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Nahum 2 :: English Standard Version (ESV)

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The Destruction of Nineveh

 

1 The scatterer has come up against you.

Man the ramparts;

watch the road;

dress for battle;[fn]

collect all your strength.

   

2 For the LORD is restoring the majesty of Jacob

as the majesty of Israel,

for plunderers have plundered them

and ruined their branches.

   

3 The shield of his mighty men is red;

his soldiers are clothed in scarlet.

The chariots come with flashing metal

on the day he musters them;

the cypress spears are brandished.

4 The chariots race madly through the streets;

they rush to and fro through the squares;

they gleam like torches;

they dart like lightning.

5 He remembers his officers;

they stumble as they go,

they hasten to the wall;

the siege tower[fn] is set up.

6 The river gates are opened;

the palace melts away;

7 its mistress[fn] is stripped;[fn] she is carried off,

her slave girls lamenting,

moaning like doves

and beating their breasts.

8 Nineveh is like a pool

whose waters run away.[fn]

“Halt! Halt!” they cry,

but none turns back.

9 Plunder the silver,

plunder the gold!

There is no end of the treasure

or of the wealth of all precious things.

   

10 Desolate! Desolation and ruin!

Hearts melt and knees tremble;

anguish is in all loins;

all faces grow pale!

11 Where is the lions’ den,

the feeding place of the young lions,

where the lion and lioness went,

where his cubs were, with none to disturb?

12 The lion tore enough for his cubs

and strangled prey for his lionesses;

he filled his caves with prey

and his dens with torn flesh.

 

13 Behold, I am against you, declares the LORD of hosts, and I will burn your[fn] chariots in smoke, and the sword shall devour your young lions. I will cut off your prey from the earth, and the voice of your messengers shall no longer be heard.

See the ESV Preface (Especially for Parenthesis, Brackets, & Asterisks).
ESV Footnotes
Hebrew gird your loins
Or the mantelet
The meaning of the Hebrew word rendered its mistress is uncertain
Or exiled
Compare Septuagint; the meaning of the Hebrew is uncertain
Hebrew her
ESV

The Holy Bible, English Standard Version copyright © 2001, 2007, 2011, 2016 by Crossway Books and Bibles, a Publishing Ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

See detailed copyright information.

For more information on this translation, see the ESV Preface.

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