chapter: 3
Verse 1
I am the man who has seen affliction by the rod of his wrath.
Verse 2
He has led me and caused me to walk in darkness, and not in light.
Verse 3
Surely he turns his hand against me again and again all day long.
Verse 4
He has made my flesh and my skin old. He has broken my bones.
Verse 5
He has built against me, and surrounded me with bitterness and hardship.
Verse 6
He has made me dwell in dark places, as those who have been long dead.
Verse 7
He has walled me about, so that I can’t go out. He has made my chain heavy.
Verse 8
Yes, when I cry, and call for help, he shuts out my prayer.
Verse 9
He has walled up my ways with cut stone. He has made my paths crooked.
Verse 10
He is to me as a bear lying in wait, as a lion in secret places.
Verse 11
He has turned away my ways, and pulled me in pieces. He has made me desolate.
Verse 12
He has bent his bow, and set me as a mark for the arrow.
Verse 13
He has caused the shafts of his quiver to enter into my kidneys.
Verse 14
I have become a derision to all my people, and their song all day long.
Verse 15
He has filled me with bitterness. He has stuffed me with wormwood.
Verse 16
He has also broken my teeth with gravel. He has covered me with ashes.
Verse 17
You have removed my soul far away from peace. I forgot prosperity.
Verse 18
I said, “My strength has perished, along with my expectation from Yahweh.”
Verse 19
Remember my affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the bitterness.
Verse 20
My soul still remembers them, and is bowed down within me.
Verse 21
This I recall to my mind; therefore I have hope.
Verse 22
It is because of Yahweh’s loving kindnesses that we are not consumed, because his compassion doesn’t fail.
Verse 23
They are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness.
Verse 24
“Yahweh is my portion,” says my soul. “Therefore I will hope in him.”
Verse 25
Yahweh is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him.
Verse 26
It is good that a man should hope and quietly wait for the salvation of Yahweh.
Verse 27
It is good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth.
Verse 28
Let him sit alone and keep silence, because he has laid it on him.
Verse 29
Let him put his mouth in the dust, if it is so that there may be hope.
Verse 30
Let him give his cheek to him who strikes him. Let him be filled full of reproach.
Verse 31
For the Lord will not cast off forever.
Verse 32
For though he causes grief, yet he will have compassion according to the multitude of his loving kindnesses.
Verse 33
For he does not afflict willingly, nor grieve the children of men.
Verse 34
To crush under foot all the prisoners of the earth,
Verse 35
to turn away the right of a man before the face of the Most High,
Verse 36
to subvert a man in his cause, the Lord doesn’t approve.
Verse 37
Who is he who says, and it comes to pass, when the Lord doesn’t command it?
Verse 38
Doesn’t evil and good come out of the mouth of the Most High?
Verse 39
Why does a living man complain, a man for the punishment of his sins?
Verse 40
Let us search and try our ways, and turn again to Yahweh.
Verse 41
Let us lift up our heart with our hands to God in the heavens.
Verse 42
“We have transgressed and have rebelled. You have not pardoned.
Verse 43
“You have covered us with anger and pursued us. You have killed. You have not pitied.
Verse 44
You have covered yourself with a cloud, so that no prayer can pass through.
Verse 45
You have made us an off-scouring and refuse in the middle of the peoples.
Verse 46
“All our enemies have opened their mouth wide against us.
Verse 47
Terror and the pit have come on us, devastation and destruction.”
Verse 48
My eye runs down with streams of water, for the destruction of the daughter of my people.
Verse 49
My eye pours down and doesn’t cease, without any intermission,
Verse 50
until Yahweh looks down, and sees from heaven.
Verse 51
My eye affects my soul, because of all the daughters of my city.
Verse 52
They have chased me relentlessly like a bird, those who are my enemies without cause.
Verse 53
They have cut off my life in the dungeon, and have cast a stone on me.
Verse 54
Waters flowed over my head. I said, “I am cut off.”
Verse 55
I called on your name, Yahweh, out of the lowest dungeon.
Verse 56
You heard my voice: “Don’t hide your ear from my sighing, and my cry.”
Verse 57
You came near in the day that I called on you. You said, “Don’t be afraid.”
Verse 58
Lord, you have pleaded the causes of my soul. You have redeemed my life.
Verse 59
Yahweh, you have seen my wrong. Judge my cause.
Verse 60
You have seen all their vengeance and all their plans against me.
Verse 61
You have heard their reproach, Yahweh, and all their plans against me,
Verse 62
the lips of those that rose up against me, and their plots against me all day long.
Verse 63
You see their sitting down and their rising up. I am their song.
Verse 64
You will pay them back, Yahweh, according to the work of their hands.
Verse 65
You will give them hardness of heart, your curse to them.
Verse 66