1 Search yourselves and one another, O unfriendly people;
2 before the decree is executed, before the day passes as the chaff, before the fierce anger of the Lord comes upon you, before the day of the Lord’s anger comes upon you.
3 Seek ye the Lord, all ye humble of the earth, who have wrought his judgment; seek righteousness, seek humility: it may be ye shall be kept in the day of the Lord’s anger.
4 For Gaza shall be forsaken, and Ashkelon a desolation: they shall spoil Ashdod at the noon day, and Ekron shall be rooted up.
5 Woe unto the inhabitants of the sea coast, the people of the Cherethites! the word of the Lord is against you; O Canaan, the land of the Palestinians, I will cause thee to be destroyed until there shall be no inhabitant left.
6 And the sea coast shall be for dwellings and cottages for pastors, and sheepfolds.
7 And the coast shall be for the remnant of the house of Judah; they shall feed thereupon: in the houses of Ashkelon they shall sleep for the night; for the Lord their God shall visit them and return their captives.
8 I have heard the reproaches of Moab, and the revilings of the sons of Ammon, by which they have dishonoured my people and magnified themselves over their border.
9 Therefore as I live, said the Lord of the hosts, the God of Israel, Surely Moab shall be as Sodom and the sons of Ammon as Gomorrah, even a field of nettles and saltpits and a perpetual desolation; the remnant of my people shall spoil them, and the remnant of my Gentiles shall inherit them.
10 This shall come upon them for their pride because they have reproached and magnified themselves against the people of the Lord of the hosts.
11 The Lord shall be terrible against them for he will weaken all the gods of the earth; and each one from his place shall worship him, even all the isles of the Gentiles.
12 Ye Ethiopians also, ye shall be slain by my sword.
13 And he will stretch out his hand over the north wind and destroy Assyria and will make Nineveh a desolation and dry like a wilderness.
14 And flocks shall lie down in the midst of her, all the beasts of the Gentiles; both the cormorant and the bittern shall lodge in her thresholds; their voice shall sing in the windows; desolation shall be in the gates: for her cedar work shall be uncovered.
15 This is the rejoicing city that dwelt carelessly, that said in her heart, I am, and there is none beside me: how is she become a desolation, a place for beasts to lie down in! anyone that passes by her shall hiss and wag his hand.