¹ Blow the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain! Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble, for the day of Yahweh comes, for it is close at hand:

² A day of darkness and gloominess, a day of clouds and thick darkness. As the dawn spreading on the mountains, a great and strong people; there has never been the like, neither will there be any more after them, even to the years of many generations.

³ A fire devours before them, and behind them, a flame burns. The land is as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them, a desolate wilderness. Yes, and no one has escaped them.

⁴ The appearance of them is as the appearance of horses, and as horsemen, so do they run.

⁵ Like the noise of chariots on the tops of the mountains do they leap, like the noise of a flame of fire that devours the stubble, as a strong people set in battle array.

⁶ At their presence the peoples are in anguish. All faces have grown pale.

⁷ They run like mighty men. They climb the wall like warriors. They each march in his line, and they don't swerve off course.

⁸ Neither does one jostle another; they march everyone in his path, and they burst through the defenses, and don't break ranks.

⁹ They rush on the city. They run on the wall. They climb up into the houses. They enter in at the windows like thieves.

¹⁰ The earth quakes before them. The heavens tremble. The sun and the moon are darkened, and the stars withdraw their shining.

¹¹ Yahweh thunders his voice before his army; for his forces are very great; for he is strong who obeys his command; for the day of Yahweh is great and very awesome, and who can endure it?

¹² "Yet even now," says Yahweh, "turn to me with all your heart, and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning."

¹³ Tear your heart, and not your garments, and turn to Yahweh, your God; for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abundant in loving kindness, and relents from sending calamity.

¹⁴ Who knows? He may turn and relent, and leave a blessing behind him, even a meal offering and a drink offering to Yahweh, your God.

¹⁵ Blow the trumpet in Zion! Sanctify a fast. Call a solemn assembly.

¹⁶ Gather the people. Sanctify the assembly. Assemble the elders. Gather the children, and those who nurse from breasts. Let the bridegroom go forth from his room, and the bride out of her room.

¹⁷ Let the priests, the ministers of Yahweh, weep between the porch and the altar, and let them say, "Spare your people, Yahweh, and don't give your heritage to reproach, that the nations should rule over them. Why should they say among the peoples, 'Where is their God?'"

¹⁸ Then Yahweh was jealous for his land, And had pity on his people.

¹⁹ Yahweh answered his people, "Behold, I will send you grain, new wine, and oil, and you will be satisfied with them; and I will no more make you a reproach among the nations.

²⁰ But I will remove the northern army far away from you, and will drive it into a barren and desolate land, its front into the eastern sea, and its back into the western sea; and its stench will come up, and its bad smell will rise." Surely he has done great things.

²¹ Land, don't be afraid. Be glad and rejoice, for Yahweh has done great things.

²² Don't be afraid, you animals of the field; for the pastures of the wilderness spring up, for the tree bears its fruit. The fig tree and the vine yield their strength.

²³ "Be glad then, you children of Zion, and rejoice in Yahweh, your God; for he gives you the former rain in just measure, and he causes the rain to come down for you, the former rain and the latter rain, as before.

²⁴ The threshing floors will be full of wheat, and the vats will overflow with new wine and oil.

²⁵ I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten, the great locust, the grasshopper, and the caterpillar, my great army, which I sent among you.

²⁶ You will have plenty to eat, and be satisfied, and will praise the name of Yahweh, your God, who has dealt wondrously with you; and my people will never again be disappointed.

²⁷ You will know that I am in the midst of Israel, and that I am Yahweh, your God, and there is no one else; and my people will never again be disappointed.

²⁸ "It will happen afterward, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh; and your sons and your daughters will prophesy. Your old men will dream dreams. Your young men will see visions.

²⁹ And also on the servants and on the handmaids in those days, I will pour out my Spirit.

³⁰ I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth: blood, fire, and pillars of smoke.

³¹ The sun will be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible day of Yahweh comes.

³² It will happen that whoever will call on the name of Yahweh shall be saved; for in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there will be those who escape, as Yahweh has said, and among the remnant, those whom Yahweh calls.

¹ The heavens and the earth were finished, and all their vast array.

² On the seventh day God finished his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.

³ God blessed the seventh day, and made it holy, because he rested in it from all his work which he had created and made.

⁴ This is the history of the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that Yahweh God made the earth and the heavens.

⁵ No plant of the field was yet in the earth, and no herb of the field had yet sprung up; for Yahweh God had not caused it to rain on the earth. There was not a man to till the ground,

⁶ but a mist went up from the earth, and watered the whole surface of the ground.

⁷ Yahweh God formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.

⁸ Yahweh God planted a garden eastward, in Eden, and there he put the man whom he had formed.

⁹ Out of the ground Yahweh God made every tree to grow that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food; the tree of life also in the middle of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

¹⁰ A river went out of Eden to water the garden; and from there it was parted, and became four heads.

¹¹ The name of the first is Pishon: this is the one which flows through the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold;

¹² and the gold of that land is good. There is aromatic resin and the onyx stone.

¹³ The name of the second river is Gihon: the same river that flows through the whole land of Cush.

¹⁴ The name of the third river is Hiddekel: this is the one which flows in front of Assyria. The fourth river is the Euphrates.

¹⁵ Yahweh God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it.

¹⁶ Yahweh God commanded the man, saying, "Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat;

¹⁷ but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall not eat of it; for in the day that you eat of it you will surely die."

¹⁸ Yahweh God said, "It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him."

¹⁹ Out of the ground Yahweh God formed every animal of the field, and every bird of the sky, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them. Whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name.

²⁰ The man gave names to all livestock, and to the birds of the sky, and to every animal of the field; but for man there was not found a helper suitable for him.

²¹ Yahweh God caused a deep sleep to fall on the man, and he slept; and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh in its place.

²² He made the rib, which Yahweh God had taken from the man, into a woman, and brought her to the man.

²³ The man said, "This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh. She will be called 'woman,' because she was taken out of man."

²⁴ Therefore a man will leave his father and his mother, and will join with his wife, and they will be one flesh.

²⁵ They were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed.