Job 7

World English Bible 84 include this book

1 “Isn’t a man forced to labor on earth? Aren’t his days like the days of a hired hand?

2 As a servant who earnestly desires the shadow, as a hireling who looks for his wages,

3 so I am made to possess months of misery, wearisome nights are appointed to me.

4 When I lie down, I say, ‘When will I arise, and the night be gone?’ I toss and turn until the dawning of the day.

5 My flesh is clothed with worms and clods of dust. My skin closes up, and breaks out afresh.

6 My days are swifter than a weaver’s shuttle, and are spent without hope.

7 Oh remember that my life is a breath. My eye will no more see good.

8 The eye of him who sees me will see me no more. Your eyes will be on me, but I will not be.

9 As the cloud is consumed and vanishes away, so he who goes down to Sheol will come up no more.

10 He will return no more to his house, neither will his place know him any more.

11 “Therefore I will not keep silent. I will speak in the anguish of my spirit. I will complain in the bitterness of my soul.

12 Am I a sea, or a sea monster, that you put a guard over me?

13 When I say, ‘My bed will comfort me. My couch will ease my complaint,’

14 then you scare me with dreams and terrify me through visions,

15 so that my soul chooses strangling, death rather than my bones.

16 I loathe my life. I don’t want to live forever. Leave me alone, for my days are but a breath.

17 What is man, that you should magnify him, that you should set your mind on him,

18 that you should visit him every morning, and test him every moment?

19 How long will you not look away from me, nor leave me alone until I swallow down my spittle?

20 If I have sinned, what do I do to you, you watcher of men? Why have you set me as a mark for you, so that I am a burden to myself?

21 Why do you not pardon my disobedience, and take away my iniquity? For now will I lie down in the dust. You will seek me diligently, but I will not be.”

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2 places named in this book — no place is named in this chapter, so the whole book is shown.

Where this was written

Not known unknown No setting is given, and the book is deliberately placed outside Israel's history.

When this was written

Traditions differ. Each position is shown rather than one asserted as settled.

Traditional: 2000 BC–1800 BC Unknown
The patriarchal setting and absence of Israelite institutions have long suggested a very early origin.
Critical: 600 BC–400 BC Unknown
Language and the developed treatment of suffering point to the exilic or post-exilic period.

Elsewhere in the world

Events overlapping the period this book is dated to (2000 BC–400 BC).

2600 BC–1900 BC Indus Valley cities India
Harappa and Mohenjo-daro housed tens of thousands, with planned streets and drainage, and a script still undeciphered.
2055 BC–1650 BC Egyptian Middle Kingdom Egypt
Egypt reunified under Theban rule; large-scale irrigation works and the classical form of the Egyptian language date from this period.
1900 BC–1450 BC Minoan palace culture Greece
Crete supported a literate palace society trading across the Aegean long before mainland Greece.
1755 BC–1750 BC Code of Hammurabi Mesopotamia
Babylonian law code inscribed on a basalt stele, covering property, family and injury, and predating the Mosaic law codes.
1600 BC–1046 BC Shang dynasty oracle bones China
The earliest substantial Chinese writing, inscribed on bone and shell for divination.
1600 BC–1178 BC Hittite empire Anatolia
An Anatolian power rivalling Egypt, ended in the Bronze Age collapse.
1200 BC–1150 BC Late Bronze Age collapse Mediterranean
Within roughly two generations most eastern Mediterranean states fell; cities were destroyed, trade networks broke and literacy contracted sharply.
1200 BC–1000 BC Iron working spreads in the Levant Levant
Iron gradually displaced bronze for tools and weapons across the eastern Mediterranean.

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