Judgment against Nineveh

1Woe to the bloody city! It is all full of lies [and] violence; the prey departeth not.

2The crack of the whip, and the noise of the rattling of the wheels, and of the prancing horses, and of the bounding chariots!

3The horseman springing up, and the glitter of the sword, and the flash of the spear, and a multitude of slain, and a mass of carcases, and no end of corpses: they stumble over their corpses.

4 -- Because of the multitude of the fornications of the well-favoured harlot, mistress of sorceries, that selleth nations through her fornications, and families through her sorceries,

5behold, I am against thee, saith Jehovah of hosts; and I will uncover thy skirts upon thy face, and I will shew the nations thy nakedness, and the kingdoms thy shame.

6And I will cast abominable filth upon thee, and make thee vile, and will set thee as a gazing stock.

7And it shall come to pass, [that] all they that see thee shall flee from thee, and shall say, Nineveh is laid waste! Who will bemoan her? whence shall I seek comforters for thee?

8Art thou better than No-Amon, that was situate among the rivers, [that had] the waters round about her, whose rampart was the sea, [and] of the sea was her wall?

9Ethiopia was her strength, and Egypt, and it was infinite; Phut and the Libyans were her helpers.

10She too was carried away, she went into captivity: her infants also were dashed in pieces, at the top of all the streets; and they cast lots for her honourable men, and all her great men were bound with chains.

11Thou also shalt be drunken: thou shalt be hid; thou also shalt seek a refuge from the enemy.

12All thy strongholds are [like] fig-trees with the first-ripe figs: if they be shaken, they even fall into the mouth of the eater.

13Behold, thy people in the midst of thee are [as] women: the gates of thy land are set wide open unto thine enemies; the fire devoureth thy bars.

14Draw thee water for the siege, strengthen thy fortresses; go into the clay, and tread the mortar, make strong the brick-kiln.

15There shall the fire devour thee; the sword shall cut thee off; it shall devour thee like the cankerworm. Make thyself many as the cankerworm, make thyself many as the locust.

16Thou hast multiplied thy merchants more than the stars of the heavens; the cankerworm spreadeth himself out and flieth away.

17Thy chosen men are as the locusts, and thy captains as swarms of grasshoppers, which camp in the hedges in the cold day: when the sun ariseth they flee away, and their place is not known where they are.

18Thy shepherds slumber, O king of Assyria; thy nobles lie still; thy people are scattered upon the mountains, and no man gathereth them.

19There is no healing of thy breach; thy wound is grievous; all that hear the report of thee clap the hands over thee; for upon whom hath not thy wickedness passed continually?