2 Esdras 4:41-43

New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition

⁴¹ And I said, “No, lord, it cannot.”

He said to me, “In Hades the chambers of the souls are like the womb.^{(A) 42} For just as a woman who is in labor makes haste to escape the pangs of birth, so also do these places hasten to give back those things who were committed to them from the beginning. ⁴³ Then the things that you desire to see will be disclosed to you.”