Jeremiah 20:14
New International Version
Cursed be the day I was born! May the day my mother bore me not be blessed!

New Living Translation
Yet I curse the day I was born! May no one celebrate the day of my birth.

English Standard Version
Cursed be the day on which I was born! The day when my mother bore me, let it not be blessed!

Berean Standard Bible
Cursed be the day I was born! May the day my mother bore me never be blessed.

King James Bible
Cursed be the day wherein I was born: let not the day wherein my mother bare me be blessed.

New King James Version
Cursed be the day in which I was born! Let the day not be blessed in which my mother bore me!

New American Standard Bible
Cursed be the day when I was born; May the day when my mother gave birth to me not be blessed!

NASB 1995
Cursed be the day when I was born; Let the day not be blessed when my mother bore me!

NASB 1977
Cursed be the day when I was born; Let the day not be blessed when my mother bore me!

Legacy Standard Bible
Cursed be the day when I was born; Let the day not be blessed when my mother bore me!

Amplified Bible
Cursed be the day on which I was born; Do not bless the day on which my mother gave birth to me!

Christian Standard Bible
May the day I was born be cursed. May the day my mother bore me never be blessed.

Holman Christian Standard Bible
May the day I was born be cursed. May the day my mother bore me never be blessed.

American Standard Version
Cursed be the day wherein I was born: let not the day wherein my mother bare me be blessed.

Aramaic Bible in Plain English
Cursed is the day in which I was born, the day when my mother bore me! Let it not be blessed!

Brenton Septuagint Translation
Cursed be the day wherein I was born: the day wherein my mother brought me forth, let it not be blessed.

Contemporary English Version
Put a curse on the day I was born! Don't bless that day.

Douay-Rheims Bible
Cursed be the day wherein I was borne: let not the day in which my mother bore me, be blessed.

English Revised Version
Cursed be the day wherein I was born: let not the day wherein my mother bare me be blessed.

GOD'S WORD® Translation
Cursed is the day that I was born, the day that my mother gave birth to me. May it not be blessed.

Good News Translation
Curse the day I was born! Forget the day my mother gave me birth!

International Standard Version
Let the day on which I was born be cursed. Don't let the day on which my mother gave birth to me be blessed.

JPS Tanakh 1917
Cursed be the day Wherein I was born; The day wherein my mother bore me, Let it not be blessed.

Literal Standard Version
Cursed [is] the day in which I was born, | The day that my mother bore me, | Let it not be blessed!

Majority Standard Bible
Cursed be the day I was born! May the day my mother bore me never be blessed.

New American Bible
Cursed be the day on which I was born! May the day my mother gave me birth never be blessed!

NET Bible
Cursed be the day I was born! May that day not be blessed when my mother gave birth to me.

New Revised Standard Version
Cursed be the day on which I was born! The day when my mother bore me, let it not be blessed!

New Heart English Bible
Cursed is the day in which I was born: do not let the day in which my mother bore me be blessed.

Webster's Bible Translation
Cursed be the day in which I was born: let not the day in which my mother bore me be blessed.

World English Bible
Cursed is the day in which I was born. Don’t let the day in which my mother bore me be blessed.

Young's Literal Translation
Cursed is the day in which I was born, The day that my mother bare me, Let it not be blessed!

Additional Translations ...
Audio Bible



Context
Jeremiah's Complaint
13Sing to the LORD! Praise the LORD! For He rescues the life of the needy from the hands of evildoers. 14Cursed be the day I was born! May the day my mother bore me never be blessed. 15Cursed be the man who brought my father the news, saying, “A son is born to you,” bringing him great joy.…

Cross References
1 Kings 19:4
while he himself traveled on a day's journey into the wilderness. He sat down under a broom tree and prayed that he might die. "I have had enough, LORD," he said. "Take my life, for I am no better than my fathers."

Job 3:3
"May the day of my birth perish, and the night it was said, 'A boy is conceived.'

Jeremiah 15:10
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.


Treasury of Scripture

Cursed be the day wherein I was born: let not the day wherein my mother bore me be blessed.

Jeremiah 15:10
Woe is me, my mother, that thou hast borne me a man of strife and a man of contention to the whole earth! I have neither lent on usury, nor men have lent to me on usury; yet every one of them doth curse me.

Job 3:3-16
Let the day perish wherein I was born, and the night in which it was said, There is a man child conceived…

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Bare Birth Blessed Blessing Bore Born Curse Cursed Mother Wherein
Jeremiah 20
1. Pashur, smiting Jeremiah, receives a new name, and a fearful doom.
7. Jeremiah complains of contempt;
10. of treachery;
14. and of his birth.














(14) Cursed be the day wherein I was born . . .--The apparent strangeness of this relapse from the confidence of the two previous verses into a despair yet deeper than before is best explained by the supposition that it is in no sense part of the same poem or meditation, but a distinct fragment belonging to the same period, and placed in its present position by Jeremiah himself, or by the first editor of his prophecies. By some, indeed, it has been thought that we have here an accidental dislocation, and that Jeremiah 20:14-18 should stand before Jeremiah 20:7. The prophet utters a cry of anguish yet keener than that which now precedes it, and borrows the language of that cry from the book of Job (Jeremiah 3:3). The prophet turned in the depth of his suffering to the words in which the great representative of sufferers had "cursed his day." The question whether we are to blame or to palliate such utterances, how far they harmonise with Christian feeling, is one on which we need not dwell long. It is enough to note (1) that, while we cannot make for them the half-evasive apology which sees in Jeremiah's prayers against his enemies, and in the imprecatory psalms, prophecies rather than prayers, they indicate the same temper as those psalms and prayers indicate when taken in their natural sense, and so help us to understand them; and (2) that in such cases, while we give thanks that we have the blessing of a higher law and the example of a higher life, we are not called upon to apportion praise or blame. It is enough to reverence, to sympathise, to be silent.

Verses 14-18. - Jeremiah curses the day of his birth. The passage is a further development of the complaint in Jeremiah 15:10, and stands in no connection with the consolatory close of the preceding passage. There is a very striking parallel in Job 3:3-12, and the question cannot be evaded, Which is the original? It is difficult to believe that Jeremiah copied from an earlier poem. Deep emotion expresses itself in language suggested by the moment; and, even after retouching his discourses, Jeremiah would leave much of the original expression. But impressions of this sort cannot be unreservedly trusted. The argument from parallel passages is only a subsidiary one in the determination of the date of books.

Parallel Commentaries ...


Hebrew
Cursed be
אָר֣וּר (’ā·rūr)
Verb - Qal - QalPassParticiple - masculine singular
Strong's 779: To execrate

the day
הַיּ֔וֹם (hay·yō·wm)
Article | Noun - masculine singular
Strong's 3117: A day

I was born!
יֻלַּ֖דְתִּי (yul·laḏ·tî)
Verb - QalPass - Perfect - first person common singular
Strong's 3205: To bear young, to beget, medically, to act as midwife, to show lineage

May the day
י֛וֹם (yō·wm)
Noun - masculine singular
Strong's 3117: A day

my mother
אִמִּ֖י (’im·mî)
Noun - feminine singular construct | first person common singular
Strong's 517: A mother, )

bore me
יְלָדַ֥תְנִי (yə·lā·ḏaṯ·nî)
Verb - Qal - Perfect - third person feminine singular | first person common singular
Strong's 3205: To bear young, to beget, medically, to act as midwife, to show lineage

never
אַל־ (’al-)
Adverb
Strong's 408: Not

be blessed.
בָרֽוּךְ׃ (ḇā·rūḵ)
Verb - Qal - QalPassParticiple - masculine singular
Strong's 1288: To kneel, to bless God, man, to curse


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OT Prophets: Jeremiah 20:14 Cursed be the day in which (Jer.)
Jeremiah 20:13
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