Top of Page
Page Style
this, Job opened his mouth and cursed the day of his birth. 2 He said:
3 “May the day perish on which I was born,
and the night it was said,
‘A boy is conceived’.
4 May that day be turned into darkness;
may God not regard it from above,
nor the light shine upon it.
5 May darkness and gloom claim it;
may a cloud settle upon it;
may the blackness of the day terrify it.
6 As for that night—may thick darkness seize it;
may it not be included in the days of the year;
may it not come into the number of the months.
7 May that night be barren;
may no joyful shout be heard in it.
8 May those who curse days curse that day,
those who are ready to rouse up Leviathan.
9 May its morning stars become dark;
may it wait for daylight, but have none,
nor see the dawning of the day,
10 because it did not shut the doors of my mother’s womb
to hide trouble from my eyes.
11 “Why did I not die at birth?
Why did I not perish when I came out of the womb?
12 Why were there knees to receive me,
or breasts that I should be nursed?
13 For now I would be laying still at peace;
I would be asleep.
Then I would be at rest
14 with kings and counsellors of the earth,
who built places for themselves now lying in ruins,
15 or with princes who had gold,
who filled their houses with silver.
16 Or why was I not hidden like a stillborn child,
like an infant who never saw light?
17 There the wicked cease from troubling,
and there the weary are at rest.
18 There the captives are at ease together;
they do not hear the voice of the taskmaster.
19 The small and the great are there,
and the slave is freed from his master.
20 “Why is light given those who are in misery,
and life to the bitter of soul,
21 to those who long for death, but it does not come,
who search for it more than for hidden treasure,
22 who rejoice exceedingly,
and are glad when they reach the grave?
23 Why is light given to a man
whose way is hidden,
whom God has hedged in?
24 For my sighing comes to me like bread,
and my groanings are poured out like water.
25 For the thing I feared come upon me,
and what I dreaded has befallen me.
26 I have no peace or quietness;
I have no rest, for trouble comes.”