<p class="poetry">Egypt is like a beautiful young cow.p> <p class="poetry">But northern armies will attack her like swarms of stinging flies.<n id="1" />p>

<p class="bodytext">The <sc>Lordsc><n id="1" /> said to him, &#8220;Take for me a heifer, a goat, and a ram, each three years old, along with a dove and a young pigeon.&#8221;

At that time<n id="1" /> a man will keep alive a young cow from the herd and a couple of goats.

and bring the heifer down to a wadi with flowing water,<n id="1" /> to a valley that is neither plowed nor sown.<n id="2" /> There at the wadi they are to break the heifer&#8217;s neck.

and all the elders of that city nearest the corpse<n id="1" /> must wash their hands over the heifer whose neck was broken in the valley.<n id="2" />

<p class="bodytext">Samuel replied, &#8220;How can I go? Saul will hear about it and kill me!&#8221; But the <sc>Lordsc> said, &#8220;Take a heifer with you<n id="1" /> and say, &#8216;I have come to sacrifice to the <sc>Lordsc>.&#8217;

<p class="poetry">&#8220;People of Babylonia,<n id="1" /> you plundered my people.<n id="2" />p> <p class="poetry">That made you happy and glad.p> <p class="poetry">You frolic about like calves in a pasture.<n id="3" />p> <p class="poetry">Your joyous sounds are like the neighs of a stallion.<n id="4" />p>

<t /><p class="poetry">The inhabitants<n id="1" /> of Samaria will lament<n id="2" /> over the calf idol<n id="3" /> of Beth Aven.<n id="4" />p> <p class="poetry">Its people will mourn over it;p> <p class="poetry">its idolatrous priests will wail<n id="5" /> over it,<n id="6" />p> <p class="poetry">because its splendor will be taken from them<n id="7" /> into exile.p>

<t /><p class="poetry">Ephraim was a well-trained heifer who loved to thresh grain;p> <p class="poetry">I myself put a fine yoke<n id="1" />on her neck.p> <p class="poetry">I will harness Ephraim.p> <p class="poetry">Let Judah plow!<n id="2" />p> <p class="poetry">Let Jacob break up<n id="3" /> the unplowed ground for himself!p>

Then the elders of the city nearest to the corpse<n id="1" /> must take from the herd a heifer that has not been worked &#8211; that has never pulled with the yoke &#8211;

On the seventh day, before the sun set, the men of the city said to him,p> <p class="poetry">&#8220;What is sweeter than honey?p> <p class="poetry">What is stronger than a lion?&#8221;p> <p class="bodyblock">He said to them,p> <p class="poetry">&#8220;If you had not plowed with my heifer,<n id="1" />p> <p class="poetry">you would not have solved my riddle!&#8221;p>

<p class="poetry">My heart cries out because of Moab&#8217;s plight,<n id="1" />p> <p class="poetry">and for the fugitives<n id="2" /> stretched out<n id="3" /> as far as Zoar and Eglath Shelishiyah.p> <p class="poetry">For they weep as they make their way up the ascent of Luhith;p> <p class="poetry">they loudly lament their demise on the road to Horonaim.<n id="4" />p>

<p class="poetry">Cries of anguish raised from Heshbon and Elealehp> <p class="poetry">will be sounded as far as Jahaz.<n id="1" />p> <p class="poetry">They will be sounded from Zoar as far as Horonaim and Eglath Shelishiyah.p> <p class="poetry">For even the waters of Nimrim will be dried up.p>