5 And Aʹhab went on to say to O·ba·diʹah: “Go through the land to all the springs of water and to all the torrent valleys. Perhaps we may find green grass,+ that we may preserve the horses and mules alive and may not have [any more] of the beasts cut off.”+

4 How long should the land keep withering away,+ and the very vegetation of all the field dry up?+ Because of the badness of those dwelling in it the beasts and the flying creatures have been swept away.+ For they have said: “He does not see our future.”

3 That is why the land will mourn+ and every inhabitant in it will have to fade away with the wild beast of the field and with the flying creature of the heavens, and even the fishes of the sea themselves will be gathered [in death].*+