What Does Job 3:7 Mean in the King James?

Lo, let that night be solitary, let no joyful voice come therein.

Job 3:7 · KJV

The analysis reads the King James wording.

King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.

THE KEY

Job imagines more than solitude: he wants the night to admit no ringing cry of joy.

THE MEANING

When anguish fills the present, this verse gives the wish for joy to stay away a stark voice. The night becomes a place where no jubilant cry can enter.

THE ROOT

רְנָנָה

renanah

GROWS FROM

רנן

To cry out or ring out, often in joy.

“joyful voice” in this verse is renanah. The Hebrew word is a ringing cry of joy, not simply pleasant speech. Job imagines barring that audible joy from the night altogether.

ALSO GROWS

ranan: To cry out, sing aloud, or shout for joy.

רָנַן

Psalm 32:11 uses this verbal form for the joyful cry that Job’s night excludes.

rinnah: A ringing cry, jubilant shout, or song.

רִנָּה

This related noun keeps joy audible as a sound, matching what Job asks the night to lack.

THE PATTERN

When grief or ruin takes hold of a place, scripture makes the loss audible through songs that stop or cannot enter.

My harp also is turned to mourning, and my organ into the voice of them that weep.

Job 30:31 · KJVMourning replaces music, so grief is heard in the changed sound of the instruments.

The mirth of tabrets ceaseth, the noise of them that rejoice endeth, the joy of the harp ceaseth.

Isaiah 24:8 · KJVThe end of rejoicing becomes audible as instruments and joyful noise fall silent.

And the voice of harpers, and musicians, and of pipers, and trumpeters, shall be heard no more at all in thee; and no craftsman, of whatsoever craft he be, shall be found any more in thee; and the sound of a millstone shall be heard no more at all in thee;

Revelation 18:22 · KJVThe place’s ruin is rendered as the disappearance of music, work, and every familiar sound.

THE THREAD

Be glad in the LORD, and rejoice, ye righteous: and shout for joy, all ye that are upright in heart.

Psalm 32:11 · KJV

Job’s ⁨רְנָנָה⁩ (renanah, a ringing cry of joy) and Psalm 32’s ⁨רננו⁩ (ranenu, shout for joy) share the root ⁨רנן⁩. One verse imagines that cry barred from the night; the other gives it voice.

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