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3If only I knew where to find him;
if only I could go to his dwelling!

4I would state my case before him
and fill my mouth with arguments.

5I would find out what he would answer me,
and consider what he would say.

6Would he oppose me with great power?
No, he would not press charges against me.

7There an upright man could present his case before him,
and I would be delivered forever from my judge.

8“But if I go to the east, he is not there;
if I go to the west, I do not find him.

9When he is at work in the north, I do not see him;
when he turns to the south, I catch no glimpse of him.

10But he knows the way that I take;
when he has tested me, I will come forth as gold.

11My feet have closely followed his steps;
I have kept to his way without turning aside.

12I have not departed from the commands of his lips;
I have treasured the words of his mouth more than my daily bread.

13“But he stands alone, and who can oppose him?
He does whatever he pleases.

14He carries out his decree against me,
and many such plans he still has in store.

15That is why I am terrified before him;
when I think of all this, I fear him.

16God has made my heart faint;
the Almighty has terrified me.

17Yet I am not silenced by the darkness,
by the thick darkness that covers my face.

2Men move boundary stones;
they pasture flocks they have stolen.

3They drive away the orphan's donkey
and take the widow's ox in pledge.

4They thrust the needy from the path
and force all the poor of the land into hiding.

5Like wild donkeys in the desert,
the poor go about their labor of foraging food;
the wasteland provides food for their children.

6They gather fodder in the fields
and glean in the vineyards of the wicked.

7Lacking clothes, they spend the night naked;
they have nothing to cover themselves in the cold.

8They are drenched by mountain rains
and hug the rocks for lack of shelter.

9The fatherless child is snatched from the breast;
the infant of the poor is seized for a debt.

10Lacking clothes, they go about naked;
they carry the sheaves, but still go hungry.

11They crush olives among the terracesOr olives between the millstones; the meaning of the Hebrew for this word is uncertain.;
they tread the winepresses, yet suffer thirst.

12The groans of the dying rise from the city,
and the souls of the wounded cry out for help.
But God charges no one with wrongdoing.

13“There are those who rebel against the light,
who do not know its ways
or stay in its paths.

14When daylight is gone, the murderer rises up
and kills the poor and needy;
in the night he steals forth like a thief.

15The eye of the adulterer watches for dusk;
he thinks, ‘No eye will see me,’
and he keeps his face concealed.

16In the dark, men break into houses,
but by day they shut themselves in;
they want nothing to do with the light.

17For all of them, deep darkness is their morningOr them, their morning is like the shadow of death;
they make friends with the terrors of darkness.Or of the shadow of death

18“Yet they are foam on the surface of the water;
their portion of the land is cursed,
so that no one goes to the vineyards.

19As heat and drought snatch away the melted snow,
so the graveHebrew Sheol snatches away those who have sinned.

20The womb forgets them,
the worm feasts on them;
evil men are no longer remembered
but are broken like a tree.

21They prey on the barren and childless woman,
and to the widow show no kindness.

22But God drags away the mighty by his power;
though they become established, they have no assurance of life.

23He may let them rest in a feeling of security,
but his eyes are on their ways.

24For a little while they are exalted, and then they are gone;
they are brought low and gathered up like all others;
they are cut off like heads of grain.

25“If this is not so, who can prove me false
and reduce my words to nothing?”