1The message concerning the Wilderness of the Sea. As whirlwinds in the South sweep on, so it comes from the wilderness, from an awesome land.

2A distressing vision is revealed to me: the treacherous betrays, and the ravager ravages. Go up, O Ěylam! Besiege, O Media! All the groaning I bring to an end.

3Therefore my loins are filled with anguish; pangs have seized me, like the pangs of a woman in labour. I was distressed when I heard it; I was troubled when I saw it.

4My heart reeled, horror overwhelmed me; the night for which I longed He turned into fear for me.

5Prepare the table, spread the mat, eat and drink. Arise, you princes, anoint the shield!

6For יהוה has said this to me, “Go, set a watchman, let him declare what he sees.”

7And he saw a chariot with a pair of horsemen, a chariot of donkeys, and a chariot of camels, and he listened attentively, very attentively.

8Then he cried, “A lion, O יהוה! I stand continually on the watchtower in the daytime, and I have sat at my post every night.

9“And see this, a chariot of men coming with a pair of horsemen!” And he spoke up and said, “Baḇel is fallen, is fallen! And all the carved images of her mighty ones He has broken to the ground.”

10Oh, my threshing and the grain of my floor! That which I have heard from יהוה of hosts, the Elohim of Yisra’ĕl, I have declared to you.

11The message concerning Dumah. He calls to me out of Sĕ‛ir, “Watchman, how much of the night is passed? Watchman, how much of the night has passed?”

12The watchman said, “Morning came, and also the night. If you inquire, inquire. Come again!”

13The message concerning Araḇia. In the forest in Araḇia you stay, O you travelling companies of Deḏanites.

14You who dwell in the land of Tĕma, bring water to him who is thirsty, meet the fugitive with bread.

15For they fled from the swords, from the drawn sword, from the bent bow, and from the stress of battle.

16For thus יהוה has said to me, “Within a year, according to the year of a hired man, all the esteem of Qĕḏar shall come to an end,

17and the rest of the number of archers, the mighty men of the people of Qĕḏar, shall be few. For יהוה Elohim of Yisra’ĕl has spoken.”