Lord, in trouble have they visited thee,

They poured out a prayer when thy chastening was upon them.

Like as a woman with child, that draweth near the time of her delivery,

Is in pain, and crieth out in her pangs;

So have we been in thy sight, O Lord.

We have been with child, we have been in pain, We have as it were brought forth wind;

We have not wrought any deliverance in the earth; Neither have the inhabitants of the world fallen.

Thy dead men shall live,

Together with my dead body shall they arise.
Awake and sing, ye that dwell in dust:
For thy dew is as the dew of herbs,

And the earth shall cast out the dead.

Come, my people, enter thou into thy chambers,

And shut thy doors about thee:

Hide thyself as it were for a little moment,
Until the indignation be overpast.

For, behold, the Lord cometh out of his place

To punish the inhabitants of the earth for their in

iquity:

The earth also shall disclose her blood,

And shall no more cover her slain.

In that day the Lord with his sore and great and

strong sword

Shall punish leviathan the piercing serpent,

Even leviathan that crooked serpent;

And he shall slay the dragon that is in the sea.

In that day sing ye unto her,

A vineyard of red wine.

I the Lord do keep it;

I will water it every moment:

Lest any

hurt it, I will keep it night and day.

Fury is not in me:

Who would set the briers and thorns against me in battle?

I would

gether.

go through them, I would burn them to

Or let him take hold of my strength,

That he may make peace

And he shall make peace

with me;

with me.

He shall cause them that come of Jacob to take

root:

Israel shall blossom and bud,

And fill the face of the world with fruit.

Hath he smitten him, as he smote those that smote him?

Or is he slain according to the slaughter of them that are slain by him?

In measure, when it shooteth forth, thou wilt debate with it:

He stayeth his rough wind in the day of the east wind.

By this therefore shall the iniquity of Jacob be purged; And this is all the fruit to take away his sin;

When he maketh all the stones of the altar as chalkstones that are beaten in sunder,

The groves and images shall not stand up.
Yet the defenced city shall be desolate,

And the habitation forsaken, and left like a wilder

ness:

There shall the calf feed, and there shall he lie down, And consume the branches thereof.

When the boughs thereof are withered, they shall be broken off:

The women come, and set them on fire:

For it is a people of no understanding:

Therefore he that made them will not have mercy on them,

And he that formed them will shew them no favour. And it shall come to pass in that day,

That the Lord shall beat off from the channel of the river unto the stream of Egypt,

And ye shall be gathered one by one, O ye children of Israel.

And it shall come to pass in that day,

That the great trumpet shall be blown,

And they shall come which were ready to perish in

the land of Assyria,

And the outcasts in the land of Egypt,

And shall worship the Lord in the holy mount at Jerusalem.

WOE to the crown of pride, to the drunkards of Ephraim,

Whose glorious beauty is a fading flower,

Which are on the head of the fat valleys of them that are overcome with wine!

Behold, the Lord hath a mighty and strong one, Which as a tempest of hail and a destroying storm, As a flood of mighty waters overflowing,

Shall cast down to the earth with the hand.

The crown of pride, the drunkards of Ephraim,
Shall be trodden under feet:

And the glorious beauty, which is on the head of
the fat valley, shall be a fading flower,
And as the hasty fruit before the summer;
Which when he that looketh upon it seeth,
While it is yet in his hand he eateth it up.

In that day shall the Lord of hosts be for a crown of glory,

And for a diadem of beauty, unto the residue of his people,

And for a spirit of judgment to him that sitteth in judgment,

And for strength to them that turn the battle to the

gate.

But they also have erred through wine, and through

strong drink are out of the way;

The priest and the prophet have erred through strong drink,

They are swallowed up of wine, they are out of the way through strong drink;

They err in vision, they stumble in judgment.

For all tables are full of vomit and filthiness,
So that there is no place clean.

Whom shall he teach knowledge?

And whom shall he make to understand doctrine?

Them that are weaned from the milk,

And drawn from the breasts.

For precept must be upon precept, precept upon

precept;

Line upon line, line upon line;

Here a little, and there a little:

For with stammering lips and another tongue
Will he speak to this people.

To whom he said,

This is the rest wherewith ye may cause the weary

to rest;

And this is the refreshing: yet they would not hear. But the word of the Lord was unto them

Precept upon precept, precept upon precept;