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Job 3

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Cursing the Day of Birth 1–10

1
After this opened Job his mouth, and cursed his day. ​
2
And Job answered and said:
3
Let the day perish wherein I was born, And the night which said, There is a man-child conceived. ​
4
Let that day be darkness; Let not God from above seek for it, Neither let the light shine upon it.
5
Let darkness and the shadow of death claim it for their own; Let a cloud dwell upon it; Let all that maketh black the day terrify it. ​
6
As for that night, let thick darkness seize upon it: Let it not rejoice among the days of the year; Let it not come into the number of the months.
7
Lo, let that night be barren; Let no joyful voice come therein.
8
Let them curse it that curse the day, Who are ready to rouse up leviathan. ​
9
Let the stars of the twilight thereof be dark: Let it look for light, but have none; Neither let it behold the eyelids of the morning:
10
Because it shut not up the doors of mymother’swomb, Nor hid trouble from mine eyes. ​

The Desire for Rest in Death 11–19

11
Why died I not from the womb? Why did I not give up the ghost when my mother bare me? ​
12
Why did the knees receive me? Or why the breasts, that I should suck? ​
13
For now should I have lain down and been quiet; I should have slept; then had I been at rest, ​
14
With kings and counsellors of the earth, Who built up waste places for themselves; ​
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Or with princes that had gold, Who filled their houses with silver:
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Or as a hidden untimely birth I had not been, As infants that never saw light.
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There the wicked cease from troubling; And there the weary are at rest. ​
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There the prisoners are at ease together; They hear not the voice of the taskmaster.
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The small and the great are there: And the servant is free from his master.

The Misery of Continued Existence 20–26

20
Wherefore is light given to him that is in misery, And life unto the bitter in soul; ​
21
Who long for death, but it cometh not, And dig for it more than for hid treasures; ​
22
Who rejoice exceedingly, And are glad, when they can find the grave?
23
Why is light givento a man whose way is hid, And whom God hath hedged in? ​
24
For my sighing cometh before I eat, And my groanings are poured out like water.
25
For the thing which I fear cometh upon me, And that which I am afraid of cometh unto me. ​
26
I am not at ease, neither am I quiet, neither have I rest; But trouble cometh. ​

Bible text: American Standard Version (1901) · Public domain

Study Notes for Job 3

Verse 1

cursed his day — After the seven days and nights of silence in 2:13, Job speaks. 'Cursed' is qalal, to treat as light or contemptible; it is not the verb Satan predicted, 'he will curse thee to thy face' (1:11; 2:5), which is barak, the verb rendered 'blessed' in 1:10. Job curses his day, not God; the verdict of 2:10 stands before he speaks: 'in all this did not Job sin with his lips'.

Verse 3

Let the day perish wherein I was born — The wish has two parts: the day of birth, and 'the night in which it was said, There is a man child conceived' (geber, a man; here a newborn male). Abad, to perish, is the verb. Jeremiah's lament has the same shape: 'Cursed be the day wherein I was born' (Jer 20:14).

Verse 5

the shadow of death — Tsalmaveth, deep darkness; it is Job's word, in nine of its seventeen verses in the Old Testament (3:5; 10:21–22; 12:22; 16:16; 24:17; 28:3; 34:22; 38:17). 'Blackness' (kimriri) occurs only here. The same darkness is where 'the light shined' in Isa 9:2, 'They that dwell in the land of the shadow of death'.

Verse 8

their mourning — The Hebrew word is livyathan, translated 'leviathan' in 41:1, Ps 74:14, 104:26 and Isa 27:1; here the KJV renders it 'mourning'. The verb 'raise up' ('ur) is that of 41:10, 'None is so fierce that dare stir him up'. The one who answers Job out of the whirlwind asks, 'who then is able to stand before me?'

Verse 10

shut not up the doors of my mother's womb — Sagar, to shut, is the verb for what the LORD does to a womb: 'the LORD had shut up her womb' (1 Sam 1:5); in Gen 20:18 he 'had fast closed up all the wombs' (a different verb, atsar). Job blames the day for not doing it. 'Sorrow' is amal, toil and trouble, the word in Eliphaz's 'man is born unto trouble' (5:7).

Verse 11

Why died I not from the womb? — Job turns from the day to the question of why he lived, and he asks it again in 10:18–19: 'Wherefore then hast thou brought me forth out of the womb? Oh that I had given up the ghost'. Gava', to expire, is the verb used of the flood in Gen 6:17. Jeremiah asks in like words, 'Wherefore came I forth out of the womb to see labour and sorrow?' (Jer 20:18).

Verse 12

Why did the knees prevent me? — 'Prevent' is used in its old sense of 'come before', qadam, as in 'the snares of death prevented me' (Ps 18:5). The knees are those that received a newborn; Scripture speaks of children 'brought up upon Joseph's knees' (Gen 50:23). Job asks why a welcome and a breast were there.

Verse 13

then had I been at rest — 'Quiet' (shaqat), 'slept' and 'at rest' (nuach) return negated in v.26: 'neither had I rest, neither was I quiet'. Death is called sleep through Scripture: 'many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake' (Dan 12:2); 'them also which sleep in Jesus' (1 Thess 4:14). Job says of the sleeper that he 'riseth not' (14:12).

Verse 14

built desolate places for themselves — Chorbah is a ruin or waste: what these kings and counsellors raised for themselves is spoken of as laid waste. Isa 14:9–10 pictures the grave receiving 'all the chief ones of the earth' and 'all the kings of the nations', who say, 'Art thou also become weak as we?'

Verse 17

the wicked cease from troubling — Rogez, agitation or raging, is the word of the chapter's last line, 'yet trouble came' (v.26). The 'weary' are literally 'weary of strength'. Of those who die in the Lord, Rev 14:13 says 'they may rest from their labours; and their works do follow them'.

Verse 20

life unto the bitter in soul — Mar nephesh, bitter of soul, is Hannah's state when she 'was in bitterness of soul, and prayed unto the LORD' (1 Sam 1:10). 'Light' stands for life, as in 'the light of the living' (33:30). The questions beginning 'Why' (vv.11, 12, 20, 23) are addressed to God, who is left unnamed here and named in v.23.

Verse 21

dig for it more than for hid treasures — 'Hid treasures' (matmon) is the image of Prov 2:4, where wisdom is sought 'as for hid treasures'. Others in Scripture have asked for death: Moses (Num 11:15, 'kill me, I pray thee, out of hand'), Elijah (1 Kgs 19:4) and Jonah (Jon 4:3). Rev 9:6 has 'shall men seek death, and shall not find it'.

Verse 23

whom God hath hedged in — The image is that of 1:10, where Satan says, 'Hast not thou made an hedge about him', which in Hebrew is a different word (suk) from the 'hedged in' here (sakak). What was protection there is confinement here; compare 19:8, 'He hath fenced up my way', and Lam 3:7, 'He hath hedged me about, that I cannot get out'.

Verse 25

the thing which I greatly feared — Both verbs, 'feared' (pachad) and 'was afraid' (yagor), are perfect tenses: a fear already held when it came. Job 1:5 shows his care over his household: 'It may be that my sons have sinned'. What came is told in 1:13–19: his herds, servants and children lost, the sons and daughters 'dead' beneath the fallen house.

Verse 26

yet trouble came — Rogez, the word of v.17, where in the grave 'the wicked cease from troubling'. The three negatives, 'safety' (shalah, ease), 'rest' and 'quiet', reverse the rest and quiet of v.13. The chapter ends here, and 4:1 begins, 'Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered and said'.