2 Esdras 5:48-50

New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition

⁴⁸ He said to me, “Even so I have given the womb of the earth to those who from time to time are sown in it.^{(A) 49} For as an infant does not bring forth, and a woman who has become old does not bring forth any longer, so I have made the same rule for the world that I created.”^(B)

When and How Will the End Come?

⁵⁰ Then I inquired and said, “Since you have now given me the opportunity, let me speak before you. Is our mother, of whom you have told me, still young, or is she now approaching old age?”^(C)