< Naum 3 >
1 O city of blood, wholly false, full of unrighteousness; the prey shall not be handled.
2 The noise of whips, and the noise of the rumbling of wheels, and of the pursuing horse, and of the bounding chariot,
3 and of the mounting rider, and of the glittering sword, and of the gleaming arms, and of a multitude of slain, and of heavy falling: and there was no end to her nations, but they shall be weak in their bodies
4 because of the abundance of fornication: [she is] a fair harlot, and well-favoured, skilled in sorcery, that sells the nations by her fornication, and peoples by her sorceries.
5 Behold, I am against you, says the Lord God Almighty, and I will uncover your skirts in your presence, and I will show the nations your shame, and the kingdoms your disgrace.
6 And I will cast abominable filth upon you according to your unclean ways, and will make you a public example.
7 And it shall be [that] every one that sees you shall go down from you, and shall say, Wretched Nineve! who shall lament for her? whence shall I seek comfort for her?
8 Prepare you a portion, tune the chord, prepare a portion for Ammon: she that dwells among the rivers, water is round about her, whose dominion is the sea, and whose walls are water.
9 And Ethiopia is her strength, and Egypt; and there was no limit of the flight [of her enemies]; and the Libyans became her helpers.
10 Yet she shall go as a prisoner into captivity, and they shall dash her infants against the ground at the top of all her ways: and they shall cast lots upon all her glorious [possessions], and all her nobles shall be bound in chains.
11 And you shall be drunken, and shall be overlooked; and you shall seek for yourself strength because of [your] enemies.
12 All your strongholds are as fig-trees having watchers: if they be shaken, they shall fall into the mouth of the eater.
13 Behold, your people within you are as women: the gates of your land shall surely be opened to your enemies: the fire shall devour your bars.
14 Draw you water for a siege, and well secure your strongholds: enter into the clay, and be you trodden in the chaff, make [the fortifications] stronger than brick.
15 There the fire shall devour you; the sword shall utterly destroy you, it shall devour you as the locust, and you shall be pressed down as a palmerworm.
16 You have multiplied your merchandise beyond the stars of heaven: the palmerworm has attacked [it], and has flown away.
17 Your mixed [multitude] has suddenly departed as the grasshopper, as the locust perched on a hedge in a frosty day; the sun arises, and it flies off, and knows not its place: woe to them!
18 Your shepherds have slumbered, the Assyrian king has laid low your mighty men: your people departed to the mountains, and there was none to receive [them].
19 There is no healing for your bruise; your wound has rankled: all that hear the report of you shall clap their hands against you; for upon whom has not your wickedness passed continually?
