¹ And He crieth in mine ears -- a loud voice -- saying, `Drawn near have inspectors of the city, and each his destroying weapon in his hand.'

² And lo, six men are coming from the way of the upper gate, that is facing the north, and each his slaughter-weapon in his hand, and one man in their midst is clothed with linen, and a scribe's inkhorn at his loins, and they come in, and stand near the brazen altar.

³ And the honour of the God of Israel hath gone up from off the cherub, on which it hath been, unto the threshold of the house.

⁴ And He calleth unto the man who is clothed with linen, who hath the scribe's inkhorn at his loins, and Jehovah saith unto him, `Pass on into the midst of the city, into the midst of Jerusalem, and thou hast made a mark on the foreheads of the men who are sighing and who are groaning for all the abominations that are done in its midst.'

⁵ And to the others he said in mine ears, `Pass on into the city after him, and smite; your eye doth not pity, nor do ye spare;

⁶ aged, young man, and virgin, and infant, and women, ye do slay -- to destruction; and against any man on whom [is] the mark ye do not go nigh, and from My sanctuary ye begin.'

⁷ And they begin among the aged men who [are] before the house, and He saith unto them, `Defile the house, and fill the courts with the wounded, go forth.' And they have gone forth and have smitten in the city.

⁸ And it cometh to pass, as they are smiting, and I -- I am left -- that I fall on my face, and cry, and say, `Ah, Lord Jehovah, art Thou destroying all the remnant of Israel, in Thy pouring out Thy wrath on Jerusalem?'

⁹ And He saith unto me, `The iniquity of the house of Israel and Judah [is] very very great, and the land is full of blood, and the city hath been full of perverseness, for they have said: Jehovah hath forsaken the land, and Jehovah is not seeing.

¹⁰ And I also, Mine eye doth not pity, nor do I spare; their way on their own head I have put.'

¹¹ And lo, the man clothed with linen, at whose loins [is] the inkhorn, is bringing back word, saying, `I have done as Thou hast commanded me.'

¹ Dinah, the daughter of Leah, whom she bore to Jacob, went out to see the daughters of the land.

² Shechem the son of Hamor the Hivite, the prince of the land, saw her. He took her, lay with her, and humbled her.

³ His soul joined to Dinah, the daughter of Jacob, and he loved the young lady, and spoke kindly to the young lady.

⁴ Shechem spoke to his father, Hamor, saying, "Get me this young lady as a wife."

⁵ Now Jacob heard that he had defiled Dinah, his daughter; and his sons were with his livestock in the field. Jacob held his peace until they came.

⁶ Hamor the father of Shechem went out to Jacob to talk with him.

⁷ The sons of Jacob came in from the field when they heard it. The men were grieved, and they were very angry, because he had done folly in Israel in lying with Jacob's daughter; a which thing ought not to be done.

⁸ Hamor talked with them, saying, "The soul of my son, Shechem, longs for your daughter. Please give her to him as a wife.

⁹ Make marriages with us. Give your daughters to us, and take our daughters for yourselves.

¹⁰ You shall dwell with us, and the land will be before you. Live and trade in it, and get possessions in it."

¹¹ Shechem said to her father and to her brothers, "Let me find favor in your eyes, and whatever you will tell me I will give.

¹² Ask me a great amount for a dowry, and I will give whatever you ask of me, but give me the young lady as a wife."

¹³ The sons of Jacob answered Shechem and Hamor his father with deceit, and spoke, because he had defiled Dinah their sister,

¹⁴ and said to them, "We can't do this thing, to give our sister to one who is uncircumcised; for that is a reproach to us.

¹⁵ Only on this condition will we consent to you. If you will be as we are, that every male of you be circumcised;

¹⁶ then will we give our daughters to you, and we will take your daughters to us, and we will dwell with you, and we will become one people.

¹⁷ But if you will not listen to us, to be circumcised, then we will take our sister, and we will be gone."

¹⁸ Their words pleased Hamor and Shechem, Hamor's son.

¹⁹ The young man didn't wait to do this thing, because he had delight in Jacob's daughter, and he was honored above all the house of his father.

²⁰ Hamor and Shechem, his son, came to the gate of their city, and talked with the men of their city, saying,

²¹ "These men are peaceful with us. Therefore let them live in the land and trade in it. For behold, the land is large enough for them. Let us take their daughters to us for wives, and let us give them our daughters.

²² Only on this condition will the men consent to us to live with us, to become one people, if every male among us is circumcised, as they are circumcised.

²³ Won't their livestock and their possessions and all their animals be ours? Only let us give our consent to them, and they will dwell with us."

²⁴ All who went out of the gate of his city listened to Hamor, and to Shechem his son; and every male was circumcised, all who went out of the gate of his city.

²⁵ It happened on the third day, when they were sore, that two of Jacob's sons, Simeon and Levi, Dinah's brothers, each took his sword, came upon the unsuspecting city, and killed all the males.

²⁶ They killed Hamor and Shechem, his son, with the edge of the sword, and took Dinah out of Shechem's house, and went away.

²⁷ Jacob's sons came on the dead, and plundered the city, because they had defiled their sister.

²⁸ They took their flocks, their herds, their donkeys, that which was in the city, that which was in the field,

²⁹ and all their wealth. They took captive all their little ones and their wives, and took as plunder everything that was in the house.

³⁰ Jacob said to Simeon and Levi, "You have troubled me, to make me odious to the inhabitants of the land, among the Canaanites and the Perizzites. I am few in number. They will gather themselves together against me and strike me, and I will be destroyed, I and my house."

³¹ They said, "Should he deal with our sister as with a prostitute?"