First ReadingJob 3:1-4a, 11-17, 20-23*
From the Book of Job
1After this Job opened his mouth,and cursed the day of his birth.2Job answered:
3“Let the day perish in which I was born,the night which said, ‘There is a boy conceived.’4Let that day be darkness.Don’t let God from above seek for it,neither let the light shine on it. verses 5–10 are not read11“Why didn’t I die from the womb?Why didn’t I give up the spirit when my mother bore me?12Why did the knees receive me?Or why the breast, that I should nurse?13For now I should have lain down and been quiet.I should have slept, then I would have been at rest,14with kings and counselors of the earth,who built up waste places for themselves;15or with princes who had gold,who filled their houses with silver;16or as a hidden untimely birth I had not been,as infants who never saw light.17There the wicked cease from troubling.There the weary are at rest. verses 18–19 are not read20“Why is light given to him who is in misery,life to the bitter in soul,21who long for death, but it doesn’t come;and dig for it more than for hidden treasures,22who rejoice exceedingly,and are glad, when they can find the grave?23Why is light given to a man whose way is hidden,whom God has hedged in?