Job 3 – read and compare multiple versions
Job 3
[1] After this Job opened his mouth, and cursed the day of his birth. [2] Job answered:
[3] “Let the day perish in which I was born,
the night which said, ‘There is a boy conceived.’
[4] Let that day be darkness.
Don’t let God from above seek for it,
neither let the light shine on it.
[5] Let darkness and the shadow of death claim it for their own.
Let a cloud dwell on it.
Let all that makes the day black terrify it.
[6] As for that night, let thick darkness seize on it.
Let it not rejoice among the days of the year.
Let it not come into the number of the months.
[7] Behold, let that night be barren.
Let no joyful voice come therein.
[8] Let them curse it who curse the day,
who are ready to rouse up leviathan.
[9] Let the stars of its twilight be dark.
Let it look for light, but have none,
neither let it see the eyelids of the morning,
[10] because it didn’t shut up the doors of my mother’s womb,
nor did it hide trouble from my eyes. [11] “Why didn’t I die from the womb?
Why didn’t I give up the spirit when my mother bore me?
[12] Why did the knees receive me?
Or why the breast, that I should nurse?
[13] For now I should have lain down and been quiet.
I should have slept, then I would have been at rest,
[14] with kings and counselors of the earth,
who built up waste places for themselves;
[15] or with princes who had gold,
who filled their houses with silver;
[16] or as a hidden untimely birth I had not been,
as infants who never saw light.
[17] There the wicked cease from troubling.
There the weary are at rest.
[18] There the prisoners are at ease together.
They don’t hear the voice of the taskmaster.
[19] The small and the great are there.
The servant is free from his master. [20] “Why is light given to him who is in misery,
life to the bitter in soul,
[21] who long for death, but it doesn’t come;
and dig for it more than for hidden treasures,
[22] who rejoice exceedingly,
and are glad, when they can find the grave?
[23] Why is light given to a man whose way is hidden,
whom God has hedged in?
[24] For my sighing comes before I eat.
My groanings are poured out like water.
[25] For the thing which I fear comes on me,
that which I am afraid of comes to me.
[26] I am not at ease, neither am I quiet, neither do I have rest;
but trouble comes.”
[3] “Let the day perish in which I was born,
the night which said, ‘There is a boy conceived.’
[4] Let that day be darkness.
Don’t let God from above seek for it,
neither let the light shine on it.
[5] Let darkness and the shadow of death claim it for their own.
Let a cloud dwell on it.
Let all that makes the day black terrify it.
[6] As for that night, let thick darkness seize on it.
Let it not rejoice among the days of the year.
Let it not come into the number of the months.
[7] Behold, let that night be barren.
Let no joyful voice come therein.
[8] Let them curse it who curse the day,
who are ready to rouse up leviathan.
[9] Let the stars of its twilight be dark.
Let it look for light, but have none,
neither let it see the eyelids of the morning,
[10] because it didn’t shut up the doors of my mother’s womb,
nor did it hide trouble from my eyes. [11] “Why didn’t I die from the womb?
Why didn’t I give up the spirit when my mother bore me?
[12] Why did the knees receive me?
Or why the breast, that I should nurse?
[13] For now I should have lain down and been quiet.
I should have slept, then I would have been at rest,
[14] with kings and counselors of the earth,
who built up waste places for themselves;
[15] or with princes who had gold,
who filled their houses with silver;
[16] or as a hidden untimely birth I had not been,
as infants who never saw light.
[17] There the wicked cease from troubling.
There the weary are at rest.
[18] There the prisoners are at ease together.
They don’t hear the voice of the taskmaster.
[19] The small and the great are there.
The servant is free from his master. [20] “Why is light given to him who is in misery,
life to the bitter in soul,
[21] who long for death, but it doesn’t come;
and dig for it more than for hidden treasures,
[22] who rejoice exceedingly,
and are glad, when they can find the grave?
[23] Why is light given to a man whose way is hidden,
whom God has hedged in?
[24] For my sighing comes before I eat.
My groanings are poured out like water.
[25] For the thing which I fear comes on me,
that which I am afraid of comes to me.
[26] I am not at ease, neither am I quiet, neither do I have rest;
but trouble comes.”