And they said to him: Thus saith Ezechias: This day is a day of tribulation and of rebuke and of blasphemy: for the children are come to the birth, and there is not strength to bring forth.
And shall be broken. Gripings and pains shall take hold of them: they shall be in pain as a woman in labour. Every one shall be amazed at his neighbour: their countenances shall be as faces burnt.
As a woman with child, when she draweth near the time of her delivery, is in pain and crieth out in her pangs: so are we become in thy presence, O Lord.
And they said to him: Thus saith Ezechias: This day is a day of tribulation, and of rebuke, and of blasphemy. The children are come to the birth; and the woman in travail hath not strength.
For when they shall say, peace and security; then shall sudden destruction come upon them, as the pains upon her that is with child, and they shall not escape.
For he saith: In an accepted time have I heard thee; and in the day of salvation have I helped thee. Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation.
And as he treated of justice, and chastity, and of the judgment to come, Felix being terrified, answered: For this time, go thy way: but when I have a convenient time, I will send for thee.
Ask ye, and see if a man bear children? Why then have I seen every man with his hands on his loins, like a woman in labour, and all faces are turned yellow?
What wilt thou say when he shall visit thee? For thou hast taught them against thee and instructed them against thy own head. Shall not sorrows lay hold on thee, as a woman in labour?
For I have heard the voice as of a woman in travail, anguishes as of a woman in labor of a child. The voice of the daughter of Sion, dying away, spreading her hands: Woe is me, for my soul hath fainted because of them that are slain.
Shall not I that make others to bring forth children, myself bring forth, saith the Lord? Shall I, that give generation to others, be barren, saith the Lord thy God?
Therefore are my loins filled with pain: anguish hath taken hold of me, as the anguish of a woman in labour. I fell down at the hearing of it: I was troubled at the seeing of it.
A woman, when she is in labour, hath sorrow, because her hour is come; but when she hath brought forth the child, she remembereth no more the anguish, for joy that a man is born into the world.
Is this the return thou makest to the Lord, O foolish and senseless people? Is not he thy father, that hath possessed thee, and made thee, and created thee?
And an angel of the Lord descended at certain times into the pond; and the water was moved. And he that went down first into the pond after the motion of the water, was made whole, of whatsoever infirmity he lay under.