Lest I strip her naked And set her forth as on the day when she was born And make her like a wilderness And make her like dry land And put her to death with thirst.
But the people thirsted there for water; and they grumbled against Moses and said, “Why, now, have you brought us up from Egypt, to put us and our children and our livestock to death with thirst?”
“If you say in your heart, ‘Why have these things happened to me?’ Because of the magnitude of your iniquity Your skirts have been uncovered And your heels have suffered violence.
“Their mighty ones have sent their underlings for water; They have come to the trenches and found no water. They have returned with their vessels empty; They have been put to shame and dishonored, And they cover their heads.
“And he will be like a juniper in the desert And will not see when prosperity comes, But will dwell in stony wastes in the wilderness, A land of salt which is not inhabited.
“O generation, behold the word of Yahweh. Have I been a wilderness to Israel Or a land of thick darkness? Why do My people say, ‘We are free to roam; We will no longer come to You’?
“They did not say, ‘Where is Yahweh Who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, Who led us through the wilderness, Through a land of deserts and of pits, Through a land of drought and of the shadow of death, Through a land that no one crossed And where no man inhabited?’
For thus says Yahweh concerning the house of the king of Judah: “You are like Gilead to Me, Like the summit of Lebanon; Yet most assuredly I will make you like a wilderness, Like cities which are not inhabited.
Besides all your abominations and harlotries you did not remember the days of your youth, when you were naked and bare—you were squirming in your blood!
¶Though he is fruitful among the reeds, An east wind will come, The wind of Yahweh coming up from the wilderness; And his fountain will become dry, And his spring will be dried up; It will plunder his treasury of every desirable article.
And the ten horns which you saw, and the beast, these will hate the harlot and will lay waste to her and make her naked, and will eat her flesh and will burn her up with fire.
Then he became very thirsty, and he called to Yahweh and said, “You have given this great salvation by the hand of Your slave, but now shall I die of thirst and fall into the hands of the uncircumcised?”