New International Version NIV
Good News Translation GNT
1 “Mortals, born of woman, are of few days and full of trouble.
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We are all born weak and helpless. All lead the same short, troubled life.
2 They spring up like flowers and wither away; like fleeting shadows, they do not endure.
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We grow and wither as quickly as flowers; we disappear like shadows.
3 Do you fix your eye on them? Will you bring them before you for judgment?
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Will you even look at me, God, or put me on trial and judge me?
4 Who can bring what is pure from the impure? No one!
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Nothing clean can ever come from anything as unclean as human beings.
5 A person’s days are determined; you have decreed the number of his months and have set limits he cannot exceed.
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The length of our lives is decided beforehand - the number of months we will live. You have settled it, and it can't be changed.
6 So look away from him and let him alone, till he has put in his time like a hired laborer.
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Look away from us and leave us alone; let us enjoy our hard life - if we can.
7 “At least there is hope for a tree: If it is cut down, it will sprout again, and its new shoots will not fail.
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There is hope for a tree that has been cut down; it can come back to life and sprout.
8 Its roots may grow old in the ground and its stump die in the soil,
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Even though its roots grow old, and its stump dies in the ground,
9 yet at the scent of water it will bud and put forth shoots like a plant.
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with water it will sprout like a young plant.
10 But a man dies and is laid low; he breathes his last and is no more.
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But we die, and that is the end of us; we die, and where are we then?
11 As the water of a lake dries up or a riverbed becomes parched and dry,
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Like rivers that stop running, and lakes that go dry,
12 so he lies down and does not rise; till the heavens are no more, people will not awake or be roused from their sleep.
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people die, never to rise. They will never wake up while the sky endures; they will never stir from their sleep.
13 “If only you would hide me in the grave and conceal me till your anger has passed! If only you would set me a time and then remember me!
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I wish you would hide me in the world of the dead; let me be hidden until your anger is over, and then set a time to remember me.
14 If someone dies, will they live again? All the days of my hard service I will wait for my renewal to come.
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If a man dies, can he come back to life? But I will wait for better times, wait till this time of trouble is ended.
15 You will call and I will answer you; you will long for the creature your hands have made.
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Then you will call, and I will answer, and you will be pleased with me, your creature.
16 Surely then you will count my steps but not keep track of my sin.
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Then you will watch every step I take, but you will not keep track of my sins.
17 My offenses will be sealed up in a bag; you will cover over my sin.
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You will forgive them and put them away; you will wipe out all the wrongs I have done.
18 “But as a mountain erodes and crumbles and as a rock is moved from its place,
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There comes a time when mountains fall and solid cliffs are moved away.
19 as water wears away stones and torrents wash away the soil, so you destroy a person’s hope.
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Water will wear down rocks, and heavy rain will wash away the soil; so you destroy our hope for life.
20 You overpower them once for all, and they are gone; you change their countenance and send them away.
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You overpower us and send us away forever; our faces are twisted in death.
21 If their children are honored, they do not know it; if their offspring are brought low, they do not see it.
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Our children win honor, but we never know it, nor are we told when they are disgraced.
22 They feel but the pain of their own bodies and mourn only for themselves.”
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We feel only the pain of our own bodies and the grief of our own minds.
Scripture quoted by permission. Quotations designated (NIV) are from THE HOLY BIBLE: NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica. All rights reserved worldwide.
Scripture taken from the Good News Translation - Second Edition, Copyright 1992 by American Bible Society. Used by Permission.