Nahum 3

¹ Woe, city of blood! All of it is dissimulation! Full of schism! No one is removing the prey! ² The sound of a whip, and the sound of the quaking wheel! And the galloping horse, and the dancing chariot, ³ and the horseman mounting up with blazing sword and flashing spear! And the many wounded, and the mass of corpses, and there is no end of the bodies; and they are stumbling among their bodies. ⁴ Because of the many prostitutions of the prostitute, good of grace and possessor of enchantments, who is selling nations by her prostitutions, and families by her enchantments. ⁵ Behold Me against you, (averring is Yahweh, Elohim of hosts). I will roll your skirts over your face, and I will show the nations your nakedness, and the kingdoms your dishonor. ⁶ I will fling on you abominable things, and I will disgrace you, and I place you as a spectacle. ⁷ And it shall come to be that all seeing you will flit from you and say, Devastated is Nineveh! Who will condole with her? Whence shall I seek comforters for you? ⁸ Are you better than No-Amon, the dweller among the waterways, water round about her, whose rampart is the sea and water is her wall? ⁹ Ethiopia is her staunchness, also Egypt, and there is no end; Phut and Lubim became your help. ¹⁰ Moreover, she was for deportation; she goes into captivity. Moreover, her unweaned children are being dashed to pieces at the head of all the streets, and over all her glorious ones, they handle the lot. And all her great ones are chained with manacles. ¹¹ Moreover, you shall be drunk; you shall become obscure. Moreover, you shall seek a stronghold because of the enemy. ¹² All your fortresses are fig trees with firstfruits: If they be swayed to and fro, then they will fall into the mouth of the eater. ¹³ Behold! your people are women within you; verily the gates of your land are opened to your enemies. Fire devours your bars. ¹⁴ Bail for yourself water for the siege! Repair your fortresses! Come into the mud, and tramp in the crushed straw! Repair the brickwork! ¹⁵ There the fire shall devour you; the sword shall cut you off. It shall devour you as the grub of the beetle. Make yourself heavy as the grub; make yourself heavy as the locust! ¹⁶ You increase your traders more than the stars of the heavens. The grub strips itself and will fly away. ¹⁷ Your men with insignias are as the locust, and your marshals as the arching caterpillar, the arching caterpillars which are camping in the stone dikes on a cold day. The sun rises, and they flit away, and their place is not known, where they are. Woe to them! ¹⁸ Your shepherds slumber, king of Assyria! Your nobles are lying down. Your people are diffused on the mountains, and no one is convening them. ¹⁹ There is no dimming of your breaking; your blow is ailing. All hearing the report of you will clasp hands over you, for over whom did not your evil pass continually?