Truly, they have become like dry stems, they have been burned in the fire; they are not able to keep themselves safe from the power of the flame: it is not a coal for warming them, or a fire by which a man may be seated.
Babylon's men of war have kept back from the fight, waiting in their strong places; their strength has given way, they have become like women: her houses have been put on fire, her locks are broken.
One man, running, will give word to another, and one who goes with news will be handing it on to another, to give word to the king of Babylon that his town has been taken from every quarter:
For these are the words of the Lord of armies, the God of Israel: The daughter of Babylon is like a grain-floor when it is stamped down; before long, the time of her grain-cutting will come.
Then an opening was made in the wall of the town, and all the men of war went in flight out of the town by night through the doorway between the two walls which was by the king's garden; now the Chaldaeans were stationed round the town: and they went by the way of the Arabah.