11 “Why(A) did I not die at birth?
Why did I not [a]perish when I came from the womb?
12 (B)Why did the knees receive me?
Or why the breasts, that I should nurse?
13 For now I would have lain still and been quiet,
I would have been asleep;
Then I would have been at rest
14 With kings and counselors of the earth,
Who (C)built ruins for themselves,
15 Or with princes who had gold,
Who filled their houses with silver;
16 Or why was I not hidden (D)like a stillborn child,
Like infants who never saw light?
17 There the wicked cease from troubling,
And there the [b]weary are at (E)rest.
18 There the prisoners [c]rest together;
(F)They do not hear the voice of the oppressor.
19 The small and great are there,
And the servant is free from his master.

20 “Why(G) is light given to him who is in misery,
And life to the (H)bitter of soul,
21 Who (I)long[d] for death, but it does not come,
And search for it more than (J)hidden treasures;
22 Who rejoice exceedingly,
And are glad when they can find the (K)grave?

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Footnotes

  1. Job 3:11 expire
  2. Job 3:17 Lit. weary of strength
  3. Job 3:18 are at ease
  4. Job 3:21 Lit. wait

If a man begets a hundred children and lives many years, so that the days of his years are many, but his soul is not satisfied with goodness, or (A)indeed he has no burial, I say that (B)a [a]stillborn child is better than he—

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Footnotes

  1. Ecclesiastes 6:3 Or miscarriage

29 (A)For indeed the days are coming in which they will say, ‘Blessed are the barren, wombs that never bore, and breasts which never nursed!’

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