---
title: Jeremiah 20:14
url: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/jeremiah-20-14/
markdown: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/jeremiah-20-14.md
type: verse
perspective: Protestant (historic Nicene) response to Jehovah's Witness teaching
reference: Jeremiah 20:14
testament: OT
section: Prophets
index: https://jw-apologetics.app/llms.txt
---

# Jeremiah 20:14

## Text (Berean Standard Bible)

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

## NWT Wording of the Key Phrase

- NWT (2013 revision): "Cursed be the day I was born! May the day my mother gave birth to me not be blessed!"

## JW Usage

Read as a passing expression of the prophet's grief and never engaged with at the level of what it implies about the day of one's birth. The Watchtower treats the verse as evidence of suffering, not as data about whether birth-days were customarily marked among the Israelites.

## Protestant Usage

A prophet cannot wish a day "unblessed" unless blessing it was the custom. The Jewish Encyclopedia (1906) — not a Christian apologetic source — reads Jeremiah 20:14 as implying that the day of birth had a recognised place among the Israelites. Pair the verse with Job 3:1 ("Job opened his mouth and cursed the day of his birth") and Luke 1:14 ("many will rejoice at his birth"). The Bible's own pattern is that birth is a day to be marked. Two pagan tyrants mark it badly — Pharaoh and Herod — and the Watchtower generalises a sample of two into a prohibition. Romans 14:5-6 in the JW's own NWT settles the question of Christian liberty: "the one who observes the day observes it to Jehovah."

## Arguments Using This Verse

- [The Birthday Ban — A Rule Generalised From Two Pagan Tyrants](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/birthday-ban-extrabiblical-canon.md) — Romans 14:5-6 / Jeremiah 20:14 / Job 3:1 [Practice]