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¹ The burden of Damascus: Behold, Damascus is taken away from being a city, and it shall be a ruined heap.² The cities of Aroer are forsaken; now they are for flocks; they lie down and no one terrifies them .³ And the fortress shall cease from Ephraim; and the kingdom from Damascus and the rest of Syria. They shall be as the glory of the sons of Israel, declares Jehovah of Hosts.⁴ And it shall be in that day, Jacob's glory shall be made thin, and the fatness of his flesh shall be made lean.⁵ And it shall be as the reaping of the harvest grain, and his arm reaps the ears. And it shall be as he who gathers ears in the Valley of the Giants.

⁶ Yet gleaning grapes shall be left in it, as the shaking of an olive tree; two or three ripe olives in the top of the uppermost branch; four or five in the fruit tree branches, declares Jehovah God of Israel.⁷ In that day a man shall gaze to his Maker; and his eyes shall look to the Holy One of Israel.⁸ And he shall not gaze to the altars, the work of his hands; and he will not see what his fingers have made, even the Asherahs, and the sun pillars.

⁹ In that day his fortified cities shall be as a thing left in the forest, or the branch that they leave, from before the sons of Israel. And it will become a desolation.¹⁰ Because you have forgotten the God of your salvation, and you did not remember the Rock of your strength. On account of this you shall plant pleasing plants, and shall sow it a foreign shoot.¹¹ In the day of your planting you fence it in; in the morning you make your seed sprout; the harvest is a heap in the day of sickness and incurable pain.

¹² Woe to the multitude of many peoples; they roar like the roar of seas; and the crash of nations, they crash like the crash of mighty waters!¹³ The nations shall crash like the crashing of many waters, but He rebukes it, and it flees far away; yea, it is driven like the chaff of mountains before the wind, and like a rolling thing before a tempest.¹⁴ At the time of evening, behold, terror! Before it is morning, it shall not be . This is the portion of those robbing us, and the lot of those plundering us.