What will you say, when he shall set over you as head those whom you have yourself taught to be friends to you? shall not sorrows take hold of you, as of a woman in travail?
So Achaz sent messengers to Tiglat-Pil'eser king of Ashur, saying, I am your servant and your son: come up, and save me out of the hand of the king of Syria, and out of the hand of the king of Yisra'el, who rise up against me.
What will you do in the day of visitation, and in the desolation which will come from afar? To whom will you flee for help? Where will you leave your wealth?
They will be dismayed. Pangs and sorrows will seize them. They will be in pain like a woman in labor. They will look in amazement one at another. Their faces will be faces of flame.
Therefore my thighs are filled with anguish. Pains have taken hold on me, like the pains of a woman in labor. I am in so much pain that I can't hear. I so am dismayed that I can't see.
Withhold your foot from being unshod, and your throat from thirst: but you said, It is in vain; no, for I have loved strangers, and after them will I go.
Inhabitant of Levanon, who makes your nest in the cedars, how greatly to be pitied shall you be when pangs come on you, the pain as of a woman in travail!
Ask now, and see whether a man does travail with child: why do I see every man with his hands on his waist, as a woman in travail, and all faces are turned into paleness?
behold, all the women who are left in the king of Yehudah's house shall be brought forth to the king of Bavel's princes, and those women shall say, Your familiar friends have set you on, and have prevailed over you: [now that] your feet are sunk in the mire, they are turned away back.
You, when you are made desolate, what will you do? Though you clothe yourself with scarlet, though you deck you with ornaments of gold, though you enlarge your eyes with paint, in vain do you make yourself beautiful; [your] lovers despise you, they seek your life.
For I have heard a voice as of a woman in travail, the anguish as of her who brings forth her first child, the voice of the daughter of Tziyon, who gasps for breath, who spreads her hands, [saying], Woe is me now! for my soul faints before the murderers.
For when they are saying, *Peace and safety,* then sudden destruction will come on them, like birth pains on a pregnant woman; and they will in no way escape.