Job 14

¹“Man, who is born of a woman,

is of few days, and full of trouble.

²He grows up like a flower, and is cut down.

He also flees like a shadow, and doesn’t continue.

³Do you open your eyes on such a one,

and bring me into judgement with you?

⁴Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean?

Not one.

⁵Seeing his days are determined,

the number of his months is with you,

and you have appointed his bounds that he can’t pass.

⁶Look away from him, that he may rest,

until he accomplishes, as a hireling, his day.

⁷“For there is hope for a tree if it is cut down,

that it will sprout again,

that the tender branch of it will not cease.

⁸Though its root grows old in the earth,

and its stock dies in the ground,

⁹yet through the scent of water it will bud,

and sprout boughs like a plant.

¹⁰But man dies, and is laid low.

Yes, man gives up the spirit, and where is he?

¹¹As the waters fail from the sea,

and the river wastes and dries up,

¹²so man lies down and doesn’t rise.

Until the heavens are no more, they will not awake,

nor be roused out of their sleep.

¹³“Oh that you would hide me in Sheol,

that you would keep me secret until your wrath is past,

that you would appoint me a set time and remember me!

¹⁴If a man dies, will he live again?

I would wait all the days of my warfare,

until my release should come.

¹⁵You would call, and I would answer you.

You would have a desire for the work of your hands.

¹⁶But now you count my steps.

Don’t you watch over my sin?

¹⁷My disobedience is sealed up in a bag.

You fasten up my iniquity.

¹⁸“But the mountain falling comes to nothing.

The rock is removed out of its place.

¹⁹The waters wear the stones.

The torrents of it wash away the dust of the earth.

So you destroy the hope of man.

²⁰You forever prevail against him, and he departs.

You change his face, and send him away.

²¹His sons come to honour, and he doesn’t know it.

They are brought low, but he doesn’t perceive it of them.

²²But his flesh on him has pain,

and his soul within him mourns.”