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¹ The burden of the wilderness of the sea. As whirlwinds in the South sweep through, it comes from the wilderness, from a terrible land.² A grievous vision is declared to me; the treacherous man deals treacherously, and the destroyer destroys. Go up, O Elam; besiege, O Media; all the sighing thereof I have made to cease.³ Therefore my loins are filled with anguish; pangs have taken hold on me, as the pangs of a woman in travail: I am pained so that I can't hear; I am dismayed so that I can't see.⁴ My heart flutters, horror has frightened me; the twilight that I desired has been turned into trembling to me.⁵ They prepare the table, they set the watch, they eat, they drink: rise up, you princes, anoint the shield.⁶ For thus has the Lord said to me, Go, set a watchman: let him declare what he sees:⁷ and when he sees a troop, horsemen in pairs, a troop of donkeys, a troop of camels, he shall listen diligently with much heed.⁸ And he cried as a lion: O Lord, I stand continually on the watch-tower in the day-time, and am set in my ward whole nights;⁹ and, look, here comes a troop of men, horsemen in pairs. And he answered and said, Fallen, fallen is Babylon; and all the graven images of her gods are broken to the ground.¹⁰ O you my threshing, and the grain of my floor! that which I have heard from Yahweh of hosts, the God of Israel, I have declared to you.

¹¹ The burden of Dumah. One calls to me out of Seir, Watchman, what of the night? Watchman, what of the night?¹² The watchman said, The morning comes, and also the night: if you will inquire, inquire: turn, come.

¹³ The burden on Arabia. In the forest in Arabia you shall lodge, O you caravans of Dedanites.¹⁴ To him that was thirsty they brought water; the inhabitants of the land of Tema met the fugitives with their bread.¹⁵ For they fled away from the swords, from the drawn sword, and from the bent bow, and from the grievousness of war.¹⁶ For thus has the Lord said to me, Within a year, according to the years of a hired worker, all the glory of Kedar shall fail;¹⁷ and the residue of the number of the archers, the mighty men of the sons of Kedar, shall be few; for Yahweh, the God of Israel, has spoken it.