JPS_ASV_Byz(i)
1 The burden of the wilderness of the sea. As whirlwinds in the South sweeping on, it cometh from the wilderness, from a dreadful land.
2 A grievous vision is declared unto me: 'The treacherous dealer dealeth treacherously, and the spoiler spoileth. Go up, O Elam! besiege, O Media! All the sighing thereof have I made to cease.'
3 Therefore are my loins filled with convulsion; pangs have taken hold upon me, as the pangs of a woman in travail; I am bent so that I cannot hear; I am affrighted so that I cannot see.
4 My heart is bewildered, terror hath overwhelmed me; the twilight that I longed for hath been turned for me into trembling.
5 They prepare the table, they light the lamps, they eat, they drink - 'Rise up, ye princes, anoint the shield.'
6 For thus hath the Lord said unto me: Go, set a watchman; let him declare what he seeth!
7 And when he seeth a troop, horsemen by pairs, a troop of asses, a troop of camels, he shall hearken diligently with much heed.
8 And he cried as a lion: 'Upon the watch-tower, O Lord, I stand continually in the daytime, and I am set in my ward all the nights.'
9 And, behold, there came a troop of men, horsemen by pairs. And he spoke and said: 'Fallen, fallen is Babylon; and all the graven images of her gods are broken unto the ground.'
10 O thou my threshing, and the winnowing of my floor, that which I have heard from the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, have I declared unto you.