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And Jeremiel the archangel answered them and said, `When the number of those like yourselves is completed; for he has weighed the age in the balance,
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and measured the times by measure, and numbered the times by number; and he will not move or arouse them until that measure is fulfilled.'"
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Then I answered and said, "O sovereign Lord, but all of us also are full of ungodliness.
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And it is perhaps on account of us that the time of threshing is delayed for the righteous -- on account of the sins of those who dwell on earth."
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He answered me and said, "Go and ask a woman who is with child if, when her nine months have been completed, her womb can keep the child within her any longer."
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And I said, "No, lord, it cannot." And he said to me, "In Hades the chambers of the souls are like the womb.
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For just as a woman who is in travail makes haste to escape the pangs of birth, so also do these places hasten to give back those things that were committed to them from the beginning.
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Then the things that you desire to see will be disclosed to you."
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I answered and said, "If I have found favor in your sight, and if it is possible, and if I am worthy,
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show me this also: whether more time is to come than has passed, or whether for us the greater part has gone by.
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For I know what has gone by, but I do not know what is to come."