Nahum 3
Translated from the Hebrew of the Westminster Leningrad Codex. Tap a verse to see why it reads as it does. Tap a small letter to read its footnote.
Woe to the city of bloodshed
1Woe to the city of bloodshed, \q full of lies, full of plunder, \q never without prey! 2The crack of the whip, \q the rumble of wheels, \q horses galloping, \q chariots bouncing! 3Horsemen charging, swords flashing, spears gleaming! \q Crowds of the slain, heaps of corpses, \q bodies without end; \q they stumble over the dead. 4All because of the countless acts of the prostitute, \q the charming beauty, the mistress of sorcery, \q who sells nations by her prostitution \q and peoples by her spells. 5I am against you, declares the LORD of Armies. \q I will pull your skirts up over your face; \q I will let the nations look on your nakedness \q and the kingdoms on your shame. 6I will pelt you with filth and treat you with scorn; \q I will make you a public spectacle. 7Everyone who sees you will shrink back from you \q and say, “Nineveh is in ruins! \q Who will grieve for her?” \q Where can I find anyone to comfort you? 8Are you better than No-amon, \q who sat by the streams of the Nile, \q surrounded by water, \q whose rampart was the sea \q and whose wall was the water? 9Cush and Egypt were her strength, without limit; \q Put and the Libyans were among her allies. 10Yet she was carried into exile and went into captivity. \q Her little ones were dashed to pieces at every street corner. \q They cast lots for her nobles, \q and all her great men were bound in chains. 11You too will become drunk; \q you will go into hiding; \q you too will look for refuge from the enemy. 12All your fortresses are like fig trees with the first ripe figs: \q shake them, and they fall into the mouth of the one who eats. 13Look at your troops: they are like women among you. \q The gates of your land stand wide open to your enemies; \q fire has consumed their bars. 14Draw water for the siege! \q Strengthen your forts! \q Go down into the clay, tread the mortar, grip the brick mold! 15There the fire will consume you, \q and the sword will cut you down; \q it will eat you up as the hopping locust does. \q Multiply like the hopping locust; \q multiply like the swarming locust! 16You have increased your merchants \q until they outnumber the stars of the sky; \q the hopping locust strips the land and flies away. 17Your guards are like swarming locusts, \q your officials like clouds of locusts \q that settle on the stone walls on a cold day; \q when the sun comes up they fly off, \q and no one knows where they have gone. 18Your shepherds are asleep, king of Assyria; \q your nobles lie still. \q Your people are scattered across the mountains, and no one gathers them. 19There is no relief for your injury; \q your wound is fatal. \q All who hear the news about you clap their hands over you, \q for who has not felt your endless cruelty?