Oh, may that night be barren! May no joyful shout come into it!
Parallel translations
- WEB Behold, let that night be barren. Let no joyful voice come therein.
- KJV Lo, let that night be solitary, let no joyful voice come therein.
- BSB Behold, may that night be barren; may no joyful voice come into it.
- NASB “Behold, may that night be barren; May no joyful shout enter it.
- NLT Let that night be childless. Let it have no joy.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Job longs for the night of his birth to be barren and joyless. He wishes it had produced no glad cry.
Overview
Job desires that the night yield no conception and no shout of joy, the opposite of the rejoicing that normally greets a birth. The imagery turns the celebration of life into emptiness. It captures how suffering can drain all gladness, even from one's own beginning.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 4
- Isa 13:20–22It will never be inhabited, neither will it be lived in from generation to generation. The Arabian will not pitch a tent there, neither will shepherds make their flocks lie down there.
- Isa 24:8The mirth of tambourines ceases. The sound of those who rejoice ends. The joy of the harp ceases.
- Jer 7:34Then I will cause to cease from the cities of Judah, and from the streets of Jerusalem, the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride; for the land shall become a waste.”
- Rev 18:22–23The voice of harpists, minstrels, flute players, and trumpeters will be heard no more at all in you. No craftsman, of whatever craft, will be found any more at all in you. The sound of a mill will be heard no more at all in you.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
Job's cry for a mediator who can lay his hand on both God and man, and his confidence that 'my Redeemer lives' and will stand on the earth, reaches forward to Jesus the living Redeemer.
How Job 3:7 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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