‘Moreover those who work in combed flax, and those who weave white cloth (or ‘cotton') will be ashamed. And her pillars will be broken in pieces, and all those who work for hire will be grieved in soul.'
The blight will even affect the makers of combed flax and linen. Supplies will have dried up, and what is available will produce shoddy products. The entrepreneurs, the pillars of industry, will be bankrupted, their workforces unemployed and unpaid resulting in grief of soul. The greatness of Egypt and its wealth will be no more. It is a picture of total economic collapse.