For the Lord, the God of armies, is he at whose touch the land is turned to water, and everyone in it will be given up to sorrow; all of it will be overflowing like the River, and will go down again like the River of Egypt;

It is he who makes his rooms in the heaven, basing his arch on the earth; whose voice goes out to the waters of the sea, and sends them flowing over the face of the earth; the Lord is his name.

Are you not as the children of the Ethiopians to me, O children of Israel? says the Lord. Have I not taken Israel up out of the land of Egypt, and the Philistines from Caphtor, and the Aramaeans from Kir?

See, the eyes of the Lord are on the evil kingdom, and I will put an end to it in all the earth; but I will not send complete destruction on Jacob, says the Lord.

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;

The vision of Obadiah. This is what the Lord has said about Edom: We have had word from the Lord, and a representative has been sent among the nations, saying, Up! and let us make war against her.

How are the things of Esau searched out! how are his secret stores looked for!

All the men who were united with you have been false to you, driving you out to the edge of the land: the men who were at peace with you have overcome you; they have taken their heritage in your place.

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?

Do not see with pleasure your brother's evil day, the day of his fate, and do not be glad over the children of Judah on the day of their destruction, or make wide your mouth on the day of trouble.

And do not take your place at the cross-roads, cutting off those of his people who get away; and do not give up to their haters those who are still there in the day of trouble.

For the day of the Lord is coming quickly on all nations: as you have done it will be done to you; the reward of your acts will come on your head.

But in Mount Zion some will be kept safe, and it will be holy; and the children of Jacob will take their heritage.

And the children of Jacob will be a fire and those of Joseph a flame, and the children of Esau dry stems of grass, burned up by them till all is gone: and there will be no people living in Esau; for the Lord has said it.

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

And Jonah got up to go in flight to Tarshish, away from the Lord; and he went down to Joppa, and saw there a ship going to Tarshish: so he gave them the price of the journey and went down into it to go with them to Tarshish, away from the Lord.

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.

Then the sailors were full of fear, every man crying to his god; and the goods in the ship were dropped out into the sea to make the weight less. But Jonah had gone down into the inmost part of the ship where he was stretched out in a deep sleep.

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.

Then they said to him, Now make clear to us what is your work, and where you come from? what is your country, and who are your people?

And the men were in great fear, and they said to him, What is this you have done? For the men had knowledge of his flight from the Lord because he had not kept it from them.

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.

So, crying to the Lord, they said, Give ear to our prayer, O Lord, give ear, and do not let destruction overtake us because of this man's life; do not put on us the sin of taking life without cause: for you, O Lord, have done what seemed good to you.

In my trouble I was crying to the Lord, and he gave me an answer; out of the deepest underworld I sent up a cry, and you gave ear to my voice.

And at the Lord's order, the fish sent Jonah out of its mouth on to the dry land.

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

And Jonah first of all went a day's journey into the town, and crying out said, In forty days destruction will overtake Nineveh.

And he had it given out in Nineveh, By the order of the king and his great men, no man or beast, herd or flock, is to have a taste of anything; let them have no food or water:

And God saw what they did, how they were turned from their evil way; and God's purpose was changed as to the evil which he said he would do to them, and he did it not.

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.

Then Jonah went out of the town, and took his seat on the east side of the town and made himself a roof of branches and took his seat under its shade till he saw what would become of the town.

But early on the morning after, God made ready a worm for the destruction of the vine, and it became dry and dead.

Give ear, you peoples, all of you; give attention, O earth and everything in it: let the Lord God be witness against you, the Lord from his holy Temple.

For see, the Lord is coming out from his place, and will come down, stepping on the high places of the earth.

All this is because of the wrongdoing of Jacob and the sins of the children of Israel. What is the wrongdoing of Jacob? is it not Samaria? and what are the high places of Judah? are they not Jerusalem?

For her wounds may not be made well: for it has come even to Judah, stretching up to the doorway of my people, even to Jerusalem.

Give no word of it in Gath, let there be no weeping at all: at Beth-le-aphrah be rolling in the dust.

Be uncovered and go away, you who are living in Shaphir: the one living in Zaanan has not come out of her town; Beth-ezel is taken away from its base, even from its resting-place.

A curse on the designers of evil, working on their beds! in the morning light they do it, because it is in their power.

For this cause the Lord has said, See, against this family I am purposing an evil from which you will not be able to take your necks away, and you will be weighted down by it; for it is an evil time.

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.

As for you, you have become haters of those who were at peace with you: you take the clothing of those who go by without fear, and make them prisoners of war.

Up! and go; for this is not your rest: because it has been made unclean, the destruction ordered will come on you.

The opener of the way will go up before them: forcing their way out they will go on to the doorway and out through it: their king will go on before them, and the Lord at their head.

And I said, Give ear, now, you heads of Jacob and rulers of the people of Israel: is it not for you to have knowledge of what is right?

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.

This is what the Lord has said about the prophets by whom my people have been turned from the right way; who, biting with their teeth, say, Peace; and if anyone puts nothing in their mouths they make ready for war against him.

For this cause it will be night for you, without a vision; and it will be dark for you, without knowledge of the future; the sun will go down over the prophets, and the day will be black over them.

And the seers will be shamed, and the readers of the future will be at a loss, all of them covering their lips; for there is no answer from God.

Then give ear to this, you heads of the children of Jacob, you rulers of the children of Israel, hating what is right, twisting what is straight.

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.

And a number of nations will go and say, Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will give us knowledge of his ways and we will be guided by his word: for from Zion the law will go out, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.

But every man will be seated under his vine and under his fig-tree, and no one will be a cause of fear to them: for the mouth of the Lord of armies has said it.

And you, O tower of the flock, Ophel of the daughter of Zion, to you it will come, even the earlier authority, the kingdom of the daughter of Jerusalem.

Be in pain, make sounds of grief, O daughter of Zion, like a woman in childbirth: for now you will go out of the town, living in the open country, and will come even to Babylon; there you will have salvation; there the Lord will make you free from the hands of your haters.

And you, Beth-lehem Ephrathah, the least among the families of Judah, out of you one will come to me who is to be ruler in Israel; whose going out has been purposed from time past, from the eternal days.

And this will be our peace: when the Assyrian comes into our country and his feet are in our land, then we will put up against him seven keepers of the flocks and eight chiefs among men.

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:

Give ear, O you mountains, to the Lord's cause, and take note, you bases of the earth: for the Lord has a cause against his people, and he will take it up with Israel.

O my people, what have I done to you? how have I been a weariness to you? give answer against me.

For I took you up out of the land of Egypt and made you free from the prison-house; I sent before you Moses, Aaron, and Miriam.

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.

With what am I to come before the Lord and go with bent head before the high God? am I to come before him with burned offerings, with young oxen a year old?

He has made clear to you, O man, what is good; and what is desired from you by the Lord; only doing what is right, and loving mercy, and walking without pride before your God.

The voice of the Lord is crying out to the town: Give ear, you tribes and the meeting of the town.

Am I to let the stores of the evil-doer go out of my memory, and the short measure, which is cursed?

Is it possible for me to let wrong scales and the bag of false weights go without punishment?

For its men of wealth are cruel, and its people have said what is not true, and their tongue is false in their mouth.

You will have food, but not enough; your shame will be ever with you: you will get your goods moved, but you will not take them away safely; and what you do take away I will give to the sword.

Their hands are made ready to do evil; the ruler makes requests for money, and the judge is looking for a reward; and the great man gives decisions at his pleasure, and the right is twisted.

I will undergo the wrath of the Lord, because of my sin against him; till he takes up my cause and does what is right for me: when he makes me come out into the light, I will see his righteousness;

And my hater will see it and be covered with shame; she who said to me, Where is the Lord your God? my eyes will see their desire effected on her, now she will be crushed under foot like the dust of the streets.

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

As in the days when you came out from the land of Egypt, let us see things of wonder.

They will take dust as their food like a snake, like the things which go flat on the earth; they will come shaking with fear out of their secret places: they will come with fear to the Lord our God, full of fear because of you.

He says sharp words to the sea and makes it dry, drying up all the rivers: Bashan is feeble, and Carmel, and the flower of Lebanon is without strength.

The mountains are shaking because of him, and the hills flowing away; the earth is falling to bits before him, the world and all who are in it.

What are you designing against the Lord? he will put an end to it: his haters will not come up again a second time.

One has gone out from you who is designing evil against the Lord, whose purposes are of no value.

This is what the Lord has said: The days of my cause against you are ended; they are cut off and past. Though I have sent trouble on you, you will no longer be troubled.

A crusher has come up before your face: keep a good look-out, let the way be watched, make yourself strong, let your power be greatly increased.

The war-carriages are rushing through the streets, pushing against one another in the wide ways, looking like burning lights, running like thunder-flames.

Take silver, take gold; for there is no end to the store; take for yourselves a weight of things to be desired.

A curse is on the town of blood; it is full of deceit and violent acts; and there is no end to the taking of life.

I will make you completely disgusting and full of shame, and will put you up to be looked at by all.

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?

But even she has been taken away, she has gone away as a prisoner: even her young children are smashed to bits at the top of all the streets: the fate of her honoured men is put to the decision of chance, and all her great men are put in chains.

All your walled places will be like fig-trees and your people like the first figs, falling at a shake into the mouth which is open for them.

See, the people who are in you are women; the doorways of your land are wide open to your attackers: the locks of your doors have been burned away in the fire.

Get water for the time when you are shut in, make strong your towns: go into the potter's earth, stamping it down with your feet, make strong the brickworks.

Sorrow! how are the keepers of your flock sleeping, O king of Assyria! your strong men are at rest; your people are wandering on the mountains, and there is no one to get them together.

Your pain may not be made better; you are wounded to death: all those hearing the news about you will be waving their hands in joy over you: for who has not undergone the weight of your evil-doing again and again?

See among the nations, and take note, and be full of wonder: for in your days I am doing a work in which you will have no belief, even if news of it is given to you.

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.

He makes little of kings, rulers are a sport to him; all the strong places are to be laughed at; for he makes earthworks and takes them.

Are you not eternal, O Lord my God, my Holy One? for you there is no death. O Lord, he has been ordered by you for our punishment; and by you, O Rock, he has been marked out to put us right.

I will take my position and be on watch, placing myself on my tower, looking out to see what he will say to me, and what answer he will give to my protest.

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.

For the vision is still for the fixed time, and it is moving quickly to the end, and it will not be false: even if it is slow in coming, go on waiting for it; because it will certainly come, it will not be kept back.

A curse on the cruel and false one! the man full of pride, who never has enough; who makes his desires wide as the underworld! he is like death; he is never full, but he makes all nations come to him, getting all peoples together to himself.