Job 3
Good News Translation
Job's Complaint to God
3 (A)Finally Job broke the silence and cursed the day on which he had been born.
Job
2-3 (B)O God, put a curse on the day I was born;
put a curse on the night when I was conceived!
4 Turn that day into darkness, God.
Never again remember that day;
never again let light shine on it.
5 Make it a day of gloom and thick darkness;
cover it with clouds, and blot out the sun.
6 Blot that night out of the year,
and never let it be counted again;
7 make it a barren, joyless night.
8 Tell the sorcerers to curse that day,
those who know how to control Leviathan.[a]
9 Keep the morning star from shining;
give that night no hope of dawn.
10 Curse that night for letting me be born,
for exposing me to trouble and grief.
11 I wish I had died in my mother's womb
or died the moment I was born.
12 Why did my mother hold me on her knees?
Why did she feed me at her breast?
13 If I had died then, I would be at rest now,
14 sleeping like the kings and rulers
who rebuilt ancient palaces.
15 Then I would be sleeping like princes
who filled their houses with gold and silver,
16 or sleeping like a stillborn child.
17 In the grave wicked people stop their evil,
and tired workers find rest at last.
18 Even prisoners enjoy peace,
free from shouts and harsh commands.
19 Everyone is there, the famous and the unknown,
and slaves at last are free.
20 Why let people go on living in misery?
Why give light to those in grief
21 (C)They wait for death, but it never comes;
they prefer a grave to any treasure.
22 They are not happy till they are dead and buried;
23 God keeps their future hidden
and hems them in on every side.
24 Instead of eating, I mourn,
and I can never stop groaning.
25 Everything I fear and dread comes true.
26 I have no peace, no rest,
and my troubles never end.
Footnotes
- Job 3:8 Some take this to be the crocodile, others a legendary monster. Magicians were thought to be able to make him cause eclipses of the sun.
Job 3
Modern English Version
Job Laments His Birth
3 After this Job opened his mouth, and cursed the day of his birth. 2 Job said:
3 “Let the day perish in which I was born
and the night in which it was said, ‘A male child is conceived.’
4 As for that day, let it be darkness;
let God above not regard it;
and let not light shine upon it.
5 Let darkness and the shadow of death claim it;
let a cloud settle on it;
let the blackness of the day terrify it.
6 As for that night, let darkness capture it;
let it not rejoice among the days of the year;
let it not come into the number of the months.
7 Yes, as for that night, let it be barren!
Let no joyful cry come into it!
8 Let them curse it who curse any day,
those who are prepared to rouse Leviathan.
9 Let its morning stars be dark;
let it look for light, but have none;
let it not see the rays of dawn,
10 because it did not shut the doors of my mother’s womb,
nor hide trouble from my eyes.
11 “Why did I not die at birth?
Why did I not expire when I came out of the womb?
12 Why did her knees receive me?
And why her breasts that I should nurse?
13 For now I would be lying down and would be at peace;
I would have slept; then there would be rest for me,
14 with kings and counselors of the earth,
who built ruins for themselves,
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 infants who never saw light?
17 There the wicked will have stopped causing trouble,
and there the exhausted will rest.
18 Captives will relax together;
they do not hear the voice of the oppressor.
19 The small and great, they are there,
and the servant is free from his master.
20 “Why is light given to the miserable,
and life unto the bitter in soul,
21 who look for death, but it is not there;
and they search for it more than for hidden treasures;
22 who rejoice exceedingly,
and they are glad when they find the grave?
23 And why is light given to a man
whose way is hidden,
whom God has hedged in?
24 For my sighing comes before I eat,
and my groaning pours forth like the waters.
25 For the thing which I greatly feared has happened to me,
and that which I dreaded has come to me.
26 I am not at peace; I have no quiet,
I cannot rest, and turmoil has come.”
Good News Translation® (Today’s English Version, Second Edition) © 1992 American Bible Society. All rights reserved. For more information about GNT, visit www.bibles.com and www.gnt.bible.
The Holy Bible, Modern English Version. Copyright © 2014 by Military Bible Association. Published and distributed by Charisma House.