Nahum

Chapter 1

1 An oracle concerning Nineveh: the book of the vision of Nahum the Elkeshite.

2 God is jealous, and the Lord takes vengeance; the Lord takes vengeance with wrath; the Lord takes vengeance on his adversaries, and he himself cuts off his enemies.

3 The Lord is longsuffering, and great is his strength, and the Lord will by no means acquit the guilty. In destruction and in earthquake is his way, and the clouds are the dust of his feet.

4 He threatens the sea and dries it up, and lays waste all the rivers; Bashan and Carmel were diminished, and the blossoms of Lebanon have failed.

5 The mountains quaked at him, and the hills were shaken; and the earth recoiled at his presence, the whole world and all who dwell in it.

6 Who shall stand before the face of his wrath? And who shall withstand the anger of his fury? His fury melts dominions, and the rocks were shattered by him.

7 The Lord is good to those who wait for him in the day of affliction, and he knows those who reverence him;

8 and with an overwhelming flood he will make an end of those who rise up, and darkness shall pursue his enemies.

9 What do you devise against the Lord? He himself will make an end; he will not take vengeance twice on the same thing in affliction;

10 for it shall be laid waste to their very foundation, and it shall be devoured like twisted bindweed, and like stubble full of dryness.

11 Out of you shall come forth a device against the Lord, one devising wicked things against him.

12 Thus says the Lord, who rules over many waters: Even so shall they be dispersed, and your report shall be heard no more.

13 And now I will break his rod from off you, and I will burst your bonds asunder;

14 and the Lord will give command concerning you: nothing of your name shall be sown any more; out of the house of your god I will utterly destroy the graven and the molten images; I will make your grave, for you are swift.

Chapter 2

1 Behold, upon the mountains are the feet of one bringing good tidings and announcing peace. Celebrate your feasts, O Judah; pay your vows, for they shall no more pass through you unto decay. It is finished; he is taken away.

2 One has come up breathing into your face, delivering you out of affliction. Watch the road, gird up your loins, be exceedingly valiant in strength,

3 for the Lord has turned away the insolence of Jacob, as the insolence of Israel, for shaking them they have shaken them out, and their branches; they have destroyed

4 the weapons of their power from among men, mighty men sporting with fire. The reins of their chariots are ready in the day of his preparation, and the horsemen shall be thrown into confusion

5 in the roads, and the chariots shall clash together and become entangled in the broad streets. Their appearance is like torches of fire, and like flashes of lightning darting to and fro.

6 And their great men shall remember, and shall flee by day; and they shall grow weak in their march, and shall hasten to the walls, and shall prepare their advance guards.

7 The gates of the rivers have been opened, and the palaces have collapsed,

8 and the foundation has been laid bare; and she went up, and her maidservants were led away like doves moaning in their hearts.

9 And as for Nineveh, her waters are like a pool of water; and they, fleeing, did not stand, and there was no one looking back.

10 They plundered the silver, they plundered the gold, and there was no end to her adornment; they are laden beyond all her desirable vessels.

11 Shaking, and upheaval, and boiling over, and shattering of heart, and loosening of knees, and pangs upon every loin; and the faces of all are like the blackening of a pot.

12 Where is the dwelling place of the lions, and the pasture that belonged to the whelps, where the lion went to enter there, the lion's whelp, and there was no one to frighten them?

13 The lion seized enough for his whelps, and strangled for his lions, and filled his lair with prey, and his dwelling place with plunder.

14 Behold, I am against you, says the Lord Almighty, and I will burn up your multitude in smoke, and the sword shall devour your lions; and I will utterly destroy your prey from the earth, and your deeds shall no more be heard.

Chapter 3

1 O city of blood, wholly false, full of injustice—the prey shall not be handled.

2 The sound of whips, and the sound of the rumbling of wheels, and of the pursuing horse, and of the rattling chariot,

3 and of the mounting horseman, and of the flashing sword, and of gleaming weapons, and of a multitude of wounded, and of heavy falling; and there was no end to her nations, and they shall grow weak in their bodies

4 from the multitude of harlotry. A harlot, fair and charming, a leader of sorceries, who sells nations by her harlotry and tribes by her sorceries

5 behold, I am against you, says the Lord God Almighty, and I will uncover your hinder parts upon your face, and I will show nations your shame and kingdoms your dishonor,

6 and I will cast abomination upon you according to your uncleannesses, and I will make you an example,

7 and it shall be that everyone who sees you shall leap away from you and say, Wretched Nineveh! Who shall lament her? Whence shall I seek consolation for her?

8 Prepare a portion, tune a string, prepare a portion, O Amon, who dwells among rivers, water round about her, whose beginning is the sea, and water her walls,

9 and Ethiopia is her strength, and Egypt, and there is no end of the flight, and the Libyans became her helpers.

10 And she too shall go into exile a captive, and they shall dash her infants to the ground at the head of all her streets, and upon all her glorious things they shall cast lots, and all her nobles shall be bound with fetters.

11 And you shall be drunken and shall be despised, and you shall seek for yourself a standing place from enemies.

12 All your strongholds are fig trees having watchers: if they be shaken, they shall fall into the mouth of the eater.

13 Behold, your people within you are like women: the gates of your land shall be opened wide to your enemies; fire shall devour your bars.

14 Draw for yourself water for the siege, and strengthen your fortresses; go into the clay and be trodden in the straw; make strong beyond brick.

15 There fire shall devour you; the sword shall utterly destroy you; it shall devour you like the locust, and you shall be weighed down like the grasshopper.

16 You multiplied your merchandise beyond the stars of heaven; the grasshopper rushed forth and flew away.

17 Your mingled crowd leaped up like the locust, like the locust settled on a hedge in days of frost; the sun arose, and it leaped away, and knew not its place. Woe to them!

18 Your shepherds slumbered; the Assyrian king put your mighty men to sleep; your people departed to the mountains, and there was none to receive them.

19 There is no healing for your ruin; your wound has become inflamed; all who hear the report of you shall clap their hands over you; for upon whom has your wickedness not come continually?