Why do you say, Jacob, Why do you say, Israel, “The Lord is not aware of what is happening to me, My God is not concerned with my vindication”?

Why, Lord, do you make us stray from your ways, and make our minds stubborn so that we do not obey you? Return for the sake of your servants, the tribes of your inheritance!

You have been the object of Israel’s hopes. You have saved them when they were in trouble. Why have you become like a resident foreigner in the land? Why have you become like a traveler who only stops in to spend the night?

Why did I ever come forth from my mother’s womb? All I experience is trouble and grief, and I spend my days in shame.

Why do you force me to witness injustice? Why do you put up with wrongdoing? Destruction and violence confront me; conflict is present and one must endure strife.

Saul said to Michal, “Why have you deceived me this way by sending my enemy away? Now he has escaped!” Michal replied to Saul, “He said to me, ‘Help me get away or else I will kill you!’”

Joab replied, “May the Lord make his army a hundred times larger! My master, O king, do not all of them serve my master? Why does my master want to do this? Why bring judgment on Israel?”

So Pharaoh summoned Abram and said, “What is this you have done to me? Why didn’t you tell me that she was your wife?

Why did you say, ‘She is my sister,’ so that I took her to be my wife? Here is your wife! Take her and go!”

The Lord said to Abraham, “Why did Sarah laugh and say, ‘Will I really have a child when I am old?’

But the children struggled inside her, and she said, “If it is going to be like this, I’m not so sure I want to be pregnant!” So she asked the Lord,

Why did you run away secretly and deceive me? Why didn’t you tell me so I could send you off with a celebration complete with singing, tambourines, and harps?

Then Jacob asked, “Please tell me your name.” “Why do you ask my name?” the man replied. Then he blessed Jacob there.

So Esau said, “Let me leave some of my men with you.” “Why do that?” Jacob replied. “My lord has already been kind enough to me.”

When he went out the next day, there were two Hebrew men fighting. So he said to the one who was in the wrong, “Why are you attacking your fellow Hebrew?”

He said to his daughters, “So where is he? Why in the world did you leave the man? Call him, so that he may eat a meal with us.”

The king of Egypt said to them, “Moses and Aaron, why do you cause the people to refrain from their work? Return to your labor!”

And the people spoke against God and against Moses, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness, for there is no bread or water, and we detest this worthless food.”

Balak said to Balaam, “Did I not send again and again to you to summon you? Why did you not come to me? Am I not able to honor you?”

Why should the name of our father be lost from among his family because he had no son? Give us a possession among the relatives of our father.”