XVII. 1 The burden of Damascus.

Behold, Damascus is removed from (being) a city, and be- cometh a heap, a ruin.

2 The cities of Aroer are forsaken: they shall be for ﬂocks, and they shall lie down, and none shall make them afraid.

3 And the fortress shall cease from Ephraim, and the kingdom from Damascus, and the remnant of Aram: they shall be as the glory of the children of Israel, saith the LORD of Hosts.

4 And it shall be in that day, the glory of ’Jacob shall be made thin, and the fatness of his ﬂesh shall wax lean.

12. Uncertain.

5 And it shall be as when the harvestman graspeth the standing Corn, and his arm reapeth the ears 3 and it shall be as one that gleaneth ears in the valley of Rephaim.

6 And there shall be left therein gleanings, as at the beating of an olive tree, two or three berries at the top of a crest, four or ﬁve in the fruit ’s branches, saith the LORD God of Israel.

7 In that day shall (a) man look toward -his Maker, and his eyes shall gaze upon the Holy One of Israel.

8 And he shall not look to the altars, the work of his hands, neither shall gaze upon what his ﬁngers made, either the Asherim or the sun-images.

9 In that day shall his strong cities be as the forsaken tract of -the woodland and the mountain crest, which men forsook from before the children of Israel 5 and there shall be a desolation.

10 For thou hast forgotten the God of thy salvation, and hast not been mindful of the rock of thy strength; therefore thou plantest plants of pleasantness, and settest them with slips of a stranger;

11 In the day of thy planting dost thou make a hedge, and in the morning thou makest thy seed to bud; a harvest heap in the day; of pain and deadly sorrow.

12 Ah, the uproar of many peoples, they roar like the roaring of seas; and the tumult of nations, they are tumultuous like the tumult of mighty waters l

13 Nations are tumultuous like the tumult of many waters; and (one) rebuketh him, and he ﬂeeth afar off, and is chased as the chaff of the mountains before the wind, and as whirling dust before the tempest.

5. Or, ‘and with his arm...6. Or, perhaps, ‘four or ﬁve in its fruit-bearing ’7, 8. ‘gaze ’ i. e. with regard or respect.9. Heb. ‘of the HORESH and the AMIR’; not, unlike ‘Hivite and in some scripts: Lagarde emends accordingly. (Cf. Greek, note inverse order.)10. Lit. ‘plants of pleasant ones’ (‘plants of Adonis,’11. Or, ‘the harvest ﬂeeth away in the day of’... ‘pain’ has been by some for a different word, meaning (expected) ‘possession.’

14 At eventide, and behold terror; before the morning, he is not. This is the portion of them that spoil us, and the lot of them that rob us.

XVIII. 1 Ah, land of the rustling of wings, whichart beyond the rivers of Cush !

2 That sendest envoys on the sea, and in vessels of papyrus on the face of the waters: Go, ye swift messengers, to a nation tall and polished, to a people terrible since it was and onward, a nation of line, line, and treading down, whose land the rivers divide.

3 All ye inhabitants of the world, and dwellers on the earth, when a standard is lifted up on (the) mountains, see ye: and when a trumpet is blown, hear ye.