1 I, the man, have seen affliction by the rod of His wrath.

2 He has led me and made me go in darkness and not in light.

3 Surely He is turned against me; He turns His hand all the day.

4 He has wasted my flesh and my skin; He has broken my bones.

5 He has built against me and has encircled me with bitterness and travail.

6 He has made me live in dark places, like the dead of old.

7 He has fenced me in and I cannot go out; He has made my bronze chain heavy.

8 Also when I cry and shout, He shuts out my prayer.

9 He walled up my ways with hewn stone; my paths are crooked.

10 He was a bear lying in wait for me, a lion in secret places.

11 He has turned my ways aside and torn me in pieces. He has made me desolate.

12 He has bent His bow and set me as a target for the arrow.

13 He has caused the arrows of His quiver to enter into my inward parts.

14 I was a laughing stock to all my people; their taunting song all the day.

15 He has filled me with bitterness and made me drunk with wormwood.

16 He also broke my teeth with gravel; He has covered me with ashes.

17 And You cast off my soul from peace; I have forgotten good things.

18 And I said, My strength and my hope from Jehovah are gone.

19 Remember my affliction and my wandering, the wormwood and bitterness.

20 My soul calls to mind and remembers, and it depresses my mind.

21 I recall this to my mind; therefore I hope.

22 Through Jehovah’s kindness we are not consumed, because His compassions never fail.

23 They are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness.

24 Jehovah is my portion, says my soul; therefore I will hope in Him.

25 Jehovah is good to those who wait for Him, to the soul who seeks Him.

26 It is good that one should hope for the salvation of Jehovah, even in silence.

27 It is good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth.

28 He sits alone and keeps silence because He has laid it upon him.

29 He puts his mouth in the dust, if perhaps there may be hope.

30 He gives his cheek to Him who strikes him; he is filled full with reproach.

31 For the Lord will not cast off forever;

32 for though He causes grief, yet He will have compassion according to the multitude of His kindness.

33 For He does not wish to afflict nor grieve the sons of men;

34 to crush all the prisoners of the earth under His feet;

35 to turn aside the justice due a man before the face of the Most High;

36 to pervert a man in his cause; this the Lord does not look after.

37 Who is he who speaks and it occurs, if the Lord has not commanded it?

38 From the mouth of the Most High does not come forth both evil and good.

39 Why does a living man complain at the punishment for his sins?

40 Let us search out and examine our ways, and return to Jehovah.

41 Let us lift up our heart and hands to the Mighty God in Heaven.

42 We have sinned and have rebelled; You have not forgiven.

43 You have wrapped Yourself with anger and pursued us; You have slain; You have not spared.

44 You have wrapped Yourself with a cloud to keep prayer from passing through.

45 You have made us as the offscouring and garbage in the midst of the peoples.

46 All our enemies have opened their mouths against us.

47 Fear and a pit have come upon us; ruin and destruction.

48 Streams of water run down my eyes for the destruction of the daughter of my people.

49 My eyes flow and do not cease, with no stopping,

50 until Jehovah looks down from Heaven and has regard.

51 My eye pains my soul because of all the daughters of my city.

52 My enemies have hunted me down like a bird, without cause.

53 They have cut off my life in the pit, and cast a stone upon me.

54 Waters flowed over my head; then I said, I am cut off.

55 I called on Your name, O Jehovah, out of the lowest pit.

56 You have heard my voice; do not hide Your ear from my relief, from my cry for help.

57 You drew near in the day that I called on You; You said, Fear not.

58 O Lord, You have pleaded the case for my soul; You have redeemed my life.

59 O Jehovah, You have seen how I am wronged; judge my case.

60 You have seen all their vengeance, all their plots against me.

61 You have heard their reproach, O Jehovah, all their plots against me;

62 the lips of those who rose up against me, and their scheming against me all the day.

63 Behold their sitting down and their rising up; I am their taunting song.

64 Return upon them a recompense, O Jehovah, according to the work of their hands.

65 Give them hardness of heart; Your curse be upon them.

66 Pursue and destroy them in anger from under the heavens of Jehovah.