For we have all become like an unclean person, and all our good acts are like a dirty robe: and we have all become old like a dead leaf, and our sins, like the wind, take us away.

And the daughter of Zion has become like a tent in a vine-garden, like a watchman's house in a field of fruit, like a town shut in by armies.

See, the nations are to him like a drop hanging from a bucket, and like the small dust in the scales: he takes up the islands like small dust.

Let your eyes be lifted up to the heavens, and turned to the earth which is under them: for the heavens will go in flight like smoke, and the earth will become old like a coat, and its people will come to destruction like insects: but my salvation will be for ever, and my righteousness will not come to an end.

We go on our way, like blind men feeling for the wall, even like those who have no eyes: we are running against things in daylight as if it was evening; our place is in the dark like dead men.

Their hearts will be full of fear; pains and sorrows will overcome them; they will be in pain like a woman in childbirth; they will be shocked at one another; their faces will be like flames.

And it will be that, like a roe in flight, and like wandering sheep, they will go every man to his people and to his land.

For the daughters of Moab will be like wandering birds, like a place from which the young birds have gone in flight, at the ways across the Arnon.

Ah! the voice of peoples, like the loud sounding of the seas, and the thundering of great nations rushing on like the bursting out of waters!

But he will put a stop to them, and make them go in flight far away, driving them like the waste of the grain on the tops of the mountains before the wind, and like the circling dust before the storm.

For this is what the Lord has said to me: I will be quiet, watching from my place; like the clear heat when the sun is shining, like a mist of dew in the heat of summer.

Come now, and let us have an argument together, says the Lord: how may your sins which are red like blood be white as snow? how may their dark purple seem like wool?

For you will be like a tree whose leaves have become dry, and like a garden without water.

Their arrows are sharp, and every bow is bent: the feet of their horses are like rock, and their wheels are like a rushing storm.

The sound of their armies will be like the voice of a lion, and their war-cry like the noise of young lions: with loud cries they will come down on their food and will take it away safely, and there will be no one to take it out of their hands.

And the goods taken in war will be got together like the massing of young locusts; men will be rushing on them like the rushing of locusts.

And the heavens will be rolled together like the roll of a book: and all their army will be gone, like a dead leaf from the vine, or a dry fruit from the fig-tree.

This is why their townsmen had no power, they were broken and put to shame; they were like the grass of the field, or a green plant; like the grass on the house-tops, which a cold wind makes waste.

My resting-place is pulled up and taken away from me like a herdsman's tent: my life is rolled up like a linen-worker's thread; I am cut off from the cloth on the frame: from day even to night you give me up to pain.

I make cries like a bird; I give out sounds of grief like a dove: my eyes are looking up with desire; O Lord, I am crushed, take up my cause.

It is he who is seated over the arch of the earth, and the people in it are as small as locusts; by him the heavens are stretched out like an arch, and made ready like a tent for a living-place.

The earth will be moving uncertainly, like a man overcome by drink; it will be shaking like a tent; and the weight of its sin will be on it, crushing it down so that it will not get up again.

See, the Lord has a strong and cruel one; like a rain of ice, a storm of destruction, like the overflowing of a strong river, he will violently overcome them.

And you will be made low, and your voice will come out of the earth, and your words will be low out of the dust; and your voice will come out of the earth like that of a spirit, making bird-like noises out of the dust.

And the army of your attackers will be like small dust, and all the cruel ones like dry stems gone before the wind; suddenly it will come about.

And all the nations making war on Ariel, and all those who are fighting against her and shutting her in with their towers, will be like a dream, like a vision of the night.

And it will be like a man desiring food, and dreaming that he is feasting; but when he is awake there is nothing in his mouth: or like a man in need of water, dreaming that he is drinking; but when he is awake he is feeble and his soul is full of desire: so will all the nations be which make war on Mount Zion.

A thousand will go in fear before one; even before five you will go in flight: till you are like a pillar by itself on the top of a mountain, and like a flag on a hill.