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.

² "This is the statute of the law which Yahweh has commanded: Speak to the children of Israel, that they bring you a red heifer without spot, in which is no blemish, [and] on which never came yoke.

³ You shall give her to Eleazar the priest, and he shall bring her forth outside of the camp, and one shall kill her before his face:

⁴ and Eleazar the priest shall take of her blood with his finger, and sprinkle her blood toward the front of the Tent of Meeting seven times.

⁵ One shall burn the heifer in his sight; her skin, and her flesh, and her blood, with her dung, shall he burn:

⁶ and the priest shall take cedar wood, and hyssop, and scarlet, and cast it into the midst of the burning of the heifer.

⁷ Then the priest shall wash his clothes, and he shall bathe his flesh in water, and afterward he shall come into the camp, and the priest shall be unclean until the evening.

⁸ He who burns her shall wash his clothes in water, and bathe his flesh in water, and shall be unclean until the evening.

⁹ "A man who is clean shall gather up the ashes of the heifer, and lay them up outside of the camp in a clean place; and it shall be kept for the congregation of the children of Israel for a water for impurity: it is a sin offering.

¹⁰ He who gathers the ashes of the heifer shall wash his clothes, and be unclean until the evening: and it shall be to the children of Israel, and to the stranger who lives as a foreigner among them, for a statute forever.

¹¹ "He who touches the dead body of any man shall be unclean seven days:

¹² the same shall purify himself with water on the third day, and on the seventh day he shall be clean: but if he doesn't purify himself the third day, then the seventh day he shall not be clean.

¹³ Whoever touches a dead person, the body of a man who has died, and doesn't purify himself, defiles the tabernacle of Yahweh; and that soul shall be cut off from Israel: because the water for impurity was not sprinkled on him, he shall be unclean; his uncleanness is yet on him.

¹⁴ "This is the law when a man dies in a tent: everyone who comes into the tent, and everyone who is in the tent, shall be unclean seven days.

¹⁵ Every open vessel, which has no covering bound on it, is unclean.

¹⁶ "Whoever in the open field touches one who is slain with a sword, or a dead body, or a bone of a man, or a grave, shall be unclean seven days.

¹⁷ "For the unclean they shall take of the ashes of the burning of the sin offering; and running water shall be put thereto in a vessel:

¹⁸ and a clean person shall take hyssop, and dip it in the water, and sprinkle it on the tent, and on all the vessels, and on the persons who were there, and on him who touched the bone, or the slain, or the dead, or the grave:

¹⁹ and the clean person shall sprinkle on the unclean on the third day, and on the seventh day: and on the seventh day he shall purify him; and he shall wash his clothes, and bathe himself in water, and shall be clean at evening.