New Revised Standard NRS
The Bible in Basic English BBE
1 "I loathe my life; I will give free utterance to my complaint; I will speak in the bitterness of my soul.
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My soul is tired of life; I will let my sad thoughts go free in words; my soul will make a bitter outcry.
2 I will say to God, Do not condemn me; let me know why you contend against me.
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I will say to God, Do not put me down as a sinner; make clear to me what you have against me.
3 Does it seem good to you to oppress, to despise the work of your hands and favor the schemes of the wicked?
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What profit is it to you to be cruel, to give up the work of your hands, looking kindly on the design of evil-doers?
4 Do you have eyes of flesh? Do you see as humans see?
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Have you eyes of flesh, or do you see as man sees?
5 Are your days like the days of mortals, or your years like human years,
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Are your days as the days of man, or your years like his,
6 that you seek out my iniquity and search for my sin,
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That you take note of my sin, searching after my wrongdoing,
7 although you know that I am not guilty, and there is no one to deliver out of your hand?
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Though you see that I am not an evil-doer; and there is no one who is able to take a man out of your hands?
8 Your hands fashioned and made me; and now you turn and destroy me.
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Your hands made me, and I was formed by you, but then, changing your purpose, you gave me up to destruction.
9 Remember that you fashioned me like clay; and will you turn me to dust again?
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O keep in mind that you made me out of earth; and will you send me back again to dust?
10 Did you not pour me out like milk and curdle me like cheese?
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Was I not drained out like milk, becoming hard like cheese?
11 You clothed me with skin and flesh, and knit me together with bones and sinews.
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By you I was clothed with skin and flesh, and joined together with bones and muscles.
12 You have granted me life and steadfast love, and your care has preserved my spirit.
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You have been kind to me, and your grace has been with me, and your care has kept my spirit safe.
13 Yet these things you hid in your heart; I know that this was your purpose.
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But you kept these things in the secret of your heart; I am certain this was in your thoughts:
14 If I sin, you watch me, and do not acquit me of my iniquity.
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That, if I did wrong, you would take note of it, and would not make me clear from sin:
15 If I am wicked, woe to me! If I am righteous, I cannot lift up my head, for I am filled with disgrace and look upon my affliction.
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That, if I was an evil-doer, the curse would come on me; and if I was upright, my head would not be lifted up, being full of shame and overcome with trouble.
16 Bold as a lion you hunt me; you repeat your exploits against me.
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And that if there was cause for pride, you would go after me like a lion; and again put out your wonders against me:
17 You renew your witnesses against me, and increase your vexation toward me; you bring fresh troops against me.
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That you would send new witnesses against me, increasing your wrath against me, and letting loose new armies on me.
18 "Why did you bring me forth from the womb? Would that I had died before any eye had seen me,
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Why then did you make me come out of my mother's body? It would have been better for me to have taken my last breath, and for no eye to have seen me,
19 and were as though I had not been, carried from the womb to the grave.
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And for me to have been as if I had not been; to have been taken from my mother's body straight to my last resting-place.
20 Are not the days of my life few? Let me alone, that I may find a little comfort
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Are not the days of my life small in number? Let your eyes be turned away from me, so that I may have a little pleasure,
21 before I go, never to return, to the land of gloom and deep darkness,
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Before I go to the place from which I will not come back, to the land where all is dark and black,
22 the land of gloom and chaos, where light is like darkness."
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A land of thick dark, without order, where the very light is dark.
New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
The Bible in Basic English is in the public domain.