Job Curses the Day He Was Born
Job breaks the silence by cursing the day he was born. He wants that night blotted from the calendar, and he envies stillborn children and dead kings because the grave at least is quiet. Why give light, he asks, to a man God has hedged in?
3 1After this Job opened his mouth and cursed the day of his birth. 2He said: 3"Let the day I was born perish, and the night that said, 'A boy is conceived.' 4That day—let it be darkness! May God above not seek it, nor let light shine upon it. 5Let darkness and deep shadow claim it; let a cloud settle over it; let the blackness of the day terrify it. 6That night—let thick darkness seize it; let it not rejoice among the days of the year, nor be counted among the months. 7Yes, let that night be barren; let no joyful cry come into it. 8Let those who curse days curse it—those ready to rouse Leviathan. a a v8 Professional cursers were believed in the ancient world to have power over auspicious and unlucky days. 9Let the stars of its dawn be dark; let it hope for light and find none, and never see the first rays of morning, 10because it did not shut the doors of my mother's womb, nor hide trouble from my eyes. 11Why did I not die at birth, come from the womb and breathe my last? 12Why were there knees to receive me, or breasts for me to nurse? b b v12 In the ancient Near East, placing a newborn on a relative's knees was a formal act of accepting the child. 13For now I would be lying down in quiet; I would be asleep and at rest, 14with kings and counselors of the earth who built ruins for themselves, 15or with princes who had gold, who filled their houses with silver. 16Or why was I not a buried stillborn child, like infants who never saw the light? 17There the wicked cease from raging, and there the weary are at rest. 18Together the captives are at ease; they no longer hear the slave driver's voice. 19The small and the great are there alike, and the slave is free from his master. 20Why is light given to one in misery, and life to the bitter in soul, 21who long for death that does not come, and dig for it more than for hidden treasure, 22who leap for joy and are glad when they find the grave? 23Why is light given to a man whose way is hidden, whom God has hedged in? 24For my sighing comes before my bread, and my groans pour out like water. 25For the thing I dreaded has come upon me, and what I feared has overtaken me. 26I have no ease, no quiet, no rest—only turmoil."
