Now why do you cry aloud? Is there no king in you? Has your counselor perished, that pain seized you like a woman in labor?
Behold, the cry of the daughter of my people from the length and breadth of the land: “Is the Lord not in Zion? Is her King not in her?” “Why have they provoked me to anger with their carved images and with their foreign idols?”
For behold, the Lord God of hosts is taking away from Jerusalem and from Judah support and supply, all support of bread, and all support of water; the mighty man and the soldier, the judge and the prophet, the diviner and the elder, the captain of fifty and the man of rank, the counselor and the skillful magician and the expert in charms. And I will make boys their princes, and infants shall rule over them. And the people will oppress one another, every one his fellow and every one his neighbor; the youth will be insolent to the elder, and the despised to the honorable.
Where now is your king, to save you in all your cities? Where are all your rulers— those of whom you said, “Give me a king and princes”? I gave you a king in my anger, and I took him away in my wrath.
For now they will say: “We have no king, for we do not fear the Lord; and a king—what could he do for us?”
For the children of Israel shall dwell many days without king or prince, without sacrifice or pillar, without ephod or household gods.
The breath of our nostrils, the Lord's anointed, was captured in their pits, of whom we said, “Under his shadow we shall live among the nations.”
“The king of Babylon heard the report of them, and his hands fell helpless; anguish seized him, pain as of a woman in labor.
Ask now, and see, can a man bear a child? Why then do I see every man with his hands on his stomach like a woman in labor? Why has every face turned pale? Alas! That day is so great there is none like it; it is a time of distress for Jacob; yet he shall be saved out of it.
O inhabitant of Lebanon, nested among the cedars, how you will be pitied when pangs come upon you, pain as of a woman in labor!”
How long must I see the standard and hear the sound of the trumpet?
Like a pregnant woman who writhes and cries out in her pangs when she is near to giving birth, so were we because of you, O Lord;
Therefore my loins are filled with anguish; pangs have seized me, like the pangs of a woman in labor; I am bowed down so that I cannot hear; I am dismayed so that I cannot see.
They will be dismayed: pangs and agony will seize them; they will be in anguish like a woman in labor. They will look aghast at one another; their faces will be aflame.
Unless otherwise indicated, all content is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License. All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. Copyright ©2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Contact me: openbibleinfo (at) gmail.com.