Immerse: Poets Full Volume - Flipbook - Page 283
2:11–3:13
Job
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good things from the hand of God and never anything bad?” So in all this,
Job said nothing wrong.
When three of Job’s friends heard of the tragedy he had suffered, they got
together and traveled from their homes to comfort and console him. Their
names were Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the
Naamathite. When they saw Job from a distance, they scarcely recognized
him. Wailing loudly, they tore their robes and threw dust into the air over
their heads to show their grief. Then they sat on the ground with him for
seven days and nights. No one said a word to Job, for they saw that his suffering was too great for words.
At last Job spoke, and he cursed the day of his birth. He said:
“Let the day of my birth be erased,
and the night I was conceived.
Let that day be turned to darkness.
Let it be lost even to God on high,
and let no light shine on it.
Let the darkness and utter gloom claim that day for its own.
Let a black cloud overshadow it,
and let the darkness terrify it.
Let that night be blotted off the calendar,
never again to be counted among the days of the year,
never again to appear among the months.
Let that night be childless.
Let it have no joy.
Let those who are experts at cursing—
whose cursing could rouse Leviathan—
curse that day.
Let its morning stars remain dark.
Let it hope for light, but in vain;
may it never see the morning light.
Curse that day for failing to shut my mother’s womb,
for letting me be born to see all this trouble.
“Why wasn’t I born dead?
Why didn’t I die as I came from the womb?
Why was I laid on my mother’s lap?
Why did she nurse me at her breasts?
Had I died at birth, I would now be at peace.
