16 oI will scatter them among the nations pwhom neither they nor their fathers have known, and I will qsend the sword after them, until I have consumed them.”

17  Thus says the Lord of hosts:

r“Consider, and call for the mourning women to come;

send for the skillful women to come;

18  let them make haste sand raise a wailing over us,

tthat our eyes may run down with tears

and our eyelids flow with water.

19  For a sound of wailing is heard from Zion:

u‘How we are ruined!

We are utterly shamed,

because we have left the land,

because they have cast down our dwellings.’ ”

20  Hear, O women, the word of the Lord,

and let your ear receive the word of his mouth;

teach to your daughters a lament,

and each to her neighbor a dirge.

21  For death has come up into our windows;

it has entered our palaces,

vcutting off the children from the streets

and the young men from the squares.