Before she goes into labor, she gives birth! Before her contractions begin, she delivers a boy!

before the mountains were set in place – before the hills – I was born,

before I depart, never to return, ¹  to the land of darkness and the deepest shadow, ² 

Turn your angry gaze away from me, so I can be happy before I pass away. ¹ 

The one who gives an answer ¹  before he listens ²  – that is his folly and his shame. ³ 

Two things ¹  I ask from you; ²  do not refuse me before I die:

before God’s decree becomes reality ¹  and the day of opportunity disappears like windblown chaff, ²  before the Lord’s raging anger ³  overtakes ⁴  you – before the day of the Lord’s angry judgment overtakes you!

Then Israel said, “Enough! My son Joseph is still alive! I will go and see him before I die.”

Before the kindling is even placed under your pots, ¹  he ²  will sweep it away along with both the raw and cooked meat. ³ 

Even before the mountains came into existence, ¹  or you brought the world into being, ²  you were the eternal God. ³ 

In the evening there is sudden terror; ¹  by morning they vanish. ²  This is the fate of those who try to plunder us, the destiny of those who try to loot us! ³ 

Look, my earlier predictive oracles have come to pass; ¹  now I announce new events. Before they begin to occur, I reveal them to you.” ² 

“Before I formed you in your mother’s womb ¹  I chose you. ²  Before you were born I set you apart. I appointed you to be a prophet to the nations.”

Then prepare for me some tasty food, the kind I love, and bring it to me. Then ¹  I will eat it so that I may bless you ²  before I die.”

Two sons were born to Joseph before the famine came. ¹  Asenath daughter of Potiphera, priest of On, was their mother. ² 

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 

So she slept beside him ¹  until morning. She woke up while it was still dark. ²  Boaz thought, ³  “No one must know that a woman visited the threshing floor.” ⁴ 

Here is why this will be so: ¹  Before the child knows how to reject evil and choose what is right, the land ²  whose two kings you fear will be desolate. ³ 

for before the child knows how to cry out, ‘My father’ or ‘My mother,’ the wealth of Damascus and the plunder of Samaria ¹  will be carried off by the king of Assyria.” ² 

I announced them to you beforehand; before they happened, I predicted them for you, so you could never say, ‘My image did these things, my idol, my cast image, decreed them.’