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 amongst 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 counsellors 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.”
Job · World English Bible British Edition (with Deuterocanon)
Job 3 World English Bible British Edition (with Deuterocanon)
Audio: World English Bible (WEB), read by Winfred W. Henson · About the recordings
Notes on this text (1)
- "World English Bible" is a trademark of eBible.org; the text is shown unaltered.
Cross references (23)
Related passages for each verse, from the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge as collected and ranked by readers at OpenBible.info.
- 1 Jeremiah 20:14–15; Psalm 106:33; Psalm 39:2–3; Job 2:9–10; Job 3:3
- 3 Jeremiah 20:14–18; Jeremiah 15:10; Job 10:18–19
- 4 Matthew 27:45; Amos 5:18; Revelation 16:10; Deuteronomy 11:12; Joel 2:2
- 5 Job 10:21–22; Job 28:3; Jeremiah 2:6; Psalm 23:4; Psalm 107:14
- 7 Isaiah 13:20–22; Jeremiah 7:34; Revelation 18:22–23; Isaiah 24:8
- 8 Job 41:1; Job 41:10; 2 Chronicles 35:25; Jeremiah 9:17–18; Job 41:25
- 9 Job 41:18; Jeremiah 8:15; Jeremiah 13:16; Job 30:26
- 10 Ecclesiastes 6:3–5; Genesis 20:18; Jeremiah 20:17; 1 Samuel 1:5; Genesis 29:31
- 11 Isaiah 46:3; Job 10:18–19; Hosea 9:14; Jeremiah 15:10; Psalm 139:13–16
- 12 Genesis 30:3; Isaiah 66:12; Genesis 50:23; Ezekiel 16:4–5
- 13 Ecclesiastes 9:10; Job 14:10–12; Job 21:13; Job 7:21; Ecclesiastes 6:3–5
- 14 Job 15:28; Psalm 89:48; Isaiah 14:10–16; Psalm 49:14; Psalm 49:6–10
- 15 1 Kings 10:27; Job 22:25; Zephaniah 1:18; Numbers 22:18; Job 27:16–17
- 16 Psalm 58:8; Ecclesiastes 6:3; 1 Corinthians 15:8
- 17 Revelation 14:13; Job 17:16; Isaiah 57:1–2; Job 14:13; Hebrews 4:11
- 18 Job 39:7; Exodus 5:15–19; Judges 4:3; Exodus 5:6–8; Isaiah 14:3–4
- 19 Ecclesiastes 8:8; Ecclesiastes 12:7; Job 30:23; Psalm 49:2; Luke 16:22–23
- 20 Jeremiah 20:18; Job 7:15–16; 1 Samuel 1:10; Proverbs 31:6; Job 6:9
- 21 Revelation 9:6; Proverbs 2:4; Numbers 11:15; Jonah 4:8; 1 Kings 19:4
- 23 Job 19:8; Lamentations 3:7; Isaiah 40:27; Job 12:14; Lamentations 3:9
- 24 Psalm 102:9; Psalm 42:3–4; Psalm 80:5; Psalm 38:8; Job 33:20
- 25 Job 1:5; Job 30:15; Job 31:23
- 26 Job 7:14; Job 27:9; Psalm 143:11
Cross references: OpenBible.info (CC BY), drawn mainly from the public-domain Treasury of Scripture Knowledge. · Sources & licences
What the Fathers said
Passages from the Church Fathers that expound or quote this chapter, verbatim from the public-domain Schaff edition (19th-century English translations).
How these were chosen
“Commentary” is the opening of a homily or exposition on this chapter (John Chrysostom’s homilies, Augustine’s tractates, sermons and expositions of the Psalms). “Quotes” are sentences where the edition’s own footnotes identify a quotation of a verse here, kept only when the wording matches the verse. Only works whose authorship is not in doubt are used. Psalms follow the Hebrew/English numbering (Augustine numbers them as the Septuagint does: his Psalm 50 is Psalm 51 here).
And this he declared, when he said, "For the thing which I greatly feared is come upon me; and that which I was afraid of is come unto me." And again, "But I wept for every helpless man, and groaned when I saw a man in distress." So because of this, nothing of what happened confounded him, none of those …
Read in context · Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 1, vol. 10 (1888)