Job 3:9-19

9 Let the stars of its dawn be dark; let it hope for light, but have none, nor see the eyelids of the morning;

10 because 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?

12 Why did the knees receive me? Or why the breasts, that I should suck?

13 For then I should have lain down and been quiet; I should have slept; then I should have been at rest,

14 with kings and counselors of the earth who rebuilt ruins for themselves,

15 or with princes who had gold, who filled their houses with silver.

16 Or why was I not as a hidden untimely birth, as infants that never see the light?

17 There the wicked cease from troubling, and there the weary are at rest.

18 There the prisoners are at ease together; they hear not the voice of the taskmaster.

19 The small and the great are there, and the slave is free from his master.

Job 3:9-19 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO JOB 3

In this chapter we have an account of Job's cursing the day of his birth, and the night of his conception; Job 3:1-3; first the day, to which he wishes the most extreme darkness, Job 3:4,5; then the night, to which he wishes the same and that it might be destitute of all joy, and be cursed by others as well as by himself, Job 3:6-9; The reasons follow, because it did not prevent his coming into the world, and because he died not on it, Job 3:10-12; which would, as he judged, have been an happiness to him; and this he illustrates by the still and quiet state of the dead, the company they are with, and their freedom from all trouble, oppression, and bondage, Job 3:13-19; but however, since it was otherwise with him, he desires his life might not be prolonged, and expostulates about the continuance of it, Job 3:20-23; and this by reason of his present troubles, which were many and great, and came upon him as he feared they would, and which had made him uneasy in his prosperity, Job 3:24-26.