¹The scatterer has gone up in confrontation with you.

Guard the rampart,

Watch the highway,

Firm up your loins;

Build up your strength greatly.

²For the Lord will restore the splendour of Jacob

As the splendour of Israel,

For the emptiers have emptied them

And have brought ruin on their branches.

³His warriors' shield is stained red,

The valiant men are dyed scarlet,

The chariots are with fiery steel

On the day which he has prepared,

And the cypresses are shaken by it.

⁴Chariots drive in a frenzy in the open places,

They run up and down the streets,

Their appearance is as flares;

They run swiftly like lightning flashes.

⁵He will remember his dignitaries;

They will stumble as they go.

They will return to its wall,

And the defence will be prepared.

⁶The sluices of the rivers will be opened,

And the palace will be dissolved.

⁷And it has been determined:

Nineveh will go into captivity,

She will be made to go up,

And her maidservants will lament like the sound of doves,

Beating their hearts.

⁸Now Nineveh has been like a pool of water

Since the days of its existence,

But they flee.

They will say, ‘Make a stand, make a stand!’

But there will be none turning back.

⁹‘Take silver as spoil;

Take gold as spoil’,

And there is no end to the store

And abundance of every precious object.

¹⁰It will be empty and emptied

And laid waste,

And its heart will melt,

And its knees will totter,

And it will be in trepidation in all its loins,

And all their faces will lose their shine.

¹¹Where is the den of the lions,

And the feeding ground of the young lions?

Where the lion goes,

The great lion is there,

And the lion's whelp,

And there is nothing to make them afraid.

¹²The lion tears in pieces enough for his whelps,

And crushes for his lionesses

And fills his lairs with prey,

And his den with what has been preyed on.

¹³Look, I am against you,

Says the Lord of hosts,

And I will set its chariots on fire with smoke,

And the sword will devour your lion cubs,

And I will cut your prey off from the land,

And the voice of your messengers will no longer be heard.