NETtext - Job - 3

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!

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.

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."