Nahum 3 · The Lantern

Judgment on Nineveh

Woe to the city of blood, all of it deceit, full of booty — prey does not depart!

Let us mourn with Nahum, and say with him, "Woe to him that buildeth his house on high." Or rather let us mourn for them as Christ mourned for those of old. "Woe to you that are rich, for ye have received your consolation." Let us, I beseech you, not cease thus lamenting, and if it be not unseemly, let us even beat our breasts for the carelessness of our brethren.

(Chapter 3, verses 1 and following) Woe to the city of blood, full of deceit and torn apart. The plunder will not cease. The sound of the whip, the sound of the rattling wheel, the galloping horses and the blazing chariots, the ascending knight and the flashing sword, the gleaming spear and the multitude of the slain, and the weighty destruction.

Woe to the bloody city, all full of lies and injustice. He has called it a city of blood; for those who had reigned in Nineveh were most ready for murder and exceedingly bloodthirsty; and those in it were otherwise warlike, and always eager to make their attacks untamable against whomever they might go.

The sound of a whip, and the sound of a quaking wheel, and a galloping horse, and a bounding chariot!

A horseman charging, and the flame of a sword, and the lightning of a spear — and a multitude of slain, and a mass of corpses, and no end to the bodies; they stumble over their bodies.

Because of the many whorings of the whore, pleasing in favor, mistress of sorceries, who sells nations by her whorings and clans by her sorceries.

See, I am against you — the utterance of the LORD of hosts — and I will uncover your skirts over your face, and I will show the nations your nakedness and the kingdoms your dishonor.

And I will throw detestable things on you, and I will treat you as a fool, and I will make you a spectacle.

And it will be that all who see you will flee from you and say, “Nineveh is devastated! Who will grieve for her?” From where shall I seek comforters for you?

Are you better than No-Amon, sitting by the Nile, waters around her, whose rampart was the sea, from the sea her wall?

Cush was her strength, and Egypt, and there was no end; Put and the Libyans were among your help.

She too went into exile, into captivity. Her children too were dashed in pieces at the head of every street; and over her honored ones they cast lots, and all her great ones were bound in chains.

You too will become drunk; you will be hidden. You too will seek a stronghold from the enemy.

All your fortifications are fig trees with first-ripe figs: if they are shaken they fall into the mouth of the eater.

See, your people in your midst are women. To your enemies the gates of your land have been thrown wide open; fire has devoured your bars.

Draw yourself water for the siege; strengthen your fortifications. Go into the mud and tread the mortar; take hold of the brick mold.

There the fire will devour you; the sword will cut you off, it will devour you like the young locust. Make yourself heavy as the young locust, make yourself heavy as the locust.

You have multiplied your merchants beyond the stars of the heavens. The young locust strips and flies away.

Your guardsmen are like the locust and your marshals like a swarm of swarming locusts, camping in the walls on a cold day — the sun rises and it flees, and its place is not known: where are they?

Your shepherds slumber, king of Assyria; your nobles lie down. Your people are strewn on the mountains, and there is no one gathering them.

There is no easing for your breaking; your blow is sick. All who hear the report of you clap the hand over you — for on whom has your evil not passed continually?

Nahum3

Judgment on Nineveh