1. The word of the Lord that came to Jeremias the prophet against the Gentiles,
2. Against Egypt, against the army of Pharao Nechao king of Egypt, which was by the river Euphrates in Charcamis, whom Nabuchodonosor the king of Babylon defeated, in the fourth year of Joakim the son of Josias king of Juda.
3. Prepare ye the shield and buckler, and go forth to battle.
4. Harness the horses, and get up, ye horsemen: stand forth with helmets, furbish the spears, put on coats of mail.
5. What then? I have seen them dismayed, and turning their backs, their valiant ones slain: they fled apace, and they looked not back: terror was round about, saith the Lord.
6. Let not the swift flee away, nor the strong think to escape: they are overthrown, and fallen down, towards the north by the river Euphrates.
7. Who is this that cometh up as a flood: and his streams swell like those of rivers?
8. Egypt riseth up like a hood, and the waves thereof shall be moved as rivers, and he shall say: I will go up and will cover the earth: I will destroy the city, and its inhabitants.
9. Get ye up on horses, and glory in chariots, and let the valiant men come forth, the Ethiopians, and the Libyans that hold the shield, and the Lydians that take, and shoot arrows.
10. For this is the day of the Lord the God of hosts, a day of vengeance, that he may revenge himself of his enemies: the sword shall devour, and shall be filled, and shall be drunk with their blood: for there is a sacrifice of the Lord God of hosts in the north country, by the river Euphrates.
11. Go up into Galaad, and take balm, O virgin daughter of Egypt: in vain dost thou multiply medicines, there shall be no cure for thee.
12. The nations have heard of thy disgrace, and thy howling hath filled the land: for the strong hath stumbled against the strong, and both are fallen together.
13. The word that the Lord spoke to Jeremias the prophet, how Nabuchodonosor king of Babylon should come and strike the land of Egypt:
14. Declare ye to Egypt, and publish it in Magdal, and let it be known in Memphis, and in Taphnis: say ye: Stand up, and prepare thyself: for the sword shall devour all round about thee.
15. Why are thy valiant men come to nothing? they stood not: because the Lord hath overthrown them.
16. He hath multiplied them that fall, and one hath fallen upon another, and they shall say: Arise, and let us return to our own people, and to the land our nativity, from the sword of the dove.
17. Call ye the name of Pharao king Egypt, a tumult time hath brought.
18. As I live, (saith the King, whose name is the Lord of hosts,) as Thabor is among the mountains, and as Carmel by the sea, so shall he come.
19. Furnish thyself to go into captivity, thou daughter inhabitant of Egypt: for Memphis shall be made desolate, and shall be forsaken and uninhabited.
20. Egypt is like a fair and beautiful heifer: there shall come from the north one that shall goad her.