Study Desk

class="poetry"> Iyov said, "Perish the day I was born and the night that said, ‘A man is conceived.' May that day be darkness, may God on high not seek it, may no light shine on it, may gloom dark as death defile it, may clouds settle on it, may it be terrified by its own blackness. "As for that night, may thick darkness seize it, may it not be joined to the days of the year, may it not be numbered among the months; may that night be desolate, may no cry of joy be heard in it; may those who curse days curse it, those who[se curses] could rouse Livyatan; may the stars of its twilight be dark, may it look for light but get none, may it never see the shimmer of dawn — because it didn't shut the doors of the womb I was in and shield my eyes from trouble. "If I had been stillborn, if I had died at birth, had there been no knees to receive me or breasts for me to suck. Then I would be lying still and in peace, I would have slept and been at rest, along with kings and their earthly advisers, who rebuilt ruins for themselves, or with princes who had [plenty of] gold, who filled their houses with silver. Or I could have been like a hidden, miscarried child that never saw light. "There the wicked cease their raging, there the weary are at rest, prisoners live at peace together without hearing a taskmaster's yells. Great and small alike are there, and the slave is free of his master. "So why must light be given to the miserable and life to the bitter in spirit? They long for death, but it never comes; they search for it more than for buried treasure; when at last they find the grave, they are so happy they shout for joy. [Why give light] to a man who wanders blindly, whom God shuts in on every side? "My sighing serves in place of my food, and my groans pour out in a torrent; for the thing I feared has overwhelmed me, what I dreaded has happened to me. I have no peace, no quiet, no rest; and anguish keeps coming."

What I see is that those who plow sin and sow trouble reap just that.

"Remember that my life is but a breath; my eyes will never again see good times.

The eye that now sees me will see me no more; while your eyes are on me, I will be gone.

He can go right by me, and I don't see him; he moves past without my being aware of him.

Do you have eyes of flesh? Do you see as humans see?

"‘Why did you bring me out of the womb? I wish I had died there where no eye could see me.

You will call, and I will answer you; you will long to see what you made again.

then where is my hope? And that hope of mine, who will see it?

so that after my skin has been thus destroyed, then even without my flesh, I will see God.

I will see him for myself, my eyes, not someone else's, will behold him. My heart grows weak inside me!

but he will vanish completely, like his own dung — those who used to see him will ask, ‘Where is he?'

The eye which once saw him will see him no more, his place will not behold him again.

They see their children settled with them, their posterity assured.

Let their own eyes see their own destruction and themselves drink the wrath of Shaddai.

or darkness , so that you can't see, and a flood of water that covers you up!

Yet you say, ‘What does God know? Can he see through thick darkness to judge?

The clouds veil him off, so that he can't see; he just wanders around in heaven.'

if I turn north, I don't spot him; in the south he is veiled, and I still don't see him.

"Why are times not kept by Shaddai? Why do those who know him not see his days?