⁶ Ask please and see whether a male can bear a child.
    Why do I see every strong man
with his hands on his loins like a woman giving birth?
    And why are all their faces changed to paleness?
⁷ Alas! For that day is great,
    there is none like it.^[a]
And it is a time of distress for Jacob,
    yet from it he will be delivered.
⁸ And it will happen on that day,’ declares^[b] Yahweh of hosts,
    ‘I will break his yoke from your neck
and your bonds I will tear to pieces.
    And strangers will no longer let him work as a slave.