1 ‘Mortals, born of woman,are of few days and full of trouble.
2 They spring up like flowers and wither away;like fleeting shadows, they do not endure.
3 Do you fix your eye on them?Will you bring them before you for judgment?
4 Who can bring what is pure from the impure?No one!
5 A person’s days are determined;you have decreed the number of his monthsand have set limits he cannot exceed.
6 So look away from him and let him alone,till he has put in his time like a hired labourer.
7 ‘At least there is hope for a tree:if it is cut down, it will sprout again,and its new shoots will not fail.
8 Its roots may grow old in the groundand its stump die in the soil,
9 yet at the scent of water it will budand put forth shoots like a plant.
10 But a man dies and is laid low;he breathes his last and is no more.
11 As the water of a lake dries upor a river bed becomes parched and dry,
12 so he lies down and does not rise;till the heavens are no more, people will not awakeor be roused from their sleep.
13 ‘If only you would hide me in the graveand conceal me till your anger has passed!If only you would set me a timeand then remember me!
14 If someone dies, will they live again?All the days of my hard serviceI will wait for my renewal to come.
15 You will call and I will answer you;you will long for the creature your hands have made.
16 Surely then you will count my stepsbut not keep track of my sin.
17 My offences will be sealed up in a bag;you will cover over my sin.
18 ‘But as a mountain erodes and crumblesand as a rock is moved from its place,
19 as water wears away stonesand torrents wash away the soil,so you destroy a person’s hope.
20 You overpower them once for all, and they are gone;you change their countenance and send them away.
21 If their children are honoured, they do not know it;if their children are brought low, they do not see it.
22 They feel but the pain of their own bodiesand mourn only for themselves.’