I will drive them out before you little by little, until you have increased and are strong enough to take possession of the land.

And you shall say before the Lord your God, ‘My father [Jacob] was a wandering Aramean, and he [along with his family] went down to Egypt and lived there [as strangers], few in number; but while there he became a great, mighty and populous nation.

Joshua said to the house of Joseph, to Ephraim and to Manasseh, “You are a numerous people and have great power; you shall not have only one lot,

And King Solomon and all the assembly of Israel who gathered together with him before the ark were sacrificing so many sheep and oxen that they could not be counted or numbered.

I will open my mouth in a parable [to instruct using examples];
I will utter dark and puzzling sayings of old [that contain important truth]—

In that day the Lord will whistle for the fly that is in the mouth of the rivers and canals of Egypt and for the bee that is in the land of Assyria.

“They have cut down her forest,” says the Lord;
“Certainly it will no longer be found,
Because they (the invaders) are more numerous than locusts
And cannot be counted.

A day of darkness and gloom,
A day of clouds and of thick [dark] mist,
Like the dawn spread over the mountains;
There is a [pagan, hostile] people numerous and mighty,
The like of which has never been before
Nor will be again afterward
Even for years of many generations.