Job Speaks (3:1–26)
Cursed the day of his birth (3:1). In 2:9 Job’s wife advises him to “curse God and die.” Instead, Job curses the day of his birth. In 2:9 the word “curse” is the ambiguous brk (also trans. “bless”); here qll instead of the stronger ʾrr is used. Job wishes he had never been born, an idea repeated in 10:18. The prophet Jeremiah (Jer. 20:14–18) does the same: “Cursed [ʾrr] be the day I was born! May the day my mother bore me not be blessed [brk]!” In the eighth-century B.C. Assyrian Myth of Erra and Ishmun a city governor says to his mother that it would have been better if he had never been born or died with her.56 A lament in the first person occurs in a letter prayer addressed to the Mesopotamian god Ea-Enki.57
That day—may it turn to darkness (3:4). In contrast to “let there be light” as the first act of God’s creation (Gen. 1:3), Job wishes for darkness (cf. Amos 8:9–10). In Ezekiel 32:7–8 the defeat of the chaos monster (cf. Job 3:8) coincides with darkness.58 Creation should be transformed into chaos,59 emphasized by the use of words like “night” (v. 2), “no light” (v. 4), “darkness and deep shadow” (v. 5), “blackness” (v. 5), and “thick darkness” (v. 6).60
Included among the days of the year, nor be entered in any of the months (3:6). The parallelism of year with months occurs only in Job and in a Ugaritic text.61 Calendars were important in the ancient Near East,62 both for agricultural activities for the common people and for religious festivals. Horoscopes, hemerologies and menologies, and lists of lucky and unlucky days from the ancient Near East are known. In Egypt the birthday of the god Seth was considered unlucky.63 The so-called “Cairo Calendar” has: “First month of the Inundation, day 1. Good, good, good: it’s the birthday of Re-Harakhte.”64 And in Mesopotamian texts we read: “On the third day he shall eat no fish, the crocodile shall attack him.”65
Cairo calendar
Brian J. McMorrow
May those who curse days … rouse Leviathan (3:8). In the ancient Near East the Leviathan66 is the primeval sea monster of chaos (cf. comments on 41:1) defeated at creation. It represents the raging floodwaters that can be destructive (22:16), and if it is aroused as part of a curse, it means that chaos will prevail. Such a magical technique may be reflected in later Jewish-Aramaic incantations.67 Because Leviathan lives in the sea, it has been proposed (as in NIV note) to read “sea” (yām) for “day(s)” (yôm), but this is unnecessary as days can be cursed.
Came from the womb (3:11). In 1:21 Job already referred to his mother’s womb, which is more than that of his natural mother, because no one “returns” to the womb. It may therefore refer to the earth as a mother,68 as in Psalm 139:13, 15, where “mother’s womb” is parallel to “depths of the earth.” Keel connected the headrests in tombs in the form of the omega symbol with the earth as mother both in birth and death.69 Job wishes that he had died at birth or after he was born and that he had been hidden in the ground like a stillborn child (Job 3:16; see also 10:18; Jer. 20:17–18).
Knees to receive me and breasts that I might be nursed (3:12). The knees may refer to Job’s father on whose knees he sat when he was born. In the Hittite myth of Ullikummi the god Kumarbi dandles the monster on his knee and gives it a name.70 The god Adad raised king Zimri-Lim in his lap.71 In Genesis 50:23 the grandchildren were placed at birth on Joseph’s knees, and in Isaiah 66:12 Jerusalem will be like a woman with a child on her knees, nursing it. The most famous comparison is that of Isis lactans, which became in later times the icon of the Madonna and Child, nursing the young god Horus on her lap, which was applied in representations of the young pharaoh, but also with mortals.72 An Egyptian stela depicts a father with his child on his knees.73
Song of Ullikummi from the Hittite Kumarbi Cycle
Istanbul Archaeological Museum © Dr. James C. Martin
Horus at the breast of Isis
Kim Walton, courtesy of the Field Museum
Lying down in peace; I would be asleep (3:13). Job would have had peace if he had died, but now he has none; he has no rest (v. 26). An inscription in the tomb of the Assyrian king Sennacherib reads: “Palace of sleep, tomb of repose.”74
Places now lying in ruins (3:14). Job prefers to be with the deceased kings lying in what may refer to Egyptian pyramid tombs or elaborate tombs filled with treasures (v. 15).
Weary are at rest (3:17). In the Egyptian Book of the Dead the deceased are called “the weary”;75 the heart is weary when death is near, as stated in the Egyptian story of Sinuhe.76 In the underworld social relations are inverted because in death all are equal—“The captives also enjoy their ease; they no longer hear the slave driver’s shout. The small and the great are there, and the slave is freed from his master” (vv. 18–19). This idea is also reflected in ancient Near Eastern texts such as the Egyptian Ipuwer: “Indeed the land turns around like a potter’s wheel. Princes are hungry and perish, Servants are served…. The serf becomes lord of serfs.”77
Various aspects of Egyptian beliefs about the afterlife are illustrated in the Book of the Dead, Nebqed.
Werner Forman Archive/The Louvre