

{With whose help} have you uttered words, and whose breath has come forth from you?

Sheol is naked before him, and destruction has no covering.

He has enclosed the face of the full moon and spread his clouds over it.

He has drawn a circle on the waters at the boundary where the day and night come together.

By his spirit he has adorned the heavens; his hand has pierced the fleeing serpent.

As God lives, who has taken away my right; and the Almighty, who has made bitter my soul;

I will keep it safe, and will not let it go: my heart has nothing to say against any part of my life.

For what is the hope of the hypocrite, though he has gained, when God takes away his soul?

I will teach you about God’s power.
I will not conceal what the Almighty has planned.

If he has many children, their destiny is to die by the sword, and his descendants won't have enough food.

"He builds his house like the moth, and like a booth [that] a watchman has made.

And it hurls at him, and it has no compassion; he will quickly flee from its power.

The stones of it are the place of sapphires: and it has dust of gold.

There is a path which no fowl knows, and which the falcon's eye has not seen:

{Proud wild animals} have not trodden it; [the] lion in its prime has not prowled over it.

On the flinty rock man has set to work with his hand; he has overturned mountains at their bases.

He has cut out channels through the rocks; his eyes have spotted every precious thing.

He has searched the sources of the rivers and what was hidden he has brought into the light.

Man has not seen the way to it, and it is not in the land of the living.

For it has been hidden from the eyes of every living creature, and from the birds of the sky it has been concealed.

God has knowledge of the way to it, and of its resting-place;

He has commanded mankind: "To fear the Lord that is wisdom; to move away from evil that is understanding.'"

Yea, how might the strength of their hands profit me, in whom vigor has perished?

Because he has loosed my cord, and afflicted me, they have also cast off restraint before me.

Terrors have turned on me. They chase my honor as the wind. My welfare has passed away as a cloud.

"Now, my soul pours itself out; the time of my affliction has taken control of me.