Job 3

¹ After this, Job opened his mouth and cursed his day.

² Job spoke out and said:

³ Perish the day on which I was born, the night when they said, "The child is a boy!"

⁴ May that day be darkness: let not God above call for it, nor light shine upon it!

⁵ May darkness and gloom claim it, clouds settle upon it, the blackness of night affright it!

⁶ May obscurity seize that day; let it not occur among the days of the year, nor enter into the count of the months!

⁷ May that night be barren; let no joyful outcry greet it!

⁸ Let them curse it who curse the sea, the appointed disturbers of Leviathan!

⁹ May the stars of its twilight be darkened; may it look for daylight, but have none, nor gaze on the eyes of the dawn,

¹⁰ Because it kept not shut the doors of the womb to shield my eyes from trouble!

¹¹ Why did I not perish at birth, come forth from the womb and expire?

¹² Wherefore did the knees receive me? or why did I suck at the breasts?

¹³ For then I should have lain down and been tranquil; had I slept, I should then have been at rest

¹⁴ With kings and counselors of the earth who built where now there are ruins

¹⁵ Or with princes who had gold and filled their houses with silver.

¹⁶ Or why was I not buried away like an untimely birth, like babes that have never seen the light?

¹⁷ There the wicked cease from troubling, there the weary are at rest.

¹⁸ There the captives are at ease together, and hear not the voice of the slave driver.

¹⁹ Small and great are there the same, and the servant is free from his master.

²⁰ Why is light given to the toilers, and life to the bitter in spirit?

²¹ They wait for death and it comes not; they search for it rather than for hidden treasures,

²² Rejoice in it exultingly, and are glad when they reach the grave:

²³ Men whose path is hidden from them, and whom God has hemmed in!

²⁴ For sighing comes more readily to me than food, and my groans well forth like water.

²⁵ For what I fear overtakes me, and what I shrink from comes upon me.

²⁶ I have no peace nor ease; I have no rest, for trouble comes!