1 W oe to the land whirring with wings which is beyond the rivers of Cush or Ethiopia,

2 T hat sends ambassadors by the Nile, even in vessels of papyrus upon the waters! Go, you swift messengers, to a nation tall and polished, to a people terrible from their beginning, a nation strong and victorious, whose land the rivers divide!

3 A ll you inhabitants of the world, you who dwell on the earth, when a signal is raised on the mountains—look! When a trumpet is blown—hear!

4 F or thus the Lord has said to me: I will be still and I will look on from My dwelling place, like clear and glowing heat in sunshine, like a fine cloud of mist in the heat of harvest.

5 F or before the harvest, when the blossom is over and the flower becomes a ripening grape, He will cut off the sprigs with pruning hooks, and the spreading branches He will remove and cut away.

6 T hey shall be left together to the ravenous birds of the mountains and to the beasts of the earth; and the ravenous birds will summer upon them, and all the beasts of the earth will winter upon them.

7 A t that time shall a present be brought to the Lord of hosts from a people tall and polished, from a people terrible from their beginning and feared and dreaded near and far, a nation strong and victorious, whose land the rivers or great channels divide—to the place of the Name of the Lord of hosts, to Mount Zion.