Isaiah 13:4

Bible in Basic English (1941)

The noise of great numbers in the mountains, like the noise of a strong people! The noise of the kingdoms of the nations meeting together! The Lord of armies is numbering his forces for war.

📖 Grammatical Analysis

Original Text

ק֥וֹל הָמ֛וֹן בֶּֽהָרִ֖ים דְּמ֣וּת עַם־רָ֑ב ק֠וֹל שְׁא֞וֹן מַמְלְכ֤וֹת גּוֹיִם֙ נֶֽאֱסָפִ֔ים יְהוָ֣ה צְבָא֔וֹת מְפַקֵּ֖ד צְבָ֥א מִלְחָמָֽה׃

Transliteration

Qôl hāmôn in-the-hārîm dəmûṯ ʿam-rāḇ qôl šəʾôn mamləḵôṯ gôyim neʾĕsāp̄îm YHWH ṣəḇāʾôṯ məp̄aqqēḏ ṣəḇā milḥāmāh

Grammar Details

• *qôl*: noun, masculine, singular, construct - sound of/voice of
• *hāmôn*: noun, masculine, singular - multitude/tumult/crowd
• *behārîm*: preposition + noun, masculine plural, + definite article - in the mountains
• *dəmûṯ*: noun, feminine, singular, construct - likeness of/resemblance of
• *ʿam-rāḇ*: noun, masculine, singular + adjective - many/great people
• *šəʾôn*: noun, masculine, singular, construct - roar of/tumult of
• *mamləḵôṯ*: noun, feminine, plural, construct - kingdoms of
• *gôyim*: noun, masculine, plural - nations/peoples
• *neʾĕsāp̄îm*: verb, Niphal participle, masculine plural - being gathered/assembled
• *YHWH*: proper noun - divine name
• *ṣəḇāʾôṯ*: noun, masculine, plural - hosts/armies
• *məp̄aqqēḏ*: verb, Piel participle, masculine singular - mustering/numbering/commanding
• *ṣəḇā*: noun, masculine, singular, construct - army of
• *milḥāmāh*: noun, feminine, singular - war/battle

Word Meanings

• *hāmôn*: multitude/tumult/crowd/noise
• *dəmûṯ*: likeness/resemblance/form/appearance
• *šəʾôn*: roar/tumult/uproar
• *neʾĕsāp̄îm*: being gathered/being assembled/coming together
• *məp̄aqqēḏ*: mustering/numbering/commanding/appointing

Referenced Verses

• Joel 3:14 : 14 Give this out among the nations; make ready for war: get the strong men awake; let all the men of war come near, let them come up.
• Zech 14:1-3 : 1 See, a day of the Lord is coming when they will make division of your goods taken by force before your eyes. 2 For I will get all the nations together to make war against Jerusalem; and the town will be overcome, and the goods taken from the houses, and the women taken by force: and half the town will go away as prisoners, and the rest of the people will not be cut off from the town. 3 Then the Lord will go out and make war against those nations, as he did in the day of the fight.
• Zech 14:13-14 : 13 And it will be on that day that a great fear will be sent among them from the Lord; and everyone will take his neighbour's hand, and every man's hand will be lifted against his neighbour's. 14 And even Judah will be fighting against Jerusalem; and the wealth of all the nations round about will be massed together, a great store of gold and silver and clothing.
• Rev 9:7-9 : 7 And the forms of the locusts were like horses made ready for war; and on their heads they had crowns like gold, and their faces were as the faces of men. 8 And they had hair like the hair of women, and their teeth were as the teeth of lions. 9 And they had breastplates like iron, and the sound of their wings was as the sound of carriages, like an army of horses rushing to the fight. 10 And they have pointed tails like scorpions; and in their tails is their power to give men wounds for five months. 11 They have over them as king the angel of the great deep: his name in Hebrew is Abaddon, and in the Greek language Apollyon. 12 The first Trouble is past: see, there are still two Troubles to come. 13 And at the sounding of the sixth angel a voice came to my ears from the horns of the gold altar which is before God, 14 Saying to the sixth angel who had the horn, Make free the four angels who are chained at the great river Euphrates. 15 And the four angels were made free, who were ready for the hour and day and month and year, that they might put to death a third part of men. 16 And the number of the armies of the horsemen was twice ten thousand times ten thousand: the number of them came to my ears. 17 And so I saw the horses in the vision, and those who were seated on them, having breastplates of fire and glass and of burning stone: and the heads of the horses were as the heads of lions; and out of their mouths came fire and smoke and a smell of burning. 18 By these evils a third part of men was put to death, by the fire, and the smoke, and the burning smell which came out of their mouths. 19 For the power of the horses is in their mouths and in their tails: because their tails are like snakes, and have heads, and with them they give wounds.
• Rev 18:8 : 8 For this reason in one day will her troubles come, death and sorrow and need of food; and she will be completely burned with fire; for strong is the Lord God who is her judge.
• Rev 19:11-21 : 11 And the heaven was open; and I saw a white horse, and he who was seated on it was named Certain and True; and he is judging and making war in righteousness. 12 And his eyes are a flame of fire, and crowns are on his head; and he has a name in writing, of which no man has knowledge but himself. 13 And he is clothed in a robe washed with blood: and his name is The Word of God. 14 And the armies which are in heaven went after him on white horses, clothed in delicate linen, white and clean. 15 And out of his mouth comes a sharp sword, with which he overcomes the nations: and he has rule over them with a rod of iron: and he is crushing with his feet the grapes of the strong wrath of God the Ruler of all. 16 And on his robe and on his leg is a name, KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS. 17 And I saw an angel taking his place in the sun; and he was crying with a loud voice, saying to all the birds in flight in the heavens, Come together to the great feast of God; 18 So that you may take for your food the flesh of kings, and of captains, and of strong men, and of horses and of those who are seated on them, and the flesh of all men, free and unfree, small and great. 19 And I saw the beast, and the kings of the earth, and their armies, come together to make war against him who was seated on the horse and against his army. 20 And the beast was taken, and with him the false prophet who did the signs before him, by which they were turned from the true way who had the mark of the beast, and who gave worship to his image: these two were put living into the sea of ever-burning fire. 21 And the rest were put to death with the sword of him who was on the horse, even the sword which came out of his mouth: and all the birds were made full with their flesh.
• Isa 10:5-6 : 5 Ho! Assyrian, the rod of my wrath, the instrument of my punishment! 6 I will send him against a nation of wrongdoers, and against the people of my wrath I will give him orders, to take their wealth in war, crushing them down like the dust in the streets.
• Isa 22:1-9 : 1 The word about the valley of vision. Why have all your people gone up to the house-tops? 2 You, who are full of loud voices, a town of outcries, given up to joy; your dead men have not been put to the sword, or come to their death in war. 3 All your rulers ... have gone in flight; all your strong ones have gone far away. 4 For this cause I have said, Let your eyes be turned away from me in my bitter weeping; I will not be comforted for the wasting of the daughter of my people. 5 For it is a day of trouble and of crushing down and of destruction from the Lord, the Lord of armies, in the valley of vision; ... 6 And Elam was armed with arrows, and Aram came on horseback; and the breastplate of Kir was uncovered. 7 And your most fertile valleys were full of war-carriages, and the horsemen took up their positions in front of the town. 8 He took away the cover of Judah; and in that day you were looking with care at the store of arms in the house of the woods. 9 And you saw all the broken places in the wall of the town of David: and you got together the waters of the lower pool.
• Isa 45:1-2 : 1 The Lord says to the man of his selection, to Cyrus, whom I have taken by the right hand, putting down nations before him, and taking away the arms of kings; making the doors open before him, so that the ways into the towns may not be shut; 2 I will go before you, and make the rough places level: the doors of brass will be broken, and the iron rods cut in two:
• Jer 50:2-3 : 2 Give it out among the nations, make it public, and let the flag be lifted up; give the word and keep nothing back; say, Babylon is taken, Bel is put to shame, Merodach is broken, her images are put to shame, her gods are broken. 3 For out of the north a nation is coming up against her, which will make her land waste and unpeopled: they are in flight, man and beast are gone.
• Jer 50:14-15 : 14 Put your armies in position against Babylon on every side, all you bowmen; let loose your arrows at her, not keeping any back: for she has done evil against the Lord. 15 Give a loud cry against her on every side; she has given herself up, her supports are overturned, her walls are broken down: for it is the payment taken by the Lord; give her payment; as she has done, so do to her.
• Jer 50:21-46 : 21 Go up against the land of Merathaim, even against it, and against the people of Pekod; put them to death and send destruction after them, says the Lord, and do everything I have given you orders to do. 22 There is a sound of war in the land and of great destruction. 23 How is the hammer of all the earth cut in two and broken! how has Babylon become a waste among the nations! 24 I have put a net for you, and you have been taken, O Babylon, without your knowledge: you have been uncovered and taken because you were fighting against the Lord. 25 From his store-house the Lord has taken the instruments of his wrath: for the Lord, the Lord of armies, has a work to do in the land of the Chaldaeans. 26 Come up against her one and all, let her store-houses be broken open: make her into a mass of stones, give her to the curse, till there is nothing of her to be seen. 27 Put all her oxen to the sword; let them go down to death: sorrow is theirs, for their day has come, the time of their punishment. 28 The voice of those who are in flight, who have got away safe from the land of Babylon, to give news in Zion of punishment from the Lord our God, even payment for his Temple. 29 Send for the archers to come together against Babylon, all the bowmen; put up your tents against her on every side; let no one get away: give her the reward of her work; as she has done, so do to her: for she has been uplifted in pride against the Lord, against the Holy One of Israel. 30 For this cause her young men will be falling in her streets, and all her men of war will be cut off in that day, says the Lord. 31 See, I am against you, O pride, says the Lord, the Lord of armies, for your day has come, the time when I will send punishment on you. 32 And pride will go with uncertain steps and have a fall, and there will be no one to come to his help: and I will put a fire in his towns, burning up everything round about him. 33 This is what the Lord of armies has said: The children of Israel and the children of Judah are crushed down together: all those who took them prisoner keep them in a tight grip; they will not let them go. 34 Their saviour is strong; the Lord of armies is his name: he will certainly take up their cause, so that he may give rest to the earth and trouble to the people of Babylon. 35 A sword is on the Chaldaeans, says the Lord, and on the people of Babylon, and on her rulers and on her wise men. 36 A sword is on the men of pride, and they will become foolish: a sword is on her men of war, and they will be broken. 37 A sword is on all the mixed people in her, and they will become like women: a sword is on her store-houses, and they will be taken by her attackers. 38 A sword is on her waters, drying them up; for it is a land of images, and their minds are fixed on false gods. 39 For this reason the beasts of the waste land with the wolves will make their holes there and the ostriches will be living in it: never again will men be living there, it will be unpeopled from generation to generation. 40 As when Sodom and Gomorrah and their neighbouring towns were overturned by God, says the Lord, so no man will be living in it, and no son of man will have a resting-place there. 41 See, a people is coming from the north; a great nation and a number of kings will be put in motion from the inmost parts of the earth. 42 Bows and spears are in their hands; they are cruel and have no mercy; their voice is like the thunder of the sea, and they go on horses; everyone in his place like men going to the fight, against you, O daughter of Babylon. 43 The king of Babylon has had news of them, and his hands have become feeble: trouble has come on him and pain like the pain of a woman in childbirth. 44 See, he will come up like a lion from the thick growth of Jordan against the resting-place of Teman: but I will suddenly make them go in flight from her; and I will put over her the man of my selection: for who is like me? and who will put forward his cause against me? and what keeper of sheep will keep his place before me? 45 So give ear to the decision of the Lord which he has made against Babylon, and to his purposes designed against the land of the Chaldaeans; Truly, they will be pulled away by the smallest of the flock; truly, he will make waste their fields with them. 46 At the cry, Babylon is taken! the earth is shaking, and the cry comes to the ears of the nations.
• Jer 51:6-9 : 6 Go in flight out of Babylon, so that every man may keep his life; do not be cut off in her evil-doing: for it is the time of the Lord's punishment; he will give her her reward. 7 Babylon has been a gold cup in the hand of the Lord, which has made all the earth overcome with wine: the nations have taken of her wine, and for this cause the nations have gone off their heads. 8 Sudden is the downfall of Babylon and her destruction: make cries of grief for her; take sweet oil for her pain, if it is possible for her to be made well. 9 We would have made Babylon well, but she is not made well: give her up, and let us go everyone to his country: for her punishment is stretching up to heaven, and lifted up even to the skies. 10 The Lord has made clear our righteousness: come, and let us give an account in Zion of the work of the Lord our God. 11 Make bright the arrows; take up the body-covers: the Lord has been moving the spirit of the king of the Medes; because his design against Babylon is its destruction: for it is the punishment from the Lord, the payment for his Temple. 12 Let the flag be lifted up against the walls of Babylon, make the watch strong, put the watchmen in their places, make ready a surprise attack: for it is the Lord's purpose, and he has done what he said about the people of Babylon. 13 O you whose living-place is by the wide waters, whose stores are great, your end is come, your evil profit is ended. 14 The Lord of armies has taken an oath by himself, saying, Truly, I will make you full with men as with locusts, and their voices will be loud against you. 15 He has made the earth by his power, he has made the world strong in its place by his wisdom, and by his wise design the heavens have been stretched out: 16 At the sound of his voice there is a massing of the waters in the heavens, and he makes the mists go up from the ends of the earth; he makes the thunder-flames for the rain and sends out the wind from his store-houses. 17 Then every man becomes like a beast without knowledge; every gold-worker is put to shame by the image he has made: for his metal image is deceit, and there is no breath in them. 18 They are nothing, a work of error: in the time of their punishment, destruction will overtake them. 19 The heritage of Jacob is not like these; for the maker of all things is his heritage: the Lord of armies is his name. 20 You are my fighting axe and my instrument of war: with you the nations will be broken; with you kingdoms will be broken; 21 With you the horse and the horseman will be broken; with you the war-carriage and he who goes in it will be broken; 22 With you man and woman will be broken; with you the old man and the boy will be broken; with you the young man and the virgin will be broken; 23 With you the keeper of sheep with his flock will be broken, and with you the farmer and his oxen will be broken, and with you captains and rulers will be broken. 24 And I will give to Babylon, and to all the people of Chaldaea, their reward for all the evil they have done in Zion before your eyes, says the Lord. 25 See, I am against you, says the Lord, O mountain of destruction, causing the destruction of all the earth: and my hand will be stretched out on you, rolling you down from the rocks, and making you a burned mountain.
• Jer 51:27-28 : 27 Let a flag be lifted up in the land, let the horn be sounded among the nations, make the nations ready against her; get the kingdoms of Ararat, Minni, and Ashkenaz together against her, make ready a scribe against her; let the horses come up against her like massed locusts. 28 Make the nations ready for war against her, the king of the Medes and his rulers and all his captains, and all the land under his rule.
• Ezek 38:3-9 : 3 And say, This is what the Lord has said: See, I am against you, O Gog, ruler of Rosh, Meshech, and Tubal: 4 And turning you round, I will put hooks in your mouth and make you come out with all your army, horses and horsemen, all of them in full war-dress, a great force with breastplate and body-cover, all of them armed with swords: 5 Persia, Cush, and Put with them; all of them with body-cover and metal head-dress: 6 Gomer and all her forces; the people of Togarmah in the inmost parts of the north, with all his forces: a great number of peoples with you. 7 Be ready, make yourself ready, you and all the forces who are with you, and be ready for my orders. 8 After a long time you will get your orders: in the last years you will come into the land which has been given back from the sword, which has been got together out of a great number of peoples, on the mountains of Israel which have ever been a waste: but it has been taken out from the peoples and they will be living, all of them, without fear of danger. 9 And you will go up, you will come like a storm, you will be like a cloud covering the land, you and all your forces, and a great number of peoples with you. 10 This is what the Lord has said: In that day it will come about that things will come into your mind, and you will have thoughts of an evil design: 11 And you will say, I will go up to the land of small unwalled towns; I will go to those who are quiet, living, all of them, without fear of danger, without walls or locks or doors: 12 To take their property by force and go off with their goods; turning your hand against the waste places which now are peopled, and against the people who have been got together out of the nations, who have got cattle and goods for themselves, who are living in the middle of the earth. 13 Sheba, and Dedan and her traders, Tarshish with all her traders, will say to you, Have you come to take our goods? have you got your armies together to take away our property by force? to take away silver and gold, cattle and goods, to go off with great wealth? 14 For this cause, son of man, be a prophet and say to Gog, These are the words of the Lord: In that day, when my people Israel are living without fear of danger, will you not be moved against them? 15 And you will come from your place in the inmost parts of the north, you and a great number of peoples with you, all of them on horseback, a great force and a strong army: 16 And you will come up against my people Israel, like a cloud covering the land; and it will come about, in the last days, that I will make you come against my land, so that the nations may have knowledge of me when I make myself holy in you, O Gog, before their eyes. 17 This is what the Lord has said: You are he of whom I gave them word in earlier times by my servants, the prophets of Israel, who in those days went on saying, year after year, that I would make you come up against them. 18 And it will come about in that day, when Gog comes up against the land of Israel, says the Lord, that my wrath will come up, and my passion and my bitter feeling. 19 For in the fire of my wrath I have said, Truly, in that day there will be a great shaking in the land of Israel; 20 So that the fish of the sea and the birds of heaven and the beasts of the field and everything moving on the earth, and all the men who are on the face of the earth, will be shaking before me, and the mountains will be overturned and the high places will come down, and every wall will come falling down to the earth. 21 And I will send to all my mountains for a sword against him, says the Lord: every man's sword will be against his brother. 22 And I will take up my cause against him with disease and with blood; and I will send down on him and on his forces and on the peoples who are with him, an overflowing shower and great ice-drops, fire, and burning. 23 And I will make my name great and make myself holy, and I will make myself clear to a number of nations; and they will be certain that I am the Lord.
• Joel 2:1-9 : 1 Let the horn be sounded in Zion, and a war-cry in my holy mountain; let all the people of the land be troubled: for the day of the Lord is coming; 2 For a day of dark and deep shade is near, a day of cloud and black night: like a black cloud a great and strong people is covering the mountains; there has never been any like them and will not be after them again, from generation to generation. 3 Before them fire sends destruction, and after them flame is burning: the land is like the garden of Eden before them, and after them an unpeopled waste; truly, nothing has been kept safe from them. 4 Their form is like the form of horses, and they are running like war-horses. 5 Like the sound of war-carriages they go jumping on the tops of the mountains; like the noise of a flame of fire burning up the grain-stems, like a strong people lined up for the fight. 6 At their coming the people are bent with pain: all faces become red together. 7 They are running like strong men, they go over the wall like men of war; every man goes straight on his way, their lines are not broken. 8 No one is pushing against another; everyone goes straight on his way: bursting through the sword points, their order is not broken. 9 They make a rush on the town, running on the wall; they go up into the houses and in through the windows like a thief. 10 The earth is troubled before them and the heavens are shaking: the sun and the moon have become dark, and the stars keep back their shining: 11 And the Lord is thundering before his forces; for very great is his army; for he is strong who gives effect to his word: for the day of the Lord is great and greatly to be feared, and who has strength against it?
• Joel 2:25 : 25 I will give back to you the years which were food for the locust, the plant-worm, the field-fly, and the worm, my great army which I sent among you.