Job 3:1

After this opened Job his mouth,.... order to speak, and began to speak of his troubles and afflictions, and the sense he had of them; for though, this phrase may sometimes signify to speak aloud,

After this opened Job his mouth, and cursed his day. Opened Job his mouth. The Orientals speaks seldom, and then sententiously. Hence, this formula, expressing deliberation and gravity (Psalms 78:2). Formally began.

JOB CHAPTER 3 Job curseth the day and services of his birth, . The ease and honours of death, . Life in anguish matter of complaint, . What he feared is now come upon him, ,26. He spake freely and boldly, as this phrase is used, ,9 Ephesians 6:19, and elsewhere, and cursed his day, to wit, his birthday, as is evident from , which is called simply a man’ s day, ; which also some others, through the same infirmity, and in the same circumstances, have cursed, as we see, . In vain do some men endeavour to excuse this and the following speeches of Job, who afterwards is reproved by God and severely accuseth himself for them, 40:4 42:3,6. And yet he doth not proceed so far as to curse or blaspheme God, but makes the devil a liar in his prognostics. But although he doth not break forth into direct and downright reproaches of God, yet he makes secret and indirect reflections upon God’ s providence. His curse was sinful, both because it was vain, being applied to an unreasonable thing, which was not capable of blessing and cursing, and to a day that was past, and so out of the reach of all curses; and because it was applied to one of God’ s creatures, all which were and are in themselves very good, and pronounced blessed by God; and so they are, if we do not turn them into curses; and because it casts a blame upon God for bringing that day, and for giving him that life which that day brought into the world. He pronounceth that day an unhappy, woeful, and cursed day, not in itself, but with respect to himself.

Job 3:1 After this opened Job his mouth, and cursed his day.Ver. 1. After this] After so long silence of his friends, and to provoke them to speak, who haply waited for some words from him first, as knowing him wise and well spoken. Or [After this] After that Job’ s pains were somewhat allayed, so that he could breathe, recollect himself, and utter his mind; for some troubles are above speech, Psalms 77:4, they will hardly suffer a man to take breath, Job 9:18, or to hear anything, though never so wholesome or comfortable, Exodus 6:9. Job opened his mouth] But better he had kept it closed still: either be silent, saith the Greek proverb, or else say something that is better than silence. But it may befall the best, left to themselves, to speak unadvisedly with their lips, as meek Moses did at the waters of Meribah, for which sin of his, some Jews say that he was damned, because we read not of his repentance. And a like wretched censure they pass upon holy Job for his cursing his day here, saying, that although in words he cursed the creature only, yet interpretatively and indeed, he cursed the Creator; like as he that spitteth upon a king’ s picture, or robe royal, doth the same to the king himself. But why do they not then say the same of Jeremiah, and pronounce him a reprobate for cursing his birthday too? Jeremiah 20:14. R. Levi answereth, because it appeareth to be otherwise by Jeremiah’ s whole prophecy besides. And may we not say the like for Job, if we wisely weigh his words in their right sense, and the end which the Lord made, James 5:11, propounding him for a pattern of patience, not of impatience, whereof nothing is said against him, though he had his outbursts, as here; and must have his allowance (as good gold hath when it comes to the scale) that so he may pass. If he had blasphemed God, or denied his providence, ascribing all events to the conjunction of the stars at a man’ s birth (as the Talmudists falsely gather from this chapter), Satan had had his design upon him; and God would never have justified him, and preferred him before his friends, as he did, Job 42:7-8 True it is, that, Job 38:2, when he had spoken his mind overly freely, and indeed sinfully (as there is not a man upon earth that liveth, and sinneth not), as if the Lord had dealt unkindly, if not unequally, with him, God in the end steppeth forth, as it were, from behind the hangings, overhearing him, and taking him up, Who is this, saith he there, that talketh thus? how now? After which Job was not only hushed, Job 40:4-5, but humbled, Job 42:6.

III.(1) After this opened Job his mouth.—There is a striking similarity between this chapter and Jeremiah 20:14-18, so much so that one must be borrowed from the other; the question is, which is the original? Is Jeremiah the germ of this? or is this the tree from which a branch has been hewn by Jeremiah? Our own conviction is that Job is the original, inasmuch as this chapter is indispensable to the development of the poem; but in Jeremiah the passage occurs casually as the record of a passing mood of despair. It is, moreover, apparently clear that Jeremiah is quoting Job as he might quote one of the Psalms or any other writing with which he was familiar. He was applying to daily life the well-known expression of a patriarchal experience, whereas in the other case the words of Job would be the ideal magnifying of a commonplace and realistic experience.

CHAPTER III Job curses the day of his birth, and regrets that he ever saw the light, 1-12. Describes the empire of death and its inhabitants, 13-19. Regrets that he is appointed to live in the midst of sorrows, for the calamities which he feared had overtaken him, 20-26. NOTES ON CHAP. III Verse 1. After this opened Job his mouth] After the seven days' mourning was over, there being no prospect of relief, Job is represented as thus cursing the day of his birth. Here the poetic part of the book begins; for most certainly there is nothing in the preceding chapters either in the form or spirit of Hebrew poetry. It is easy indeed to break the sentences into hemistichs; but this does not constitute them poetry: for, although Hebrew poetry is in general in hemistichs, yet it does not follow that the division of narrative into hemistichs must necessarily constitute it poetry. In many cases the Asiatic poets introduce their compositions with prose narrative; and having in this way prepared the reader for what he is to expect, begin their deevans, cassidehs, gazels, c. This appears to be the plan followed by the author of this book. Those who still think, after examining the structure of those chapters, and comparing them with the undoubted poetic parts of the book, that they also, and the ten concluding verses, are poetry, have my consent, while I take the liberty to believe most decidedly the opposite. Cursed his day.] That is, the day of his birth and thus he gave vent to the agonies of his soul, and the distractions of his mind. His execrations have something in them awfully solemn, tremendously deep, and strikingly sublime. But let us not excuse all the things which he said in his haste, and in the bitterness of his soul, because of his former well established character of patience. He bore all his privations with becoming resignation to the Divine will and providence: but now, feeling himself the subject of continual sufferings, being in heaviness through manifold temptation, and probably having the light of God withdrawn from his mind, as his consolations most undoubtedly were, he regrets that ever he was born; and in a very high strain of impassioned poetry curses his day. We find a similar execration to this in Jeremiah, Jeremiah 20:14-18, and in other places; which, by the way, are no proofs that the one borrowed from the other; but that this was the common mode of Asiatic thinking, speaking, and feeling, on such occasions.

1–10. Would God I had never been conceived or born This is the idea really expressed when Job curses his day and wishes it blotted out of existence. First he curses the day of his birth and the night of his conception together, Job 3:3, and then each separately, the day in two verses and the night in four. Let darkness seize that day; let not God from above seek after it; let thick darkness and the shadow of death claim it as part of their heritage; let clouds and all that maketh black the day, eclipses, ominous obscurations, affright it, Job 3:4-5. Let darkness swallow up that night that it be not reckoned nor come in among the joyful troop of nights in their glittering procession; while other nights ring with birth-day gladness let it sit barren; let enchanters curse it; let it be endless, waiting always for a dawn that never breaks, Job 3:6-10.

After this - Dr. Good renders this, “at length.” It means after the long silence of his friends, and after he saw that there was no prospect of relief or of consolation.

THE .1. After this — With the close of the Historical Introduction, Satan, as an open actor, disappears from the scene; the supernatural passes into abeyance; and we are for awhile left alone with