May the stars of its morning be dark; May it look for light, but have none, And not see the dawning of the day;
Parallel translations
- WEB Let the stars of its twilight be dark. Let it look for light, but have none, neither let it see the eyelids of the morning,
- KJV Let the stars of the twilight thereof be dark; let it look for light, but have none; neither let it see the dawning of the day:
- BSB May its morning stars grow dark; may it wait in vain for daylight; may it not see the breaking of dawn.
- NASB “May the stars of its twilight be darkened; May it wait for light but have none, And may it not see the breaking dawn;
- NLT Let its morning stars remain dark. Let it hope for light, but in vain; may it never see the morning light.
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 wishes the dawn of that day would never come. He longs for it to wait in vain for morning light.
Overview
Job pictures the stars of twilight darkened and the day forever failing to see the dawn's first light. The poetic "eyelids of the morning" makes the longed-for sunrise something that never opens. The verse intensifies his wish that the day of his birth had simply never broken.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 4
- Job 41:18His sneezing flashes out light. His eyes are like the eyelids of the morning.
- Jer 13:16Give glory to Yahweh your God, before he causes darkness, and before your feet stumble on the dark mountains, and, while you look for light, he turns it into the shadow of death, and makes it gross darkness.
- Job 30:26When I looked for good, then evil came; When I waited for light, there came darkness.
- Jer 8:15We looked for peace, but no good came; and for a time of healing, and behold, dismay!
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 3:9 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
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.