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Chapter 14

Everyone Born of Woman . . .[a]

“Everyone born of woman
    has life that is short and filled with troubles.
He blossoms like a flower and soon begins to wither;
    as fleeting as a shadow, he does not endure.
Is it upon a creature like this that you fix your gaze
    and bring him before you to be judged?
“Can a man be found who has avoided defilement?
    There is no such person.
The extent of his life has already been determined,
    and the number of his months is known to you;
    you have established the limits that he cannot pass.
Turn your gaze away from him and leave him alone
    so that, like a hired laborer, he may complete his days.
“At least for a tree there is always hope:
    if it is cut down, it may sprout once again,
    and its new shoots may burst with life.
Although its roots age in the earth
    and its stump dies in the ground,
once it scents water it will begin to bud
    and put forth branches like a sapling.
10 “But when a man dies, he remains lifeless;
    what is his fate once he expires?
11 As occurs when the waters of a lake recede
    or a river ceases to flow and runs dry,
12 so men lie down and never rise again;
    until the heavens cease to exist, they will not awaken
    or be stirred out of their slumber.

Hide Me in the Netherworld[b]

13 “How I wish you would hide me in the netherworld
    and shelter me until your wrath has subsided
    while designating a time to call me to mind.
14 If one who dies were permitted to live once again,
    I would willingly endure all the days of my service
    waiting for my relief to arrive.
15 You would call and I would answer you;
    you would long to see once again the creature you have made.
16 You would count my every step
    but not watch for any evidence of sin in me.
17 You would store up all my transgressions in a bag,
    and you would cover over my guilt.
18 “But as a mountain eventually falls
    and a rock is removed from its place,
19 as the waters wear away the stones
    and cloudbursts wash away the soil,
    so you destroy the hope of man.
20 You crush him once for all and he disappears;
    you alter his appearance and send him away.
21 If his sons are honored, he is unaware of it;
    if they are disgraced, he does not know it.
22 He is cognizant only of the pains his flesh endures,
    and he grieves for no one except himself.”

Footnotes

  1. Job 14:1 Thoroughly unclean, humans cannot attain true purity, i.e., moral perfection. This wretchedness is precisely their excuse before God. And if the universe can be shaken and then renewed, for humans there is no revival; they remain buried in death forever. Survival in the subterranean netherworld is nothing more than a diminished existence. Human beings thus hasten toward their end without hope. What reason is there for God to pursue them?
  2. Job 14:13 An astounding proposition is put forth: Job desires to descend to the netherworld as in a provisional hiding place or refuge (Ps 139:7-12; Isa 26:20) to escape the divine wrath and wait there for the Lord to remember the creature [he has] made and grant him forgiveness. Job dreams of immortality and suffers because he no longer enjoys the friendship of his God.