1The burden of Damascus. Behold, Damascus is removed from being a city, and it shall be a ruinous heap.
2The cities of Aroer are forsaken; they shall be for flocks, and they shall lie down, with none making them afraid.
3And the fortress shall cease from Ephraim, and the kingdom from Damascus, and the remnant of Aram; like the glory of the children of Israel they shall be, declares YHWH of hosts (tzevaot).
4And it shall be in that day, the glory of Jacob shall be made thin, and the fatness of his flesh (basar) shall grow lean.
5And it shall be as when the harvester gathers the standing grain, and his arm reaps the ears; and it shall be as when one gleans ears in the valley of Rephaim.
6And there shall be left in it gleanings, as at the beating of an olive tree, two, three berries in the top of the topmost bough, four, five in its fruitful branches, declares YHWH, the God of Israel.
7In that day the man (adam) shall look to his Maker, and his eyes shall look to the Holy One of Israel.
8And he shall not look to the altars, the work of his hands, and that which his fingers have made he shall not regard, the Asherim and the sun-images.
9In that day his strong cities shall be like the forsaken place of the wood and the topmost bough, which they forsook from before the children of Israel; and it shall be a desolation.
10For you have forgotten the God of your salvation, and the Rock of your stronghold you have not remembered; therefore you plant plants of pleasantness, and with a strange slip you sow it.
11In the day of your planting you make it grow, and in the morning you make your seed blossom; but a heap is the harvest in the day of sickness and incurable pain.
12Woe, the multitude of many peoples, like the roaring of the seas they roar; and the rushing of nations, like the rushing of mighty waters they rush.
13Nations rush like the rushing of many waters, but he rebukes it, and it flees far off, and is chased like chaff of the mountains before the spirit (ruach), and like the whirling dust before the storm.
14At the time of evening, behold terror; before morning it is no more. This is the portion of those who plunder us, and the lot of those who spoil us.