1
The burden of Egypt. Behold, Yahweh rides on a swift cloud, and comes to Egypt: and the idols of Egypt shall tremble at his presence; and the heart of Egypt shall melt in the midst of it.
2
I will stir up the Egyptians against the Egyptians: and they shall fight everyone against his brother, and everyone against his neighbor; city against city, [and] kingdom against kingdom.
3
The spirit of Egypt shall fail in the midst of it; and I will destroy the counsel of it: and they shall seek to the idols, and to the charmers, and to those who have familiar spirits, and to the wizards.
4
I will give over the Egyptians into the hand of a cruel lord; and a fierce king shall rule over them, says the Lord, Yahweh of Hosts.
5
The waters shall fail from the sea, and the river shall be wasted and become dry.
6
The rivers shall become foul; the streams of Egypt shall be diminished and dried up; the reeds and flags shall wither away.
7
The meadows by the Nile, by the brink of the Nile, and all the sown fields of the Nile, shall become dry, be driven away, and be no more.
8
The fishermen shall lament, and all those who cast angle into the Nile shall mourn, and those who spread nets on the waters shall languish.
9
Moreover those who work in combed flax, and those who weave white cloth, shall be confounded.
10
The pillars [of Egypt] shall be broken in pieces; all those who work for hire [shall be] grieved in soul.
11
The princes of Zoan are utterly foolish; the counsel of the wisest counselors of Pharaoh is become brutish: how say you to Pharaoh, I am the son of the wise, the son of ancient kings?
12
Where then are your wise men? and let them tell you now; and let them know what Yahweh of Hosts has purposed concerning Egypt.
13
The princes of Zoan are become fools, the princes of Memphis are deceived; they have caused Egypt to go astray, who are the corner-stone of her tribes.
14
Yahweh has mingled a spirit of perverseness in the midst of her; and they have caused Egypt to go astray in every work of it, as a drunken man staggers in his vomit.
15
Neither shall there be for Egypt any work, which head or tail, palm-branch or rush, may do.