If indeed you would exalt yourselves above me and plead my disgrace against me,

People have opened their mouths against me, they have struck my cheek in scorn; they unite together against me.

A rope is hidden for him on the ground and a trap for him lies on the path.

Thus his anger burns against me, and he considers me among his enemies.

“Yes, I know what you are thinking, the schemes by which you would wrong me.

“Does not humanity have hard service on earth? Are not their days also like the days of a hired man?

Am I the sea, or the creature of the deep, that you must put me under guard?

They glide by like reed boats, like an eagle that swoops down on its prey.

“Refrain from talking with me so that I may speak; then let come to me what may.

For you write down bitter things against me and cause me to inherit the sins of my youth.

Because he covered his face with fat, and made his hips bulge with fat,

He breaks through against me, time and time again; he rushes against me like a warrior.

I have sewed sackcloth on my skin, and buried my horn in the dust;

know then that God has wronged me and encircled me with his net.

when he caused his lamp to shine upon my head, and by his light I walked through darkness;

just as I was in my most productive time, when God’s intimate friendship was experienced in my tent,

When I went out to the city gate and secured my seat in the public square,

the blessing of the dying man descended on me, and I made the widow’s heart rejoice;

By the brush they would gather herbs from the salt marshes, and the root of the broom tree was their food.

“And now my soul pours itself out within me; days of suffering take hold of me.