1 The one who will scatter you is coming to attack you. Guard your fortress! Keep a lookout on the road! Prepare for battle! Be very courageous!

2 The LORD will restore Jacob's glory like Israel's glory, although enemies have looted it and have destroyed its vines.

3 The shields of his warriors are painted red. His soldiers have red uniforms. The metal on his chariots flashes fiery red, so do the spears when they are waved on the day he prepares for battle.

4 Chariots are racing madly through the streets, rushing this way and that in the city squares. They look like torches, like lightning, as they dart about.

5 He remembers his best fighting men. They stumble over themselves as they march. They hurry to Nineveh's wall. The shield has been set up for the battering ram.

6 The gates of the rivers are opened, and the palace melts away.

7 The LORD has determined: "It will be stripped. It will be carried away. Its young women will be mourning like doves as they beat their breasts."

8 Nineveh was like a pool of water from its first day on. But now its people are fleeing. "Stop! Stop!" But no one turns around.

9 Steal the silver! Steal the gold! There is no end to what is stored here- everything a person could ever want.

10 Nineveh is destroyed, deserted, demolished. Hearts are melting. Knees are knocking. Every stomach becomes upset. Every face turns pale.

11 Where is the lions' den, that feeding place for young lions? Where are the lion, the lioness, and the lion cub who moved about with no one to terrify them?

12 The lion tore its prey to pieces to feed its cubs. It strangled [the prey] for its mates. It used to fill its caves with torn carcasses and its dens with torn flesh.

13 "I am against you, Nineveh," declares the LORD of Armies. "I will send your chariots up in smoke, and a sword will kill your young lions. I will remove your prey from the earth, and no one will ever hear the voice of your messengers again."