1He who breaks in pieces has come up before your face. Guard the ramparts! Watch the way! Strengthen your loins! Strengthen your power greatly.

2For יהוה shall turn back the splendour of Ya‛aqoḇ like the splendour of Yisra’ĕl, for the emptiers have emptied them out and ruined their vine branches.

3The shields of his mighty men have become red, the men of battle are in scarlet. The chariots are like flaming torches in the day of his preparation, and the cypresses shall be shaken.

4The chariots dash about in the streets, they rush one another in the broad ways. They look like flaming torches, they run like lightning.

5He remembers his noble ones, they stumble in their walk, they hurry to her walls, and the defence is prepared.

6The river gates have been opened, and the palace is melted.

7And it is established: she shall be exiled, she shall be led away. And her female servants are moaning as with the voice of doves, beating on their breasts.

8And Ninewĕh of old was like a pool of water, now they flee away. “Stop! Stop!” they cry, but no one turns back.

9Plunder the silver! Plunder the gold! There is no limit to the treasure – a wealth of all precious objects.

10She is empty, even emptiness and waste! And the heart has melted, and the knees have knocked together, and much pain is in all loins, and all their faces have become flushed.

11Where is the den of the lions, and the feeding place of the young lions, where the lion, the lioness and the lion’s cub walked, with no one to disturb them?

12The lion tore in pieces enough for his cubs, and strangled for his lionesses, and filled his caves with prey, and his dens with torn prey.

13“See, I am against you,” declares יהוה of hosts, “and I shall burn your chariots in smoke, and the sword devour your young lions. And I shall cut off your prey from the earth, and no longer is the voice of your messengers heard.”