Hear this, O elders,
And listen, all inhabitants of the land.
Has anything like this happened in your days
Or in your fathers’ days?

Wail like a virgin girded with sackcloth
For the bridegroom of her youth.

A day of darkness and gloom,
A day of clouds and thick darkness.
As the dawn is spread over the mountains,
So there is a great and mighty people;
There has never been anything like it,
Nor will there be again after it
To the years of many generations.

A fire consumes before them
And behind them a flame burns.
The land is like the garden of Eden before them
But a desolate wilderness behind them,
And nothing at all escapes them.

Their appearance is like the appearance of horses;
And like war horses, so they run.

With a noise as of chariots
They leap on the tops of the mountains,
Like the crackling of a flame of fire consuming the stubble,
Like a mighty people arranged for battle.

They run like mighty men,
They climb the wall like soldiers;
And they each march in line,
Nor do they deviate from their paths.

They rush on the city,
They run on the wall;
They climb into the houses,
They enter through the windows like a thief.