when they also are afraid of heights and of dangers on the road, when the almond tree blossoms, the grasshopper drags itself along, and the caper berry fails to excite— for a man is going to his eternal home, and mourners go about in the street—
And you will say to them, thus says Adonai-Tzva’ot, the God of Israel: “Drink, be drunken, vomit, fall down and rise no more, because of the sword that I will send among you.”
thus says Adonai-Tzva’ot: “I am about to send on them the sword, famine and pestilence, and will make them like vile figs, that cannot be eaten, they are so bad.
Here I am, watching over them for evil, and not for good. All the people of Judah who are in the land of Egypt will be consumed by the sword and by famine, until there is an end of them.
Listen, the sound of the cry of the daughter of my people —a voice from a distant land— “Is Adonai no longer in Zion? Is her King no longer in her?” “Why have they provoked Me with their graven images, with foreign idols?”
Therefore say, thus says Adonai Elohim, “I will gather you from the peoples and collect you out of the countries where you have been scattered, and I will give you the land of Israel.
A third of you will die with the plague and will be consumed with famine in your midst. A third will fall by the sword all around you. A third I will scatter to all the winds, and draw out a sword after them.
A third you will burn in fire in the midst of the city, when the days of the siege are complete. Take a third and strike it with the sword all around the city. Scatter a third to the wind, and I will draw out a sword after them.
I will scatter you among the nations and I will draw out the sword after you. So your land will become a desolation and your cities will become a waste.
Therefore thus said Adonai Elohei-Tzva’ot, my Lord: “There will be wailing in all plazas and in all streets. They will say: ‘Alas! Alas!’ The farmer will be called to mourning along with those who know the lamentation song.
In that day He will lift up a parable for you, and there will be wailing lamentation, saying: “We have been utterly ruined! He changes the portion of my people. How He removes it from me! To the faithless He apportions our fields!”
‘I scattered them with a whirlwind among all the nations they have not known. Thus the land was left so desolate behind them that no one passed through or returned, for they made the pleasant land desolate.’”
“Adonai will bring you to defeat before your enemies. You will go out one way against them and flee seven ways before them. You will become a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth.
“Adonai will bring you and the king you set over you to a nation you and your fathers have not known—and there you will serve other gods, wood and stone.
“Adonai will scatter you among all peoples from the one end of the earth to the other, and there you will serve other gods—wood and stone—that you and your fathers have not known.