The Message Bible MSG
World English Bible WEB
1 Then Job broke the silence. He spoke up and cursed his fate:
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After this Job opened his mouth, and cursed the day of his birth.
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Job answered:
3 "Obliterate the day I was born. Blank out the night I was conceived!
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"Let the day perish in which I was born, The night which said, 'There is a man-child conceived.'
4 Let it be a black hole in space. May God above forget it ever happened. Erase it from the books!
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Let that day be darkness; Don't let God from above seek for it, Neither let the light shine on it.
5 May the day of my birth be buried in deep darkness, shrouded by the fog, swallowed by the night.
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Let darkness and the shadow of death claim it for their own. Let a cloud dwell on it. Let all that makes black the day terrify it.
6 And the night of my conception - the devil take it! Rip the date off the calendar, delete it from the almanac.
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As for that night, let thick darkness seize on it. Let it not rejoice among the days of the year. Let it not come into the number of the months.
7 Oh, turn that night into pure nothingness - no sounds of pleasure from that night, ever!
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Behold, let that night be barren. Let no joyful voice come therein.
8 May those who are good at cursing curse that day. Unleash the sea beast, Leviathan, on it.
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Let them curse it who curse the day, Who are ready to rouse up leviathan.
9 May its morning stars turn to black cinders, waiting for a daylight that never comes, never once seeing the first light of dawn.
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Let the stars of the twilight of it be dark. Let it look for light, but have none, Neither let it see the eyelids of the morning,
10 And why? Because it released me from my mother's womb into a life with so much trouble.
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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 at birth, my first breath out of the womb my last?
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"Why didn't I die from the womb? Why didn't I give up the spirit when my mother bore me?
12 Why were there arms to rock me, and breasts for me to drink from?
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Why did the knees receive me? Or why the breast, that I should suck?
13 I could be resting in peace right now, asleep forever, feeling no pain,
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For now should I have lain down and been quiet. I should have slept, then I would have been at rest,
14 In the company of kings and statesmen in their royal ruins,
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With kings and counselors of the earth, Who built up waste places for themselves;
15 Or with princes resplendent in their gold and silver tombs.
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Or with princes who had gold, Who filled their houses with silver:
16 Why wasn't I stillborn and buried with all the babies who never saw light,
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Or as a hidden untimely birth I had not been, As infants who never saw light.
17 Where the wicked no longer trouble anyone and bone-weary people get a long-deserved rest?
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There the wicked cease from troubling; There the weary are at rest.
18 Prisoners sleep undisturbed, never again to wake up to the bark of the guards.
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There the prisoners are at ease together. They don't hear the voice of the taskmaster.
19 The small and the great are equals in that place, and slaves are free from their masters.
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The small and the great are there. The servant is free from his master.
20 "Why does God bother giving light to the miserable, why bother keeping bitter people alive,
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"Why is light given to him who is in misery, Life to the bitter in soul,
21 Those who want in the worst way to die, and can't, who can't imagine anything better than death,
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Who long for death, but it doesn't come; Dig for it more than for hidden treasures,
22 Who count the day of their death and burial the happiest day of their life?
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Who rejoice exceedingly, Are glad, when they can find the grave?
23 What's the point of life when it doesn't make sense, when God blocks all the roads to meaning?
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Why is light given to a man whose way is hid, Whom God has hedged in?
24 "Instead of bread I get groans for my supper, then leave the table and vomit my anguish.
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For my sighing comes before I eat, My groanings are poured out like water.
25 The worst of my fears has come true, what I've dreaded most has happened.
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For the thing which I fear comes on me, That which I am afraid of comes to me.
26 My repose is shattered, my peace destroyed. No rest for me, ever - death has invaded life."
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I am not at ease, neither am I quiet, neither have I rest; But trouble comes."