And I will send you away as prisoners farther than Damascus, says the Lord, whose name is the God of armies.

Go on to Calneh and see; and from there go to Hamath the great; then go down to Gath of the Philistines: are you better than these kingdoms? or is your land wider than theirs?

Then it will come about that if there are still ten men in a house, death will overtake them.

This is what the Lord God let me see: and I saw that, when the growth of the late grass was starting, he made locusts; it was the late growth after the king's cutting was done.

And it came about that after they had taken all the grass of the land, I said, O Lord God, have mercy: how will Jacob be able to keep his place? for he is small.

This is what the Lord let me see: and I saw that the Lord God sent for a great fire to be the instrument of his punishment; and, after burning up the great deep, it was about to put an end to the Lord's heritage.

And the songs of the king's house will be cries of pain in that day, says the Lord God: great will be the number of the dead bodies, and everywhere they will put them out without a word.

Saying, When will the new moon be gone, so that we may do trade in grain? and the Sabbath, so that we may put out in the market the produce of our fields? making the measure small and the price great, and trading falsely with scales of deceit;

And it will come about in that day, says the Lord God, that I will make the sun go down in the middle of the day, and I will make the earth dark in daylight:

Your feasts will be turned into sorrow and all your melody into songs of grief; everyone will be clothed with haircloth, and the hair of every head will be cut; I will make the weeping like that for an only son, and the end of it like a bitter day.

In that day the fair virgins and the young men will be feeble from need of water.

I saw the Lord stationed by the side of the altar, giving blows to the tops of the pillars so that the doorsteps were shaking: and he said, I will let all of them be broken with earth-shocks; I will put the last of them to the sword: if any one of them goes in flight he will not get away, not one of them will be safe.

In that day I will put up the tent of David which has come down, and make good its broken places; and I will put up again his damaged walls, building it up as in the past;

So that the rest of Edom may be their heritage, and all the nations who have been named by my name, says the Lord, who is doing this.

Will I not, in that day, says the Lord, take away the wise men out of Edom, and wisdom out of the mountain of Esau?

And your men of war, O Teman, will be overcome with fear, so that every one of them may be cut off from the mountain of Esau.

Up! go to Nineveh, that great town, and let your voice come to it; for their evil-doing has come up before me.

And the Lord sent out a great wind on to the sea and there was a violent storm in the sea, so that the ship seemed in danger of being broken.

And the ship's captain came to him and said to him, What are you doing sleeping? Up! say a prayer to your God, if by chance God will give a thought to us, so that we may not come to destruction.

And they said to him, What are we to do to you so that the sea may become calm for us? For the sea was getting rougher and rougher.

And he said to them, Take me up and put me into the sea, and the sea will become calm for you: for I am certain that because of me this great storm has come on you.

Up! go to Nineveh, that great town, and give it the word which I have given you.

Who may say that God will not be turned, changing his purpose and turning away from his burning wrath, so that destruction may not overtake us?

And he made prayer to the Lord and said, O Lord, is this not what I said when I was still in my country? This is why I took care to go in flight to Tarshish: for I was certain that you were a loving God, full of pity, slow to be angry and great in mercy, and ready to be turned from your purpose of evil.

So now, O Lord, give ear to my prayer and take my life from me; for death is better for me than life.

Then when the sun came up, God sent a burning east wind: and so great was the heat of the sun on his head that Jonah was overcome, and, requesting death for himself, said, Death is better for me than life.

And am I not to have mercy on Nineveh, that great town, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons without the power of judging between right and left, as well as much cattle?

In that day this saying will be said about you, and this song of grief will be made: The heritage of my people is measured out, and there is no one to give it back; those who have made us prisoners have taken our fields from us, and complete destruction has come to us.

Then they will be crying to the Lord for help, but he will not give them an answer: yes, he will keep his face veiled from them at that time, because their acts have been evil.

But in the last days it will come about that the mountain of the Lord's house will be placed on the top of the mountains, and be lifted up over the hills; and peoples will be flowing to it.

In that day, says the Lord, I will get together her who goes with uncertain steps, I will get together her who has been sent away, and her on whom I have sent evil;

Now why are you crying so loudly? is there no king in you? has destruction come on your wise helper? so that pains have taken you like the pains of a woman in childbirth:

And it will come about in that day, says the Lord, that I will take away your horses from you, and will give your war-carriages to destruction:

O my people, keep in mind now what was designed by Balak, king of Moab, and the answer which Balaam, son of Beor, gave him; the events, from Shittim to Gilgal, so that you may be certain of the upright acts of the Lord.

For you have kept the laws of Omri and all the works of the family of Ahab, and you have been guided by their designs: so that I might make you a cause of wonder and your people a cause of hisses; and the shame of my people will be on you.

A day for building your walls! in that day will your limits be stretched far and wide.

In that day they will come to you from Assyria and the towns of Egypt, and from Egypt even to the River, and from sea to sea and from mountain to mountain.

The Lord has given an order about you, that no more of your name are to be planted: from the house of your gods I will have the pictured and metal images cut off; I will make your last resting-place a place of shame; for you are completely evil.

And it will come about that all who see you will go in flight from you and say, Nineveh is made waste: who will be weeping for her? where am I to get comforters for her?

Are you better than No-amon, seated on the Nile streams, with waters all round her; whose wall was the sea and her earthwork the waters?

Let your traders be increased more than the stars of heaven:

For see, I am sending the Chaldaeans, that bitter and quick-moving nation; who go through the wide spaces of the earth to get for themselves living-places which are not theirs.

And their horses are quicker than leopards and their horsemen more cruel than evening wolves; they come from far away, like an eagle in flight rushing on its food.

Before your holy eyes sin may not be seen, and you are unable to put up with wrong; why, then, are your eyes on the false? why do you say nothing when the evil-doer puts an end to one who is more upright than himself?

And the Lord gave me an answer, and said, Put the vision in writing and make it clear on stones, so that the reader may go quickly.

A curse on him who gets evil profits for his family, so that he may put his resting-place on high and be safe from the hand of the wrongdoer!

See, is it not the pleasure of the Lord of armies that the peoples are working for the fire and using themselves up for nothing?

A curse on him who gives his neighbour the wine of his wrath, making him overcome with strong drink from the cup of his passion, so that you may be a witness of their shame!

Was your wrath burning against the rivers? were you angry with the sea, that you went on your horses, on your war-carriages of salvation?

And it will come about in the day of the Lord's offering, that I will send punishment on the rulers and the king's sons and all who are clothed in robes from strange lands.

And in that day I will send punishment on all those who come jumping over the doorstep and make their master's house full of violent behaviour and deceit.

And in that day, says the Lord, there will be the sound of a cry from the fish doorway, and an outcry from the new town, and a great thundering from the hills, and cries of grief from the people of the Hollow;

And it will come about at that time, that I will go searching through Jerusalem with lights; and I will send punishment on the men who have become like wine stored over-long, who say to themselves, The Lord will not do good and will not do evil.

The great day of the Lord is near, it is near and coming very quickly; the bitter day of the Lord is near, coming on more quickly than a man of war.

That day is a day of wrath, a day of trouble and sorrow, a day of wasting and destruction, a day of dark night and deep shade, a day of cloud and thick dark.

And I will send trouble on men so that they will go about like the blind, because they have done evil against the Lord: and their blood will be drained out like dust, and their strength like waste.

Make search for the Lord, all you quiet ones of the earth, who have done what is right in his eyes; make search for righteousness and a quiet heart: it may be that you will be safely covered in the day of the Lord's wrath.

I have had the nations cut off, their towers are broken down; I have made their streets a waste so that no one goes through them: destruction has overtaken their towns, so that there is no man living in them.

I said, Certainly you will go in fear of me, and come under my training, so that whatever I may send on her may not be cut off before her eyes: but they got up early and made all their works evil.

For this reason, go on waiting for me, says the Lord, till the day when I come up as a witness: for my purpose is to send for the nations and to get the kingdoms together, so that I may let loose on them my passion, even all my burning wrath: for all the earth will be burned up in the fire of my bitter passion.

For then I will give the people a clean language, so that they may all make prayer to the Lord and be his servants with one mind.

In that day you will have no shame on account of all the things in which you did evil against me: for then I will take away from among you those who were lifted up in pride, and you will no longer be lifted up with pride in my holy mountain.

In that day it will be said to Jerusalem, Have no fear: O Zion, let not your hands be feeble.

See, at that time I will put an end to all who have been troubling you: I will give salvation to her whose steps are uncertain, and get together her who has been sent in flight; and I will make them a cause of praise and an honoured name in all the earth, when I let their fate be changed.

At that time I will make you come in, at that time I will get you together: for I will make you a name and a praise among all the peoples of the earth when I let your fate be changed before your eyes, says the Lord.

The second glory of this house will be greater than the first, says the Lord of armies: and in this place I will give peace, says the Lord of armies.

In that day, says the Lord of armies, I will take you, O Zerubbabel, my servant, the son of Shealtiel, says the Lord, and will make you as a jewelled ring: for I have taken you to be mine, says the Lord of armies.

For at the shaking of my hand over them, their goods will be taken by those who were their servants: and you will see that the Lord of armies has sent me.

And a number of nations will be joined to the Lord in that day, and will become my people; and I will be living among you, and you will see that the Lord of armies has sent me to you.

For see, the stone which I have put before Joshua; on one stone are seven eyes: see, the design cut on it will be my work, says the Lord of armies, and I will take away the sin of that land in one day.

In that day, says the Lord of armies, you will be one another's guests under the vine and under the fig-tree.

The hands of Zerubbabel have put the base of this house in place, and his hands will make it complete; and it will be clear to you that the Lord of armies has sent me to you.

And the red ones go to the east; and they made request that they might go up and down through the earth: and he said, Go up and down through the earth. So they went up and down through the earth.

And those who are far away will come and be builders in the Temple of the Lord, and it will be clear to you that the Lord of armies has sent me to you.

And it came about in the fourth year of King Darius, that the word of the Lord came to Zechariah on the fourth day of the ninth month, the month Chislev.

And they made their hearts like the hardest stone, so that they might not give ear to the law and the words which the Lord of armies had said by the earlier prophets: and there came great wrath from the Lord of armies.

And it came about that as they would not give ear to his voice, so I would not give ear to their voice, says the Lord of armies:

But with a storm-wind I sent them in flight among all the nations of whom they had no knowledge. So the land was waste after them, so that no man went through or came back: for they had made waste the desired land.

This is what the Lord of armies has said: Let your hands be strong, you who are now hearing these words from the mouths of the prophets, that is to say, in the days when the base of the house of the Lord of armies has been put in place for the building of the house, that is the Temple.

And it will come about that, as you were a curse among the nations, O children of Judah and children of Israel, so I will give you salvation and you will be a blessing: have no fear and let your hands be strong.

This is what the Lord of armies has said: It will again come about that when peoples and those living in great towns come,

This is what the Lord of armies has said: In those days, ten men from all the languages of the nations will put out their hands and take a grip of the skirt of him who is a Jew, saying, We will go with you, for it has come to our ears that God is with you.

And I will put my forces in position round my house, so that there may be no coming and going: and no cruel master will again go through them: for now I have seen his trouble.

And they will come back to you, O daughter of Zion, as prisoners of hope: today I say to you that I will give you back twice as much;

And the Lord their God will be their saviour in that day, giving them food like the flock of his people: for they will be like the jewels of a crown shining over his land.

Let your doors be open, O Lebanon, so that fire may be burning among your cedars.

And I took my rod Beautiful, cutting it in two, so that the Lord's agreement, which he had made with all the peoples, might be broken.

And it was broken on that day: and the sheep-traders, who were watching me, were certain that it was the word of the Lord.

Then I took my other rod, the one named Bands, cutting it in two, so that the relation of brothers between Judah and Israel might be broken.

For see, I will put a sheep-keeper over the land, who will have no care for that which is cut off, and will not go in search of the wanderers, or make well what is broken, and he will not give food to that which is ill, but he will take for his food the flesh of the fat, and let their feet be broken.

And it will come about in that day that I will make Jerusalem a stone of great weight for all the peoples; all those who take it up will be badly wounded; and all the nations of the earth will come together against it.

In that day, says the Lord, I will put fear into every horse and make every horseman go off his head: and my eyes will be open on the people of Judah, and I will make every horse of the peoples blind.

In that day I will make the families of Judah like a pot with fire in it among trees, and like a flaming stick among cut grain; they will send destruction on all the peoples round about, on the right hand and on the left: and Jerusalem will be living again in the place which is hers, that is, in Jerusalem.

And the Lord will give salvation to the tents of Judah first, so that the glory of the family of David and the glory of the people of Jerusalem may not be greater than that of Judah.

In that day the Lord will be a cover over the people of Jerusalem; and he who is feeble among them in that day will be as strong as David, and the family of David will be as God, as the angel of the Lord before them.

And it will come about on that day that I will take in hand the destruction of all the nations who come against Jerusalem.

In that day there will be a great weeping in Jerusalem, like the weeping of Hadad-rimmon in the valley of Megiddon.

In that day there will be a fountain open to the family of David and to the people of Jerusalem, for sin and for that which is unclean.

And it will come about on that day, says the Lord of armies, that I will have the names of the images cut off out of the land, and there will be no more memory of them: and I will send all the prophets and the unclean spirit away from the land.

And it will come about in that day that the prophets will be shamed, every man on account of his vision, when he is talking as a prophet; and they will not put on a robe of hair for purposes of deceit: