This is what the Lord says: "Because Damascus has committed three crimes -- make that four! -- I will not revoke my decree of judgment. They ripped through Gilead like threshing sledges with iron teeth.

Yet destroyed I the Amorite before them, whose height was like the height of the cedars, and he was strong as the oaks; yet I destroyed his fruit from above, and his roots from beneath.

Look! I will press you down, like a cart loaded down with grain presses down.

Thus saith Jehovah: Like as the shepherd rescueth out of the jaw of the lion two legs, or a piece of an ear; so shall the children of Israel be rescued that sit in Samaria in the corner of a couch, and upon the damask of a bed.

“Offer [by burning] a sacrifice of thanksgiving of that which is leavened,
And [boastfully] proclaim freewill offerings, announce them.
For this you so love to do, O children of Israel!”
Says the Lord God.

I sent plagues like those of Egypt;
I killed your young men with the sword,
along with your captured horses.
I caused the stench of your camp
to fill your nostrils,
yet you did not return to Me.
This is the Lord’s declaration.

I have overthrown among you, like God's overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrah, and ye were as a brand plucked out of the burning; yet have ye not returned unto me, saith Jehovah.

Seek the LORD, and ye shall live; lest he break out like fire in the house of Joseph, and devour it, and there be none to quench it in Bethel.

It is he who is raining sudden destruction upon the strong like lightning, so that ruin comes upon the fortress.

It will be like a man who flees from a lion
only to have a bear confront him.
He goes home and rests his hand against the wall
only to have a snake bite him.

“But let justice run down like waters
And righteousness like an ever-flowing stream [flowing abundantly].

That chant to the sound of the viol, and invent to themselves instruments of musick, like David;

Shall not the land tremble for this, and every one mourn that dwelleth therein? yea, it shall rise up wholly like the River; and it shall be troubled and sink again, like the River of Egypt.

And I will turn your feasts into mourning and all of your songs into lament, and I will put sackcloth on all loins and baldness on every head. And I will make it like the mourning for an only child, and its end like a bitter day.

And the Lord GOD of hosts is he that toucheth the land, and it shall melt, and all that dwell therein shall mourn: and it shall rise up wholly like a flood; and shall be drowned, as by the flood of Egypt.

"Are you not like the Cushites to me, O people of Israel?" {declares} Yahweh. "Did I not bring up Israel from the land of Egypt and [the] Philistines from Caphtor and {the Arameans} from Kir?

For, lo, I will command, and I will sift the house of Israel among all nations, like as corn is sifted in a sieve, yet shall not the least grain fall upon the earth.

On that day I will raise up the booth of David that is fallen, and I will repair its breaches and will raise up its ruins and will build it like the days of old.