Job Regrets His Birth
3:1 After this Job opened his mouth and cursed the day he was born. 3:2 Job spoke up and said:
3:3 “Let the day on which I was born perish,
and the night that said,
‘A man has been conceived!’
3:4 That day – let it be darkness;
let not God on high regard it,
nor let light shine on it!
3:5 Let darkness and the deepest
shadow claim it;
let a cloud settle on it;
let whatever blackens the day terrify it!
3:6 That night – let darkness seize it;
let it not be included among the days of the year;
let it not enter among the number of the months!
3:7 Indeed, let that night be barren;
let no shout of joy penetrate it!
3:8 Let those who curse the day curse it –
those who are prepared to rouse Leviathan.
3:9 Let its morning stars be darkened;
let it wait for daylight but find none,
nor let it see the first rays of dawn,
3:10 because it did not shut the doors of my mother’s womb on me,
nor did it hide trouble from my eyes!
Job Wishes He Had Died at Birth
3:11 “Why did I not die at birth,
and why did I not expire
as I came out of the womb?
3:12 Why did the knees welcome me,
and why were there two breasts
that I might nurse at them?
3:13 For now I would be lying down
and would be quiet,
I would be asleep and then at peace
3:14 with kings and counselors of the earth
who built for themselves places now desolate,
3:15 or with princes who possessed gold,
who filled their palaces with silver.
3:16 Or why was I not buried
like a stillborn infant,
like infants who have never seen the light?
3:17 There the wicked cease from
turmoil,
and there the weary are at rest.
3:18 There the prisoners relax together;
they do not hear the voice of the oppressor.
3:19 Small and great are there,
and the slave is free from his master.
Longing for Death
3:20 “Why does God give light to one who is in misery,
and life to those whose soul is bitter,
3:21 to those who wait for death that does not come,
and search for it
more than for hidden treasures,
3:22 who rejoice even to jubilation,
and are exultant when they find the grave?
3:23 Why is light given to a man
whose way is hidden,
and whom God has hedged in?
3:24 For my sighing comes in place of my food,
and my groanings flow forth like water.
3:25 For the very thing I dreaded has happened to me,
and what I feared has come upon me.
3:26 I have no ease, I have no quietness;
I cannot rest; turmoil has come upon me.”