13. For we are about to destroy this place, because their outcry has become so great before Adonai that Adonai has sent us to destroy it.”
14. So Lot went out and spoke to his sons-in-law who were going to marry his daughters, “Get up!” he said, “Get out of this place! For Adonai is about to destroy the city!” But in the eyes of his sons-in-law, he was like a joker.
15. So when morning dawned the angels rushed Lot, saying, “Get up! Take your wife and your two daughters who are here, or else you will be swept away with the city’s iniquity!”
16. But he hesitated. So the men grabbed his hand, his wife’s hand and his two daughters’ hands—because of Adonai’s compassion for him—and they brought him out and left him outside the city.
17. When they brought them outside, one said, “Flee for your life! Do not look behind you, and do not stop anywhere in the surrounding area! Escape to the hills, or else you’ll be swept away!”
18. But Lot said to them, “No, my Lord, please!
19. Look, please, your servant has found favor in Your eyes and You have magnified Your merciful loyalty, which You have shown me by letting me live. But I can’t escape to the hill country—for the disaster will overtake me and I’ll die!
20. Look, please, this city is close enough to flee there, and it’s little. Please let me escape there. Isn’t it small? And let me live!”
21. So He said to him, “Behold, I will grant your request concerning this matter too—not to demolish the city of which you have spoken.
22. Hurry! Flee to safety there, because I cannot do anything until you arrive there.” (This is why the town is named Zoar.)
23. The moment the sun rose upon the land, Lot entered Zoar,
24. and Adonai rained sulfur and fire upon Sodom and Gomorrah from Adonai out of the sky.
25. So He demolished these cities and the whole surrounding area, all the inhabitants of the cities and the vegetation of the ground.
26. But his wife looked behind him and she turned into a pillar of salt.
27. Now Abraham rose early in the morning to the place where he had stood before Adonai,
28. and he looked down toward Sodom and Gomorrah, and toward the entire land of the surrounding area, and saw, behold, the smoke of the land ascended like smoke from a furnace.