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9:1  Job responded:
9:2  I know for certain that this is so; and how can anyone be innocent before God?
9:3  If one wants to contend with him, he won’t answer one in a thousand.
9:4  He is wise and powerful; who can resist him and prosper?
9:5  Who removes mountains, and they are unaware; who overthrows them in anger?
9:6  Who shakes the earth from its place, and its pillars shudder?
9:7  Who commands the sun, and it does not rise, even seals up the stars;
9:8  stretched out the heavens alone and trod on the waves of the Sea;
9:9  made the Bear and Orion, Pleiades and the southern constellations;
9:10  does great and unsearchable things, wonders beyond number?
9:11  If God goes by me, I can’t see him; he glides past, and I can’t perceive him.
9:12  If he seizes, who can bring back? Who can say to him, “What are you doing?”
9:13  God won’t retract his anger; the helpers of Rahab bow beneath him.
9:14  Yet I myself will answer him; I’ll choose my words in a contest with him.
9:15  Even if I’m innocent, I can’t answer; I must plead for justice.
9:16  If I were to call and he answered me, I couldn’t believe that he heard my voice.
9:17  Who bruises me with a tempest and multiplies my wounds for no reason?
9:18  He doesn’t let me catch my breath, for he fills me with bitterness.
9:19  If the issue is strength—behold power! If justice—who calls God to meet me?
9:20  If I’m innocent, my mouth condemns me; I have integrity; but God declares me perverse.
9:21  I’m blameless, yet don’t know myself; I reject my life.
9:22  It’s all the same; therefore, I say God destroys the blameless and the sinners.
9:23  If calamity suddenly kills, he mocks at the slaying of innocents.
9:24  The earth is handed over to the wicked; he covers the faces of its judges. If not God, then who does?
9:25  My days are swifter than a runner; they flee and don’t experience good.
9:26  They sweep by like ships made of reeds, as an eagle swoops on prey.
9:27  If I say, “I’ll forget my lament, put on a different face so I can smile,”
9:28  I’m still afraid of all my suffering; I know that you won’t declare me innocent.
9:29  I myself am thought guilty; why have I tried so hard in vain?
9:30  If I wash myself with snow, purify my hands with soap,
9:31  then you’ll hurl me into a slimy pit so that my clothes detest me.
9:32  God is not a man like me—someone I could answer— so that we could come together in court.
9:33  Oh, that there were a mediator between us; he would lay his hand on both of us,
9:34  remove his rod from me, so his fury wouldn’t frighten me.
9:35  Then I would speak—unafraid— for I’m not that way.