Woe ¹  to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing their babies in those days!

Woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing their babies in those days!

And ¹  yearn ²  like newborn infants for pure, spiritual milk, ³  so that by it you may grow up to ⁴  salvation, ⁵ 

How blessed will be the one who grabs your babies and smashes them on a rock! ¹ 

Now people ¹  were even bringing their babies ²  to him for him to touch. ³  But when the disciples saw it, they began to scold those who brought them. ⁴ 

This was the one who exploited ¹  our people ²  and was cruel to our ancestors, ³  forcing them to abandon ⁴  their infants so they would die. ⁵ 

and said to him, “Do you hear what they are saying?” Jesus said to them, “Yes. Have you never read, ‘Out of the mouths of children and nursing infants you have prepared praise for yourself’?” ¹ 

Woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing their babies in those days! For there will be great distress ¹  on the earth and wrath against this people.

They shed innocent blood – the blood of their sons and daughters, whom they sacrificed to the idols of Canaan. The land was polluted by bloodshed. ¹ 

כ (Kaf) My eyes are worn out ¹  from weeping; ²  my stomach is in knots. ³  My heart ⁴  is poured out on the ground due to the destruction ⁵  of my helpless people; ⁶  children and infants faint in the town squares.

Gather the people; sanctify an assembly! Gather the elders; gather the children and the nursing infants. Let the bridegroom come out from his bedroom and the bride from her private quarters. ¹ 

But ¹  the midwives feared God and did not do what the king of Egypt had told them; they let the boys live. ² 

From the mouths of children and nursing babies you have ordained praise on account of your adversaries, ¹  so that you might put an end to the vindictive enemy. ² 

Their arrows will cut young men to ribbons; ¹  they have no compassion on a person’s offspring, ²  they will not ³  look with pity on children.

Who is the Lord ¹  trying to teach? To whom is he explaining a message? ²  Those just weaned from milk! Those just taken from their mother’s breast! ³ 

ג (Gimel) Even the jackals ¹  nurse their young at their breast, ²  but my people ³  are cruel, like ostriches ⁴  in the desert.

The Lord ¹  made his people very fruitful, and made them ²  more numerous than their ³  enemies.

The midwives said to Pharaoh, “Because the Hebrew ¹  women are not like the Egyptian women – for the Hebrew women ²  are vigorous; they give birth before the midwife gets to them!” ³ 

opened it, ¹  and saw the child ²  – a boy, ³  crying! ⁴  – and she felt compassion ⁵  for him and said, “This is one of the Hebrews’ children.”

As for Nob, the city of the priests, he struck down with the sword men and women, children and infants, oxen, donkeys, and sheep – all with the sword.