The debate

Job's outburst

1After this Job opened his mouth and cursed the day of his birth. 2And Job said:

33.3-19: Jer 20.14-18.“Let the day perish wherein I was born,

and the night which said,

‘A man-child is conceived.’

4Let that day be darkness!

May God above not seek it,

nor light shine upon it.

5Let gloom and deep darkness claim it.

Let clouds dwell upon it;

let the blackness of the day terrify it.

6That night — let thick darkness seize it!

let it not rejoice among the days of the year,

let it not come into the number of the months.

7Yea, let that night be barren;

let no joyful cry be heard3.7 Heb come in it.

8Let those curse it who curse the day,

who are skilled to rouse up Leviathan.

9Let the stars of its dawn be dark;

let it hope for light, but have none,

nor see the eyelids of the morning;

10because it did not shut the doors of my mother's womb,

nor hide trouble from my eyes.

11“Why did I not die at birth,

come forth from the womb and expire?

12Why did the knees receive me?

Or why the breasts, that I should suck?

13For then I should have lain down and been quiet;

I should have slept; then I should have been at rest,

14with kings and counsellors of the earth

who rebuilt ruins for themselves,

15or with princes who had gold,

who filled their houses with silver.

16Or why was I not as a hidden untimely birth,

as infants that never see the light?

17There the wicked cease from troubling,

and there the weary are at rest.

18There the prisoners are at ease together;

they hear not the voice of the taskmaster.

19The small and the great are there,

and the slave is free from his master.

20“Why is light given to him that is in misery,

and life to the bitter in soul,

21who long for death, but it comes not,

and dig for it more than for hid treasures;

22who rejoice exceedingly,

and are glad, when they find the grave?

23Why is light given to a man whose way is hid,

whom God has hedged in?

24For my sighing comes as3.24 Heb before my bread,

and my groanings are poured out like water.

25For the thing that I fear comes upon me,

and what I dread befalls me.

26I am not at ease, nor am I quiet;

I have no rest; but trouble comes.”