Job 3:11
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Why did I not perish at birth; why did I not die as I came from the womb?
Commentaries
Excerpts gathered from published commentaries to ground the reading.
Job, perhaps reflecting upon himself for his folly in wishing he had never been born, follows it, and thinks to mend it, with another, little better, that he had died as soon as he was born, which he enlarges upon in these verses. When our Saviour would set forth a very calamitous state of things he seems to allow such a saying as this, Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never bore, and the paps which never gave suck (Luk 23:29); but blessing the barren womb is one thing and cursing the fruitful womb is another! It is good to make the best of afflictions, but it is not good to make the worst of mercies. Our rule is, Bless, and curse not. Life is often put for all good, and death for all evil; yet Job here very absurdly complains of life and its supports as a curse and plague to him, and covets death and the grave as the greatest and most desirable bliss. Surely Satan was deceived in Job when he applied that maxim to him, All that a man hath will he give for his life; for never any man valued life at a lower rate than he did. I. He ungratefully quarrels with life, and is angry that it was not taken from him as soon as it was given him (Job 3:11, Job 3:12): Why died not I from the womb? See here, 1. What a weak and helpless creature man is when he comes into the world, and how slender the thread of life is when it is first drawn. We are ready to die from the womb, and to breathe our last as soon as we begin to breathe at all. We can do nothing for ourselves, as other creatures can, but should drop into the grave if the knees did not prevent us; and the lamp of life, when first lighted, would go out of itself if the breasts given us, that we should suck, did not supply it with fresh oil. 2. What a merciful and tender care divine Providence took of us at our entranc…
Open source ↗3:11-24 Job’s language turns from curse to lamentation. Job alternates between repugnance for life and a romance with death. Seven times, Job laments his situation by asking why (3:11, 12, 16, 20, 23; see Pss 10:1; 22:1; Jer 20:18; Lam 5:20).
Open source ↗Original language
The Hebrew and Greek words behind this passage, with Strong's numbers — from openscriptures (CC BY-SA).
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“Listen to Me, O house of Jacob, all the remnant of the house of Israel, who have been sustained from the womb, carried along since birth.
Woe to me, my mother, that you have borne me, a man of strife and conflict in all the land. I have neither lent nor borrowed, yet everyone curses me.
I have leaned on You since birth; You pulled me from my mother’s womb. My praise is always for You.
Give them, O LORD— what will You give? Give them wombs that miscarry and breasts that dry up!
Like a slug that dissolves in its slime, like a woman’s stillborn child, may they never see the sun.