The Sibyl · a new plain-English translation from the original language
which the heavenly God, for the most righteous of men,
set up as the prize of victory; and they who take
the crown shall pass through it in glory.
But when this sign shall appear throughout the whole world,
children born gray-templed from their very birth,
afflictions of men, famines, plagues, and wars,
and change of times, and mournings, and many tears,
ah, how many children in their lands shall feast
on their parents, piteously wailing as they do it, and wrapping the flesh
in cloths, shall bury it in the earth, mother of nations,
smeared with blood and dust — O greatly wretched,
men of the last generation, dread and evil-working,
foolish, and understanding nothing, that when the tribes of women
bear no more children, the harvest of mortal men has come.
The consummation is near, when certain men in place of prophets
shall draw close upon the earth, deceivers proclaiming falsehoods.
And Beliar too shall come, and shall work many signs
for men. Then there shall be turmoil among holy men,
the elect and the faithful, and plundering shall come
upon these and upon the Hebrews. Dread wrath shall come upon them,
when the ten-tribed people shall come from the east
seeking the people whom the Assyrian branch destroyed,
their Hebrew kinsmen; and the nations shall perish before them.
Afterward again shall rule over overweening men
the elect and faithful Hebrews, enslaving
them as before, since power shall never fail them.
The Most High, overseer of all, dwelling in the heavens,
shall pour sleep upon men, covering their eyelids round about.
O blessed servants, as many as, when he comes, watching
the Master shall find; for they are all awake,
ever expectant with unslumbering eyes.
For he shall come at dawn, or at evening, or at midday;
and he shall come surely, and it shall be as I proclaim,
it shall be for those yet to be, when from the starry heaven
all the stars shall appear to all in the midst of the day
together with the two great lights, as the time draws near.
And then the Thesbite, stretching his chariot
from heaven, and setting foot upon the earth, shall then show three signs
to the whole world, as life is perishing.
Ah, all the women who in that day, heavy with burden,
shall be found with child, and all who give their infants
the breast, and all who dwell upon the waves;
ah, all who shall behold that day;
for a murky darkness shall cover the boundless world,
east and west and south and north.
And then indeed a great river of blazing fire
shall flow down from heaven and consume every place,
earth, and the great ocean, and the gray sea,
lakes and rivers, springs, and pitiless Hades,
and the vault of heaven. But the heavenly lights