“Their widows shall be more numerous than the sand of the seas. I shall bring against them, against the mother of the young men, a ravager at noon. I shall cause agitation and sudden alarm to fall on her, suddenly.
‘See, I am commanding,’ declares יהוה, ‘and shall bring them back to this city, and they shall fight against it and take it and burn it with fire. And I shall make the cities of Yehuḏ
At that time it shall be said to this people and to Yerushalayim, “A scorching wind of the bare heights blows in the wilderness toward the daughter of My people, not to fan or to cleanse.
“A lion has come up from his bush, and the destroyer of nations is on his way. He has set out from his place to make your land a ruin. Your cities are laid waste, without inhabitant.
‘But she was uprooted in wrath, she was cast down to the ground, and the east wind dried her fruit. Her strong rods were broken and withered, fire consumed them.
“And he shall set his face to enter with the strength of his entire rule, and make an alliance with him. And he shall do so, and give him the daughter of women to corrupt her. But she shall not stand, neither be for him.
“Though he bears fruit among his brothers, an east wind comes, a wind from יהוה comes up from the wilderness, and it dries up his fountain, and his spring becomes dry – it plunders a treasure of all desirable objects.
“See, I am raising up the Chaldeans, a bitter and hasty nation, who is going through the breadth of the earth, to possess dwelling places that are not theirs.