3
1 After this Job opened his mouth and cursed the day of his birth.
2 Job answered and said,
3 “Let the day perish on which I was born, and the night that said, ‘A male child has been conceived!’
4 Let that day be darkness;
let God above not seek it, nor light shine upon it.
5 Let darkness and deep gloom reclaim it;
let a cloud dwell over it;
let the blackness of the day terrify it.
6 Let thick darkness seize that night;
let it not rejoice among the days of the year or enter the count of the months.
7 Look, let that night be barren;
let no cry of joy enter it.
8 Let those who curse the day curse it, those prepared to rouse Leviathan.
9 Let the stars of its twilight be dark;
let it wait for light and have none, and not see the eyelids of dawn,
10 because it did not shut the doors of my mother's womb and hide trouble from my eyes.
11 Why did I not die at birth, come from the womb and expire?
12 Why did knees receive me, and why were there breasts for me to nurse?
13 For now I would be lying down in quiet;
I would be asleep, and then I would have rest,
14 with kings and counselors of the earth who built up ruins for themselves,
15 or with princes who had gold, who filled their houses with silver.
16 Or like a hidden stillborn child I would not be, like infants who never saw light.
17 There the wicked cease their turmoil, and there those drained of strength rest.
18 There prisoners are at ease together;
they do not hear the taskmaster's voice.
19 The small and the great are there, and the slave is free from his master.
20 Why is light given to one who suffers, and life to the bitter in soul,
21 who wait for death, but it does not come, and dig for it more than for hidden treasures,
22 who rejoice with exultation and are glad when they find a grave—
23 to a man whose way is hidden, whom God has hedged in?
24 For my sighing comes before my bread, and my roars are poured out like water.
25 For the thing I greatly feared has come upon me, and what I dreaded has reached me.
26 I am not at ease, I am not quiet, I have no rest;
turmoil comes.”