Jeremiah 50 Cross References - NHEB

¹ The word that the LORD spoke concerning Babylon, concerning the land of the Chaldeans, by Jeremiah the prophet. ² "Declare among the nations and publish, and set up a standard; publish, and do not conceal: say, 'Babylon is taken, Bel is disappointed, Marduk is dismayed; her images are disappointed, her idols are dismayed. ³ For out of the north there comes up a nation against her, which shall make her land desolate, and none shall dwell in it: they are fled, they are gone, both man and animal. ⁴ In those days, and in that time,' says the LORD, 'the children of Israel shall come, they and the people of Judah together; they shall go on their way weeping, and shall seek the LORD their God. ⁵ They shall inquire concerning Zion with their faces turned toward it. They will come and join themselves to the LORD in an everlasting covenant that shall not be forgotten. ⁶ My people have been lost sheep: their shepherds have caused them to go astray; they have turned them away on the mountains; they have gone from mountain to hill; they have forgotten their resting place. ⁷ All who found them have devoured them; and their adversaries said, "We are not guilty, because they have sinned against the LORD, the habitation of righteousness, even the LORD, the hope of their fathers." ⁸ Flee out of the midst of Babylon, and go forth out of the land of the Chaldeans, and be as the male goats before the flocks. ⁹ For, look, I will stir up and cause to come up against Babylon a company of great nations from the north country; and they shall set themselves in array against her; from there she shall be taken. Their arrows shall be like a skilled warrior who does not return empty-handed. ¹⁰ Chaldea shall be a prey: all who prey on her shall be satisfied,' says the LORD.' ¹¹ Because you are glad, because you rejoice, O you who plunder my heritage, because you are wanton as a heifer that treads out the grain, and neigh as strong horses; ¹² your mother shall be utterly disappointed; she who bore you shall be confounded: look, she shall be the least of the nations, a wilderness, a dry land, and a desert. ¹³ Because of the wrath of the LORD she shall not be inhabited, but she shall be wholly desolate: everyone who goes by Babylon shall be astonished, and hiss at all her plagues. ¹⁴ "Set yourselves in array against Babylon all around, all you who bend the bow; shoot at her, spare no arrows: for she has sinned against the LORD. ¹⁵ Shout against her all around: she has submitted herself; her towers are fallen, her walls are thrown down; for it is the vengeance of the LORD: take vengeance on her; as she has done, do to her. ¹⁶ Cut off the sower from Babylon, and him who handles the sickle in the time of harvest: for fear of the oppressing sword they shall turn everyone to his people, and they shall flee everyone to his own land."' ¹⁷ 'Israel is a hunted sheep; the lions have driven him away: first, the king of Assyria devoured him; and now at last Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon has broken his bones. ¹⁸ Therefore thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: "Look, I will punish the king of Babylon and his land, as I have punished the king of Assyria. ¹⁹ I will bring Israel again to his pasture, and he shall feed on Carmel and Bashan, and his soul shall be satisfied on the hills of Ephraim and in Gilead. ²⁰ In those days, and in that time, says the LORD, the iniquity of Israel shall be sought for, and there shall be none; and the sins of Judah, and they shall not be found: for I will pardon them whom I leave as a remnant."'" ²¹ "Go up against the land of Merathaim, even against it, and against the inhabitants of Pekod: kill and utterly destroy after them," says the LORD, "and do according to all that I have commanded you. ²² A sound of battle is in the land, and of great destruction. ²³ How is the hammer of the whole earth cut apart and broken. How is Babylon become a desolation among the nations. ²⁴ I have laid a snare for you, and you are also taken, Babylon, and you weren't aware: you are found, and also caught, because you have striven against the LORD. ²⁵ The LORD has opened his armory, and has brought forth the weapons of his indignation; for the Lord, the LORD of hosts, has a work to do in the land of the Chaldeans. ²⁶ Come against her from the utmost border; open her storehouses; cast her up as heaps, and destroy her utterly; let nothing of her be left. ²⁷ Kill all her bulls; let them go down to the slaughter. Woe to them, their day has come, the time of their visitation." ²⁸ The voice of those who flee and escape out of the land of Babylon, to declare in Zion the vengeance of the LORD our God, the vengeance of his temple. ²⁹ "Call together the archers against Babylon, all those who bend the bow; camp against her all around; let none of it escape: recompense her according to her work; according to all that she has done, do to her; for she has been proud against the LORD, against the Holy One of Israel. ³⁰ Therefore her young men will fall in her streets, and all her men of war will be brought to silence in that day," says the LORD. ³¹ "Look, I am against you, you proud one," says the Lord, the LORD of hosts; for your day has come, the time that I will visit you. ³² The proud one shall stumble and fall, and none shall raise him up; and I will kindle a fire in his cities, and it shall devour all who are around him." ³³ Thus says the LORD of hosts: "The children of Israel and the people of Judah are oppressed together; and all who took them captive hold them fast; they refuse to let them go. ³⁴ Their Redeemer is strong; the LORD of hosts is his name: he will thoroughly plead their cause, that he may give rest to the earth, and disquiet the inhabitants of Babylon. ³⁵ A sword is on the Chaldeans," says the LORD, "and on the inhabitants of Babylon, and on her officials, and on her wise men. ³⁶ A sword is on the boasters, and they shall become fools; a sword is on her mighty men, and they shall be dismayed. ³⁷ A sword is on their horses, and on their chariots, and on all the mixed people who are in the midst of her; and they shall become as women: a sword is on her treasures, and they shall be robbed. ³⁸ A drought is on her waters, and they shall be dried up; for it is a land of engraved images, and they glory over idols. ³⁹ Therefore the wild animals of the desert with the wolves shall dwell there, and the ostriches shall dwell in it: and it shall be no more inhabited forever; neither shall it be lived in from generation to generation. ⁴⁰ As when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah and the neighbor cities of it," says the LORD, "so shall no man dwell there, neither shall any son of man live in it." ⁴¹ "Look, a people comes from the north; and a great nation and many kings shall be stirred up from the uttermost parts of the earth. ⁴² They lay hold on bow and spear; they are cruel, and have no mercy; their voice roars like the sea; and they ride on horses, everyone set in array, as a man to the battle, against you, daughter of Babylon. ⁴³ The king of Babylon has heard the news of them, and his hands wax feeble: anguish has taken hold of him, pains as of a woman in labor. ⁴⁴ Look, the enemy shall come up like a lion from the pride of the Jordan against the strong habitation: for I will suddenly make them run away from it; and whoever is chosen, him will I appoint over it: for who is like me? And who will appoint me a time? And who is the shepherd who can stand before me?" ⁴⁵ Therefore hear the counsel of the LORD, that he has taken against Babylon; and his purposes, that he has purposed against the land of the Chaldeans: "Surely they shall drag them away, even the little ones of the flock; surely he shall make their habitation desolate over them. ⁴⁶ At the noise of the taking of Babylon the earth trembles, and the cry is heard among the nations."

¹⁰ And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel, and Erech, and Akkad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar.

³¹ And Terah took Abram his son, Lot the son of Haran, his grandson, and Sarai his daughter-in-law, his son Abramʼs wife, and with them he set out from Ur Kasdim to go into the land of Canaan. But when they came to Haran, they settled there.

² "The Spirit of the LORD spoke by me. His word was on my tongue.

¹⁷ While he was still speaking, there came also another, and said, "The Kasdim made three bands, and swept down on the camels, and have taken them away, and killed the young men with the edge of the sword; and I alone have escaped to tell you."

⁸ Daughter of Babylon, doomed to destruction, he will be blessed who rewards you, as you have served us. ⁹ Blessed shall he be who takes and dashes your little ones against the rock.

¹ The burden of Babylon, which Isaiah the son of Amoz saw: ² Set up a banner on the bare mountain. Lift up your voice to them. Wave your hand, that they may go into the gates of the nobles. ³ I have commanded my consecrated ones; I have also called my mighty men to carry out my anger, my proudly exulting ones.

⁴ that you will take up this parable against the king of Babylon, and say, "How the oppressor has ceased. How the attacker has ceased."

¹ The oracle of the wilderness of the sea. As whirlwinds in the Negev sweep through, it comes from the wilderness, from an awesome land. ² A grievous vision is declared to me. The treacherous man deals treacherously, and the destroyer destroys. Go up, Elam; attack. I have stopped all of Media's sighing. ³ Therefore my thighs are filled with anguish. Pains have taken hold on me, like the pains of a woman in labor. I am in so much pain that I can't hear. I so am dismayed that I can't see. ⁴ My heart flutters. Horror has frightened me. The twilight that I desired has been turned into trembling for me. ⁵ They prepare the table. They set the watch. They eat. They drink. Rise up, you princes, oil the shield. ⁶ For the Lord said to me, "Go, set a watchman. Let him declare what he sees. ⁷ When he sees chariots, horsemen in pairs, riders on donkeys, riders on camels, let him listen diligently, very diligently." ⁸ Then the lookout shouted: "Lord, I stand continually on the watchtower in the daytime, and every night I stay at my post. ⁹ Look, here comes a troop of men, horsemen in pairs." He answered, "Fallen, fallen is Babylon; and all the engraved images of her gods are broken to the ground. ¹⁰ You are my threshing, and the grain of my floor." That which I have heard from the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, I have declared to you.

¹³ Look, the land of the Chaldeans. This people was not. The Assyrians founded it for those who dwell in the wilderness. They set up their towers. They overthrew its palaces. They made it a ruin.

¹ "Come down, and sit in the dust, virgin daughter of Babylon; sit on the ground without a throne, daughter of the Chaldeans: for you shall no more be called tender and delicate. ² Take the millstones, and grind meal; remove your veil, strip off the train, uncover the leg, pass through the rivers. ³ Your nakedness shall be uncovered, yes, your shame shall be seen: I will take vengeance, and will spare no man," ⁴ says our Redeemer; the LORD of hosts is his name, the Holy One of Israel. ⁵ "Sit in silence, and go into darkness, daughter of the Chaldeans; for you shall no more be called the mistress of kingdoms. ⁶ I was angry with my people, I profaned my inheritance, and gave them into your hand: you showed them no mercy; on the aged you have very heavily laid your yoke. ⁷ You said, 'I shall be a mistress forever;' so that you did not lay these things to your heart, nor did you remember the latter end of it. ⁸ "Now therefore hear this, you who are given to pleasures, who sit securely, who say in your heart, 'I am, and there is no other besides me; I shall not sit as a widow, neither shall I know the loss of children:' ⁹ but these two things shall come to you in a moment in one day, the loss of children, and widowhood; in their full measure shall they come on you, in spite of your many sorceries and the potency of your spells. ¹⁰ For you have trusted in your wickedness; you have said, No one sees me; your wisdom and your knowledge, it has perverted you, and you have said in your heart, 'I am, and there is no other besides me.' ¹¹ Therefore disaster will come on you; you won't know when it dawns: and calamity will fall on you; you will not be able to put it away: and desolation shall come on you suddenly and unexpectedly. ¹² "Stand now with your enchantments, and with the multitude of your sorceries, in which you have labored from your youth; if so be you shall be able to profit, if so be you may prevail. ¹³ You are wearied in the multitude of your counsels; those who conjure the heavens, the stargazers, the monthly prognosticators, stand up, and save you from the things that shall come on you. ¹⁴ Look, they shall be as stubble; the fire shall burn them; they shall not deliver themselves from the power of the flame: it shall not be a coal to warm at, nor a fire to sit before. ¹⁵ Thus shall the things be to you in which you have labored: those who have trafficked with you from your youth shall wander everyone to his quarter; there shall be none to save you.

²⁶ and all the kings of the north, far and near, one with another; and all the kingdoms of the world, which are on the surface of the earth: and the king of Sheshach shall drink after them. ²⁷ "You shall tell them, 'Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: "Drink, and be drunk, vomit, fall, and rise no more, because of the sword which I will send among you."'

⁷ All the nations shall serve him, and his son, and his son's son, until the time of his own land come: and then many nations and great kings shall make him their bondservant.

¹ Thus says the LORD: "Look, I will raise up against Babylon, and against those who dwell in Lebkamai, a destroying wind. ² I will send to Babylon foreigners who shall winnow her; and they shall empty her land: for in the day of trouble they shall be against her around. ³ Do not let him who bends the bow bend it; nor not let him rise up in his armor. And do not spare her young men; utterly destroy all her army. ⁴ They shall fall down slain in the land of the Chaldeans, and thrust through in her streets. ⁵ "For Israel is not forsaken, nor Judah, of his God, of the LORD of hosts; though their land is full of guilt against the Holy One of Israel. ⁶ Flee out of the midst of Babylon, and save every man his life; do not be cut off in her iniquity: for it is the time of the LORD's vengeance; he will render to her a recompense. ⁷ Babylon has been a golden cup in the LORD's hand, who made all the earth drunk: the nations have drunk of her wine; therefore the nations are mad. ⁸ Babylon is suddenly fallen and destroyed: wail for her; take balm for her pain, if so be she may be healed. ⁹ 'We would have healed Babylon, but she is not healed: forsake her, and let us go everyone into his own country; for her judgment reaches to heaven, and is lifted up even to the skies.' ¹⁰ 'The LORD has brought forth our righteousness: come, and let us declare in Zion the work of the LORD our God.' ¹¹ Make sharp the arrows; hold firm the shields: the LORD has stirred up the spirit of the kings of the Medes; because his purpose is against Babylon, to destroy it: for it is the vengeance of the LORD, the vengeance of his temple. ¹² Set up a standard against the walls of Babylon, make the watch strong, set the watchmen, prepare the ambushes; for the LORD has both purposed and done that which he spoke concerning the inhabitants of Babylon. ¹³ You who dwell on many waters, abundant in treasures, your end has come, the measure of your covetousness. ¹⁴ The LORD of hosts has sworn by himself, saying, "Surely I will fill you with men, as with the canker worm; and they shall lift up a shout against you."

⁵ And moreover, wealth is treacherous; a proud man will not endure. He enlarges his desire as Sheol, and he is like death, and canʼt be satisfied. He gathers all nations to himself, and collects to himself all peoples. ⁶ Won't all these take up a parable against him, and a taunting proverb against him, and say, 'Woe to him who increases that which is not his, and who enriches himself by extortion. How long?' ⁷ Won't your debtors rise up suddenly, and wake up those who make you tremble, and you will be their victim? ⁸ Because you have plundered many nations, all the remnant of the peoples will plunder you, because of men's blood, and for the violence done to the land, to the city and to all who dwell in it. ⁹ Woe to him who gets an evil gain for his house, that he may set his nest on high, that he may be delivered from the hand of evil. ¹⁰ You have devised shame to your house, by cutting off many peoples, and have sinned against your soul. ¹¹ For the stone will cry out of the wall, and the beam out of the woodwork will answer it. ¹² Woe to him who builds a town with blood, and establishes a city by iniquity. ¹³ Look, isn't it of the LORD of hosts that the peoples labor for the fire, and the nations weary themselves for vanity? ¹⁴ For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea. ¹⁵ "Woe to him who gives his neighbor drink, pouring your inflaming wine until they are drunk, so that you may gaze at their naked bodies. ¹⁶ You are filled with shame, and not glory. You will also drink, and be exposed. The cup of the LORD's right hand will come around to you, and disgrace will cover your glory. ¹⁷ For the violence done to Lebanon will overwhelm you, and the destruction of the animals, which made them afraid; because of men's blood, and for the violence done to the land, to every city and to those who dwell in them. ¹⁸ "What value does the engraved image have, that its maker has engraved it; the molten image, even the teacher of lies, that he who fashions its form trusts in it, to make mute idols? ¹⁹ Woe to him who says to the wood, 'Awake.' or to the mute stone, 'Arise.' Shall this teach? Look, it is overlaid with gold and silver, and there is no breath at all in its midst. ²⁰ But the LORD is in his holy temple. Let all the earth be silent before him."

⁴ Then he came out of the land of the Kasdim, and lived in Haran. From there, after his father died, he moved him into this land, where you are now living.

²¹ For no prophecy ever came by human will, but people spoke from God, being moved by the Holy Spirit.

¹ After these things, I saw another angel coming down out of the sky, having great authority. The earth was illuminated with his glory. ² He shouted with a mighty voice, saying, "Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great, and she has become a habitation of demons, a prison of every unclean spirit, and a prison of every unclean bird, and a prison of every unclean and detestable beast. ³ For all the nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her sexual immorality, the kings of the earth committed sexual immorality with her, and the merchants of the earth grew rich from the abundance of her luxury." ⁴ I heard another voice from heaven, saying, "Come out of her, my people, that you have no participation in her sins, and that you do not receive of her plagues, ⁵ for her sins have reached to the sky, and God has remembered her iniquities. ⁶ Return to her just as she returned, and repay her double as she did, and according to her works. In the cup which she mixed, mix to her double. ⁷ However much she glorified herself, and grew wanton, so much give her of torment and mourning. For she says in her heart, 'I sit a queen, and am no widow, and will in no way see mourning.' ⁸ Therefore in one day her plagues will come: death, mourning, and famine; and she will be utterly burned with fire; for the Lord God who has judged her is strong. ⁹ The kings of the earth, who committed sexual immorality and lived wantonly with her, will weep and wail over her, when they look at the smoke of her burning, ¹⁰ standing far away for the fear of her torment, saying, 'Woe, woe, the great city, Babylon, the strong city. For your judgment has come in one hour.' ¹¹ The merchants of the earth weep and mourn over her, for no one buys their merchandise any more; ¹² merchandise of gold, silver, precious stones, pearls, fine linen, purple, silk, scarlet, all expensive wood, every vessel of ivory, every vessel made of most precious wood, and of bronze, and iron, and marble; ¹³ and cinnamon, spice, incense, perfume, frankincense, wine, olive oil, fine flour, wheat, cattle, sheep, horses, chariots, slaves and human lives. ¹⁴ The fruits which your soul lusted after have been lost to you, and all things that were luxury and splendor have perished from you, and you will never ever find them again. ¹⁵ The merchants of these things, who were made rich by her, will stand far away for the fear of her torment, weeping and mourning; ¹⁶ saying, 'Woe, woe, the great city, she who was dressed in fine linen, purple, and scarlet, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls. ¹⁷ For in an hour such great riches are made desolate.' Every shipmaster, and everyone who sails anywhere, and mariners, and as many as gain their living by sea, stood far away, ¹⁸ and exclaimed as they looked at the smoke of her burning, saying, 'What is like the great city?' ¹⁹ They cast dust on their heads, and shouting, weeping and mourning, saying, 'Woe, woe, the great city, in which all who had their ships in the sea were made rich by reason of her great wealth.' For in one hour is she made desolate. ²⁰ "Rejoice over her, O heaven, you saints, apostles, and prophets; for God has judged your judgment on her." ²¹ A mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone and cast it into the sea, saying, "Thus with violence will Babylon, the great city, be thrown down, and will be found no more at all. ²² The voice of harpists, minstrels, flute players, and trumpeters will be heard no more at all in you. No craftsman, of whatever craft, will be found any more at all in you. The sound of a mill will be heard no more at all in you. ²³ The light of a lamp will shine no more at all in you. The voice of the bridegroom and of the bride will be heard no more at all in you; for your merchants were the princes of the earth; for with your sorcery all the nations were deceived. ²⁴ In her was found the blood of prophets and of saints, and of all who have been slain on the earth."

⁹ All humankind shall be afraid. They shall declare the work of God, and shall wisely ponder what he has done.

³ Declare his glory among the nations, his marvelous works among all the peoples.

⁴ In that day you will say, "Give thanks to the LORD. Call on his name. Declare his doings among the peoples. Proclaim that his name is exalted.

² Set up a banner on the bare mountain. Lift up your voice to them. Wave your hand, that they may go into the gates of the nobles.

⁹ Look, here comes a troop of men, horsemen in pairs." He answered, "Fallen, fallen is Babylon; and all the engraved images of her gods are broken to the ground.

¹⁹ and have cast their gods into the fire; for they were no gods, but the work of men's hands, wood and stone; therefore they have destroyed them.

¹ At that time, Marduk-Baladan the son of Baladan, king of Babylon, sent letters and a present to Hezekiah; for he heard that he had been sick, and had recovered.

¹ Bel bows down, Nebo stoops; their idols are on the animals, and on the livestock: the things that you carried about are made a load, a burden to the weary.

⁶ You have heard it; see all this; and you, will you not declare it? "I have shown you new things from this time, even hidden things, which you have not known.

¹⁸ "For I know their works and their thoughts. I am coming to gather all nations and languages; and they will come and see my glory. ¹⁹ "I will set a sign among them, and I will send such as escape of them to the nations, to Tarshish, Pul, and Lud, who draw the bow, to Tubal and Javan, to the islands afar off, who have not heard my fame, neither have seen my glory; and they shall declare my glory among the nations.

¹⁶ "Tell the nations; look, publish against Jerusalem, 'Besiegers come from a far country, and raise their voice against the cities of Judah.

¹⁸ "Therefore hear, you nations, and know, congregation, what will happen to them.

¹⁰ Hear the word of the LORD, you nations, and declare it in the islands afar off; and say, "He who scattered Israel will gather him, and keep him, as shepherd does his flock."

¹² I will kindle a fire in the houses of the gods of Egypt; and he shall burn them, and carry them away captive: and he shall array himself with the land of Egypt, as a shepherd puts on his garment; and he shall go forth from there in peace. ¹³ He shall also break the pillars of Beth Shemesh, that is in the land of Egypt; and the houses of the gods of Egypt shall he burn with fire."'"

¹⁴ "Declare in Egypt, and publish in Migdol, and publish in Memphis and in Tahpanhes: say, 'Stand forth, and prepare; for the sword has devoured around you.'

⁴⁶ At the noise of the taking of Babylon the earth trembles, and the cry is heard among the nations."

⁸ Babylon is suddenly fallen and destroyed: wail for her; take balm for her pain, if so be she may be healed.

³¹ One runner will run to meet another, and one messenger to meet another, to show the king of Babylon that his city is taken on every quarter:

⁴⁴ I will execute judgment on Bel in Babylon, and I will bring forth out of his mouth that which he has swallowed up; and the nations shall not flow any more to him: yes, the wall of Babylon shall fall."

⁴⁷ Therefore look, the days come, that I will execute judgment on the engraved images of Babylon; and her whole land shall be confounded; and all her slain shall fall in the midst of her.

⁵² "Therefore look, the days come," says the LORD, "that I will execute judgment on her engraved images; and through all her land the wounded shall groan.

³¹ It happened in the seven and thirtieth year of the captivity of Jehoiachin king of Judah, in the twelfth month, in the five and twentieth day of the month, that Awil-Marduk king of Babylon, in the first year of his reign, lifted up the head of Jehoiachin king of Judah, and brought him forth out of prison;

¹¹ The LORD will be awesome to them, for he will famish all the gods of the land. Men will worship him, everyone from his place, even all the shores of the nations.

⁶ I saw another angel flying in mid heaven, having an everlasting Good News to proclaim to those who dwell on the earth, and to every nation, tribe, language, and people. ⁷ He said with a loud voice, "Fear God, and give him glory; for the hour of his judgment has come. Worship him who made the heaven, the earth, the sea, and the springs of waters." ⁸ Another, a second angel, followed, saying, "Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great, which has made all the nations to drink of the wine of the wrath of her sexual immorality."

² He shouted with a mighty voice, saying, "Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great, and she has become a habitation of demons, a prison of every unclean spirit, and a prison of every unclean bird, and a prison of every unclean and detestable beast.

⁷ God said, "I will destroy humankind whom I have created from the face of the earth; humankind, along with animals, crawling creatures, and flying creatures of the sky; for I am sorry that I have made them."

¹² For I will go through the land of Egypt in that night, and will strike all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and animal. Against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments: I am the LORD.

⁵ They come from a far country, from the uttermost part of heaven, even the LORD, and the weapons of his indignation, to destroy the whole land. ⁶ Wail; for the day of the LORD is at hand. It will come as destruction from Shaddai. ⁷ Therefore all hands will be feeble, and everyone's heart will melt. ⁸ They will be dismayed. Pangs and sorrows will seize them. They will be in pain like a woman in labor. They will look in amazement one at another. Their faces will be faces of flame. ⁹ Look, the day of the LORD comes, cruel, with wrath and fierce anger; to make the land a desolation, and to destroy its sinners out of it. ¹⁰ For the stars of the sky and its constellations will not give their light. The sun will be darkened in its going forth, and the moon will not cause its light to shine.

¹⁷ Look, I will stir up the Medes against them, who will not value silver, and as for gold, they will not delight in it. ¹⁸ Their bows will dash the young men in pieces; and they shall have no pity on the fruit of the womb. Their eyes will not spare children. ¹⁹ Babylon, the glory of kingdoms, the beauty of the Chaldeans' pride, will be like when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah. ²⁰ It will never be inhabited, neither will it be lived in from generation to generation. The Arabian will not pitch a tent there, neither will shepherds make their flocks lie down there. ²¹ But wild animals of the desert will lie there, and their houses will be full of jackals. Ostriches will dwell there, and wild goats will frolic there. ²² Wolves will cry in their fortresses, and jackals in the pleasant palaces. Her time is near to come, and her days will not be prolonged.

²² "I will rise up against them," says the LORD of hosts, "and cut off from Babylon name and remnant, and son and son's son," says the LORD. ²³ "I will also make it a possession for the porcupine, and pools of water. I will sweep it with the broom of destruction," says the LORD of hosts. ²⁴ The LORD of hosts has sworn, saying, "Surely, as I have thought, so shall it happen; and as I have purposed, so shall it stand:

²⁰ Therefore thus says the Lord GOD: "Look, my anger and my wrath shall be poured out on this place, on man, and on animal, and on the trees of the field, and on the fruit of the ground; and it shall burn, and shall not be quenched."

⁶ I will strike the inhabitants of this city, both man and animal: they shall die of a great pestilence.

⁹ For, look, I will stir up and cause to come up against Babylon a company of great nations from the north country; and they shall set themselves in array against her; from there she shall be taken. Their arrows shall be like a skilled warrior who does not return empty-handed.

¹² your mother shall be utterly disappointed; she who bore you shall be confounded: look, she shall be the least of the nations, a wilderness, a dry land, and a desert. ¹³ Because of the wrath of the LORD she shall not be inhabited, but she shall be wholly desolate: everyone who goes by Babylon shall be astonished, and hiss at all her plagues.

³⁵ A sword is on the Chaldeans," says the LORD, "and on the inhabitants of Babylon, and on her officials, and on her wise men. ³⁶ A sword is on the boasters, and they shall become fools; a sword is on her mighty men, and they shall be dismayed. ³⁷ A sword is on their horses, and on their chariots, and on all the mixed people who are in the midst of her; and they shall become as women: a sword is on her treasures, and they shall be robbed. ³⁸ A drought is on her waters, and they shall be dried up; for it is a land of engraved images, and they glory over idols. ³⁹ Therefore the wild animals of the desert with the wolves shall dwell there, and the ostriches shall dwell in it: and it shall be no more inhabited forever; neither shall it be lived in from generation to generation. ⁴⁰ As when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah and the neighbor cities of it," says the LORD, "so shall no man dwell there, neither shall any son of man live in it." ⁴¹ "Look, a people comes from the north; and a great nation and many kings shall be stirred up from the uttermost parts of the earth.

⁸ Babylon is suddenly fallen and destroyed: wail for her; take balm for her pain, if so be she may be healed. ⁹ 'We would have healed Babylon, but she is not healed: forsake her, and let us go everyone into his own country; for her judgment reaches to heaven, and is lifted up even to the skies.'

¹¹ Make sharp the arrows; hold firm the shields: the LORD has stirred up the spirit of the kings of the Medes; because his purpose is against Babylon, to destroy it: for it is the vengeance of the LORD, the vengeance of his temple.

²⁵ "Look, I am against you, destroying mountain," says the LORD, "which destroys all the earth; and I will stretch out my hand on you, and roll you down from the rocks, and will make you a burnt mountain. ²⁶ They shall not take of you a stone for a corner, nor a stone for foundations; but you shall be desolate for ever," says the LORD. ²⁷ Set up a standard in the land, blow the trumpet among the nations, prepare the nations against her, call together against her the kingdoms of Ararat, Minni, and Ashkenaz: appoint a marshal against her; cause the horses to come up as the rough canker worm.

³⁷ Babylon shall become heaps, a dwelling place for jackals, an astonishment, and a hissing, without inhabitant. ³⁸ They shall roar together like young lions; they shall growl as lions' cubs. ³⁹ When they are heated, I will make their feast, and I will make them drunk, that they may rejoice, and sleep a perpetual sleep, and not wake," says the LORD. ⁴⁰ "I will bring them down like lambs to the slaughter, like rams with male goats. ⁴¹ How is Sheshach taken, and the praise of the whole earth seized. How is Babylon become a desolation among the nations. ⁴² The sea has come up on Babylon; she is covered with the multitude of its waves. ⁴³ Her cities are become a desolation, a dry land, and a desert, a land in which no man dwells, neither does any son of man pass thereby. ⁴⁴ I will execute judgment on Bel in Babylon, and I will bring forth out of his mouth that which he has swallowed up; and the nations shall not flow any more to him: yes, the wall of Babylon shall fall."

⁴⁸ Then the heavens and the earth, and all that is in them, shall sing for joy over Babylon; for the destroyers shall come to her from the north," says the LORD.

⁶² and say, 'LORD, you have spoken concerning this place, to cut it off, that none shall dwell in it, neither man nor animal, but that it shall be desolate forever.'

³ I will sweep away man and animal. I will sweep away the birds of the sky, the fish of the sea, and the heaps of rubble with the wicked. I will cut off man from the surface of the earth, says the LORD.

²¹ A mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone and cast it into the sea, saying, "Thus with violence will Babylon, the great city, be thrown down, and will be found no more at all. ²² The voice of harpists, minstrels, flute players, and trumpeters will be heard no more at all in you. No craftsman, of whatever craft, will be found any more at all in you. The sound of a mill will be heard no more at all in you. ²³ The light of a lamp will shine no more at all in you. The voice of the bridegroom and of the bride will be heard no more at all in you; for your merchants were the princes of the earth; for with your sorcery all the nations were deceived.

¹² But many of the priests and Levites and heads of ancestral houses, the old men who had seen the first house, when the foundation of this house was laid before their eyes, wept with a loud voice. Many also shouted aloud for joy, ¹³ so that the people could not discern the noise of the shout of joy from the noise of the weeping of the people; for the people shouted with a loud shout, and the noise was heard far away.

⁴ Seek the LORD and his strength. Seek his face forever more.

⁴ Restore our fortunes again, LORD, like the streams in the Negev. ⁵ Those who sow in tears will reap in joy. ⁶ He who goes out weeping, carrying seed for sowing, will certainly come again with joy, carrying his sheaves.

¹² He will set up a banner for the nations, and will assemble the outcasts of Israel, and gather together the dispersed of Judah from the four quarters of the earth. ¹³ The envy also of Ephraim will depart, and those who persecute Judah will be cut off. Ephraim won't envy Judah, and Judah won't persecute Ephraim.

¹ For the LORD will have compassion on Jacob, and will yet choose Israel, and set them in their own land. The foreigner will join himself with them, and they will unite with the house of Jacob.

¹⁹ I have not spoken in secret, in a place of the land of darkness. I did not say to the descendants of Jacob, 'Seek me in vain.' I, the LORD, speak righteousness. I declare things that are right.

⁶ Seek the LORD while he may be found; call you on him while he is near:

⁴ For the day of vengeance was in my heart, and the year of my redeemed has come.

¹⁶ It shall come to pass, when you are multiplied and increased in the land, in those days," says the LORD, "they shall say no more, 'The ark of the covenant of the LORD.' neither shall it come to mind; neither shall they remember it; neither shall they miss it; neither shall it be made any more. ¹⁷ At that time they shall call Jerusalem 'The throne of the LORD;' and all the nations shall be gathered to it, to the name of the LORD, to Jerusalem. Neither shall they walk any more after the stubbornness of their evil heart. ¹⁸ In those days the house of Judah shall walk with the house of Israel, and they shall come together out of the land of the north to the land that I gave for an inheritance to your fathers.

¹² You shall call on me, and you shall go and pray to me, and I will listen to you. ¹³ You shall seek me, and find me, when you shall search for me with all your heart. ¹⁴ I will be found by you,' says the LORD, 'and I will turn again your captivity, and I will gather you from all the nations, and from all the places where I have driven you,' says the LORD; 'and I will bring you again to the place from where I caused you to be carried away captive.'

¹⁰ Therefore do not be afraid, O Jacob my servant, says the LORD; neither be dismayed, Israel: for, look, I will save you from afar, and your descendants from the land of their captivity; and Jacob shall return, and shall be quiet and at ease, and none shall make him afraid. ¹¹ For I am with you, says the LORD, to save you: for I will make a full end of all the nations where I have scattered you, but I will not make a full end of you; but I will correct you in measure, and will in no way leave you unpunished."

⁶ For there shall be a day, that the watchmen on the hills of Ephraim shall cry, "Arise, and let us go up to Zion to the LORD our God."'" ⁷ For thus says the LORD, "Sing with gladness for Jacob, and shout for the chief of the nations: publish, praise, and say, 'For the LORD has saved your people, the remnant of Israel.'

⁹ They shall come with weeping; and with petitions will I lead them: I will cause them to walk by rivers of waters, in a straight way in which they shall not stumble; for I am a father to Israel, and Ephraim is my firstborn.'" ¹⁰ Hear the word of the LORD, you nations, and declare it in the islands afar off; and say, "He who scattered Israel will gather him, and keep him, as shepherd does his flock."

³¹ Look, the days come," says the LORD, "when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah:

⁶ 'Look, I will bring it health and healing, and I will heal them; and I will reveal to them abundance of peace and truth. ⁷ I will cause the captivity of Judah and the captivity of Israel to return, and will build them, as at the first. ⁸ I will cleanse them from all their iniquity, by which they have sinned against me; and I will pardon all their iniquities, by which they have sinned against me, and by which they have transgressed against me.

¹⁵ In those days, and at that time, will I cause a Branch of righteousness to grow up to David; and he shall execute justice and righteousness in the land.

¹⁹ I will bring Israel again to his pasture, and he shall feed on Carmel and Bashan, and his soul shall be satisfied on the hills of Ephraim and in Gilead. ²⁰ In those days, and in that time, says the LORD, the iniquity of Israel shall be sought for, and there shall be none; and the sins of Judah, and they shall not be found: for I will pardon them whom I leave as a remnant."'"

³³ Thus says the LORD of hosts: "The children of Israel and the people of Judah are oppressed together; and all who took them captive hold them fast; they refuse to let them go. ³⁴ Their Redeemer is strong; the LORD of hosts is his name: he will thoroughly plead their cause, that he may give rest to the earth, and disquiet the inhabitants of Babylon.

⁴⁷ Therefore look, the days come, that I will execute judgment on the engraved images of Babylon; and her whole land shall be confounded; and all her slain shall fall in the midst of her. ⁴⁸ Then the heavens and the earth, and all that is in them, shall sing for joy over Babylon; for the destroyers shall come to her from the north," says the LORD.

¹⁶ "You, son of man, take one stick, and write on it, 'For Judah, and for the children of Israel his companions': then take another stick, and write on it, 'For Joseph, the stick of Ephraim, and for all the house of Israel his companions': ¹⁷ and join them for you one to another into one stick, that they may become one in your hand. ¹⁸ When the children of your people shall speak to you, saying, 'Will you not show us what you mean by these?' ¹⁹ tell them, 'Thus says the Lord GOD: "Look, I will take the stick of Joseph, which is in the hand of Ephraim, and the tribes of Israel his companions; and I will put them with it, even with the stick of Judah, and make them one stick, and they shall be one in my hand."' ²⁰ The sticks whereon you write shall be in your hand before their eyes. ²¹ "Say to them, 'Thus says the Lord GOD: "Look, I will take the children of Israel from among the nations, where they are gone, and will gather them on every side, and bring them into their own land: ²² and I will make them one nation in the land, on the mountains of Israel; and one king shall be king to them all; and they shall be no more two nations, neither shall they be divided into two kingdoms any more at all;

²⁵ "Therefore thus says the Lord GOD: 'Now will I bring back the captivity of Jacob, and have mercy on the whole house of Israel; and I will be jealous for my holy name.

¹¹ The people of Judah and the children of Israel will be gathered together, and they will appoint themselves one head, and will go up from the land; for great will be the day of Jezreel.

⁵ Afterward the children of Israel shall return, and seek the LORD their God, and David their king, and shall come with trembling to the LORD and to his blessings in the last days.

¹² "Yet even now," says the LORD, "turn to me with all your heart, and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning."

²¹ and the inhabitants of one shall go to another, saying, 'Let us go speedily to entreat the favor of the LORD, and to seek the LORD of hosts. I will go also.' ²² Yes, many peoples and strong nations will come to seek the LORD of hosts in Jerusalem, and to entreat the favor of the LORD." ²³ Thus says the LORD of hosts: "In those days, ten men will take hold, out of all the languages of the nations, they will take hold of the skirt of him who is a Jew, saying, 'We will go with you, for we have heard that God is with you.'"

¹⁰ I will pour on the house of David, and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of petition; and they will look to me whom they have pierced; and they shall mourn for him, as one mourns for his only son, and will grieve bitterly for him, as one grieves for his firstborn.

⁹ Lament, mourn, and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to gloom.

⁷ I will establish my covenant between me and you and your descendants after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your descendants after you.

⁵ Most certainly my house is not so with God, yet he has made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things, and sure, for it is all my salvation, and all my desire, although he doesn't make it grow.

¹⁰ He said, "I have been very jealous for the LORD, the God of hosts; for the children of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and slain your prophets with the sword, and I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away."

¹⁴ He said, "I have been very jealous for the LORD, the God of hosts; for the children of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and slain your prophets with the sword, and I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away."

⁸ Good and upright is the LORD, therefore he will instruct sinners in the way. ⁹ He will guide the humble in justice. He will teach the humble his way.

⁷ They go from strength to strength. Everyone of them appears before God in Zion.

³ And many peoples shall come and say, "Come, let's go up to the mountain of the LORD, and to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths." For out of Zion the law shall go forth, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem. ⁴ He will judge between the nations, and will decide concerning many peoples; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. ⁵ House of Jacob, come, and let us walk in the light of the LORD.

⁸ And a highway will be there, and it will be called the Way of Holiness. The unclean shall not pass over it, but it will be for those who walk in the Way. Wicked fools will not go there.

³ Turn your ear, and come to me; hear, and your soul shall live: and I will make an everlasting covenant with you, the faithful kindnesses of David.

⁶ Also the foreigners who join themselves to the LORD, to minister to him, and to love the name of the LORD, to be his servants, everyone who keeps the Sabbath from profaning it, and holds fast my covenant; ⁷ even them will I bring to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer: their burnt offerings and their sacrifices shall be accepted on my altar; for my house will be called a house of prayer for all peoples."

¹⁶ Thus says the LORD, "Stand in the ways and see, and ask for the old paths, 'Where is the good way?' and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls." But they said, "We will not walk in it."

³¹ Look, the days come," says the LORD, "when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah: ³² not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which my covenant they broke, and I disregarded them," says the LORD. ³³ "But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days," says the LORD: "I will put my law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people: ³⁴ and they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, 'Know the LORD'; for they shall all know me, from their least to their greatest,for I will forgive their iniquity, and their sins I will remember no more." ³⁵ Thus says the LORD, who gives the sun for a light by day, and the ordinances of the moon and of the stars for a light by night, who stirs up the sea, so that its waves roar; the LORD of hosts is his name: ³⁶ "If this fixed order departs from before me," says the LORD, "then the descendants of Israel also shall cease from being a nation before me forever."

⁴⁰ and I will make an everlasting covenant with them, that I will not turn away from following them, to do them good; and I will put my fear in their hearts, that they may not depart from me.

¹ But in the latter days, it will happen that the mountain of the LORD's temple will be established on the top of the mountains, and it will be exalted above the hills; and peoples will stream to it. ² Many nations will go and say, "Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, and to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths." For out of Zion will go forth the law, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem;

¹⁷ If anyone desires to do his will, he will know about the teaching, whether it is from God, or if I am speaking from myself.

²³ who, when he had come, and had seen the grace of God, was glad. He exhorted them all, that with purpose of heart they should remain true to the Lord.

⁵ This was not as we had hoped, but first they gave their own selves to the Lord, and to us through the will of God. ⁶ But now he has obtained a more excellent ministry, by so much as he is also the mediator of a better covenant, which on better promises has been given as Law. ⁷ For if that first had been faultless, then no place would have been sought for a second. ⁸ For finding fault with them, he said, "Look, the days are coming," says the Lord, "when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah; ⁹ not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers, in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; for they did not continue in my covenant, and I disregarded them," says the Lord. ¹⁰ "For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel. After those days," says the Lord; "I will put my laws into their mind, I will also write them on their heart. I will be their God, and they will be my people.

² He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters.

⁷ You are my hiding place. You will preserve me from trouble. You will surround me with songs of deliverance. Selah.

¹ [A Prayer by Moses, the man of God.] Lord, you have been our dwelling place for all generations.

¹ He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High will rest in the shadow of Shaddai.

⁷ Return to your rest, my soul, for the LORD has dealt bountifully with you.

¹⁷⁶ I have gone astray like a lost sheep. Seek your servant, for I do not forget your commandments.

⁷ Tell me, you whom my soul loves, where you graze your flock, where you rest them at noon; For why should I be as one who is veiled beside the flocks of your companions? ⁸ If you do not know, most beautiful among women, follow the tracks of the sheep. Graze your young goats beside the shepherds' tents.

¹⁵ For thus said the LORD, the Holy One of Israel, "You will be saved in returning and rest. Your strength will be in quietness and in confidence." You refused,

² A man shall be as a hiding place from the wind, and a shelter from the storm, as streams of water in a dry place, as the shade of a large rock in a weary land.

⁶ All we like sheep have gone astray. Everyone has turned to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.

¹⁰ His watchmen are blind, they are all without knowledge; they are all mute dogs, they can't bark; dreaming, lying down, loving to slumber. ¹¹ Yes, the dogs are greedy, they can never have enough; and these are shepherds who can't understand: they have all turned to their own way, each one to his gain, from every quarter. ¹² "Come," say they, "I will get wine, and we will fill ourselves with strong drink; and tomorrow shall be as this day, great beyond measure."

²⁰ "For of old time I have broken your yoke, and burst your bonds; and you said, 'I will not serve;' for on every high hill and under every green tree you bowed yourself, playing the prostitute.

³² "Can a virgin forget her ornaments, or a bride her attire? Yet my people have forgotten me for days without number.

⁶ Moreover, the LORD said to me in the days of Josiah the king, "Have you seen that which backsliding Israel has done? She has gone up on every high mountain and under every green tree, and there has played the prostitute.

²³ Truly the hills are a delusion, the tumult on the mountains. Truly the salvation of Israel is in the LORD our God.

²¹ For the shepherds are become brutish, and have not inquired of the LORD: therefore they have not prospered, and all their flocks are scattered.

¹¹ for both prophet and priest are profane; yes, in my house have I found their wickedness," says the LORD. ¹² "Therefore their way shall be to them as slippery places in the darkness: they shall be driven on, and fall in it; for I will bring evil on them, even the year of their visitation," says the LORD. ¹³ "I have seen folly in the prophets of Samaria; they prophesied by Baal, and caused my people Israel to err. ¹⁴ In the prophets of Jerusalem also I have seen a horrible thing: they commit adultery, and walk in lies; and they strengthen the hands of evildoers, so that none does return from his wickedness: they are all of them become to me as Sodom, and its inhabitants as Gomorrah. ¹⁵ Therefore thus says the LORD of hosts concerning the prophets: 'Look, I will feed them with wormwood, and make them drink the water of gall; for from the prophets of Jerusalem is ungodliness gone forth into all the land.'

¹⁷ 'Israel is a hunted sheep; the lions have driven him away: first, the king of Assyria devoured him; and now at last Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon has broken his bones.

¹⁹ I will bring Israel again to his pasture, and he shall feed on Carmel and Bashan, and his soul shall be satisfied on the hills of Ephraim and in Gilead.

⁴ You haven't strengthened the diseased, neither have you healed that which was sick, neither have you bound up that which was broken, neither have you brought back that which was driven away, neither have you sought that which was lost; but with force and with rigor you have ruled over them. ⁵ They were scattered, because there was no shepherd; and they became food to all the animals of the field, and were scattered. ⁶ My sheep wandered through all the mountains, and on every high hill: yes, my sheep were scattered on all the surface of the earth; and there was none who searched or sought."' ⁷ "'"Therefore, you shepherds, hear the word of the LORD: ⁸ 'As I live,' says the Lord GOD, 'surely because my sheep became a prey, and my sheep became food to all the animals of the field, because there was no shepherd, neither did my shepherds search for my sheep, but the shepherds fed themselves, and didn't feed my sheep'; ⁹ therefore, you shepherds, hear the word of the LORD: ¹⁰ Thus says the Lord GOD: 'Look, I am against the shepherds; and I will require my sheep at their hand, and cause them to cease from feeding the sheep; neither shall the shepherds feed themselves any more; and I will deliver my sheep from their mouth, that they may not be food for them.'" ¹¹ "'For thus says the Lord GOD: "Look, I myself, even I, will search for my sheep, and will seek them out. ¹² As a shepherd seeks out his flock in the day that he is among his sheep that are scattered abroad, so will I seek out my sheep; and I will deliver them out of all places where they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day.

¹⁴ I will feed them with good pasture; and on the mountains of the height of Israel shall their fold be: there shall they lie down in a good fold; and on fat pasture shall they feed on the mountains of Israel.

²⁵ "'I will make with them a covenant of peace, and will cause evil animals to cease out of the land; and they shall dwell securely in the wilderness, and sleep in the woods. ²⁶ I will make them and the places around my hill a blessing; and I will cause the shower to come down in its season; there shall be showers of blessing. ²⁷ The tree of the field shall yield its fruit, and the earth shall yield its increase, and they shall be secure in their land; and they shall know that I am the LORD, when I have broken the bars of their yoke, and have delivered them out of the hand of those who made slaves of them. ²⁸ They shall no more be a prey to the nations, neither shall the animals of the earth devour them; but they shall dwell securely, and none shall make them afraid.

⁴ Thus says the LORD my God: "Feed the flock of slaughter. ⁵ Their buyers slaughter them, and go unpunished. Those who sell them say, 'Blessed be the LORD, for I am rich;' and their own shepherds do not pity them. ⁶ For I will no more pity the inhabitants of the land," says the LORD; "but, look, I will deliver the men everyone into his neighbor's hand, and into the hand of his king. They will strike the land, and out of their hand I will not deliver them." ⁷ So I fed the flock of slaughter, especially the oppressed of the flock. I took for myself two staffs. The one I called "Favor," and the other I called "Union," and I fed the flock. ⁸ I cut off the three shepherds in one month; for my soul was weary of them, and their soul also loathed me. ⁹ Then I said, "I will not feed you. That which dies, let it die; and that which is to be cut off, let it be cut off; and let those who are left eat each other's flesh."

³⁶ But when he saw the crowds, he was moved with compassion for them, because they were harassed and scattered, like sheep without a shepherd.

⁶ Rather, go to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.

²⁴ But he answered, "I was not sent to anyone but the lost sheep of the house of Israel."

¹⁰ See that you do not despise one of these little ones, for I tell you that in heaven their angels always see the face of my Father who is in heaven. ^{11 12} "What do you think? If someone has one hundred sheep, and one of them goes astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine, go to the mountains, and seek that which has gone astray? ¹³ If he finds it, truly I tell you, he rejoices over it more than over the ninety-nine which have not gone astray.

⁴ "Which one of you, if you had one hundred sheep, and lost one of them, would not leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness, and go after the one that was lost, until he found it? ⁵ When he has found it, he carries it on his shoulders, rejoicing. ⁶ When he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors, saying to them, 'Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which was lost.' ⁷ I tell you that even so there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents, than over ninety-nine righteous people who need no repentance.

²⁵ For you were going astray like sheep; but now have returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.

⁴ Our fathers trusted in you. They trusted, and you delivered them. ⁵ They cried to you, and escaped. They trusted in you, and were not put to shame.

⁷ For they have devoured Jacob, and destroyed his homeland.

¹² The Arameans in front, and the Philistines behind; and they will devour Israel with open mouth. For all this, his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still.

⁶ I was angry with my people, I profaned my inheritance, and gave them into your hand: you showed them no mercy; on the aged you have very heavily laid your yoke.

⁹ All you animals of the field, come to devour, all you animals in the forest.

³ Israel was holiness to the LORD, the first fruits of his increase. All who devour him shall be held guilty. Evil shall come on them,"' says the LORD."

⁷ I have forsaken my house, I have cast off my heritage; I have given the dearly beloved of my soul into the hand of her enemies. ⁸ My heritage has become to me as a lion in the forest: she has uttered her voice against me; therefore I have hated her. ⁹ Is my heritage to me as a speckled bird of prey? Are the birds of prey against her all around? Go, assemble all the animals of the field, bring them to devour. ¹⁰ Many shepherds have destroyed my vineyard, they have trodden my portion under foot, they have made my pleasant portion a desolate wilderness. ¹¹ They have made it a desolation; it mourns to me, being desolate; the whole land is made desolate, because no man lays it to heart.

⁸ Hope of Israel, its Savior in the time of trouble, why should you be as a foreigner in the land, and as a wayfaring man who turns aside to stay for a night?

²³ Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, "Yet again shall they use this speech in the land of Judah and in its cities, when I shall bring again their captivity: 'The LORD bless you, habitation of righteousness, mountain of holiness.'

² The captain of the guard took Jeremiah, and said to him, "The LORD your God pronounced this evil on this place; ³ and the LORD has brought it, and done according as he spoke: because you have sinned against the LORD, and have not obeyed his voice, therefore this thing has come on you.

³³ Thus says the LORD of hosts: "The children of Israel and the people of Judah are oppressed together; and all who took them captive hold them fast; they refuse to let them go.

⁶ Neither have we listened to your servants the prophets, who spoke in your name to our kings, our leaders, and our fathers, and to all the people of the land.

¹⁶ Lord, according to all your righteousness, let your anger and please let your wrath be turned away from your city Jerusalem, your holy mountain; because for our sins, and for the iniquities of our fathers, Jerusalem and your people have become a reproach to all who are around us.

¹⁵ I am very angry with the nations that are at ease; for I was but only a little angry, but they added to the calamity."

⁵ Their buyers slaughter them, and go unpunished. Those who sell them say, 'Blessed be the LORD, for I am rich;' and their own shepherds do not pity them.

¹ Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus according to the commandment of God our Savior, and Christ Jesus our hope;

²⁶ He spoke to the congregation, saying, "Depart, please, from the tents of these wicked men, and touch nothing of theirs, lest you be consumed in all their sins."

³¹ the greyhound, the male goat also; and the king against whom there is no rising up.

²⁰ Go forth from Babylon, flee from the Chaldeans; with a voice of singing declare, tell this, send it out throughout the earth. Say, 'The LORD has redeemed his servant Jacob.'

¹ Awake, awake, put on your strength, Zion; put on your beautiful garments, Jerusalem, the holy city, for there shall no more enter into you the uncircumcised and the unclean.

⁶ Flee out of the midst of Babylon, and save every man his life; do not be cut off in her iniquity: for it is the time of the LORD's vengeance; he will render to her a recompense.

⁴⁵ "My people, go away from the midst of her, and save yourselves every man from the fierce anger of the LORD.

⁶ Come. Come. Flee from the land of the north,' says the LORD; 'for I have spread you abroad as the four winds of the sky,' says the LORD. ⁷ 'Come, Zion. Escape, you who dwell with the daughter of Babylon.'

¹⁷ Therefore, "'Go out from their midst, and be separate,' says the Lord, 'and touch no unclean thing,' and I will receive you.

⁴ I heard another voice from heaven, saying, "Come out of her, my people, that you have no participation in her sins, and that you do not receive of her plagues,

²² From the blood of the slain, from the fat of the mighty, Jonathan's bow did not turn back. Saul's sword did not return empty.

¹ Now in the first year of Koresh king of Persia, that the word of the LORD by the mouth of Jeremiah might be accomplished, the LORD stirred up the spirit of Koresh king of Persia, so that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom, and put it also in writing, saying, ² "Thus says Koresh king of Persia, 'The LORD, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth; and he has commanded me to build him a house in Jerusalem, which is in Judah.

² Set up a banner on the bare mountain. Lift up your voice to them. Wave your hand, that they may go into the gates of the nobles. ³ I have commanded my consecrated ones; I have also called my mighty men to carry out my anger, my proudly exulting ones. ⁴ The noise of a multitude is in the mountains, as of a great people; the noise of an uproar of the kingdoms of the nations gathered together. The LORD of hosts is mustering the army for the battle. ⁵ They come from a far country, from the uttermost part of heaven, even the LORD, and the weapons of his indignation, to destroy the whole land.

¹⁷ Look, I will stir up the Medes against them, who will not value silver, and as for gold, they will not delight in it. ¹⁸ Their bows will dash the young men in pieces; and they shall have no pity on the fruit of the womb. Their eyes will not spare children.

² A grievous vision is declared to me. The treacherous man deals treacherously, and the destroyer destroys. Go up, Elam; attack. I have stopped all of Media's sighing.

²⁵ "I have raised up one from the north, and he has come; from the rising of the sun, one who calls on my name; and he shall come on rulers as on mortar, and as the potter treads clay.

¹ Thus says the LORD to his anointed, to Koresh, whose right hand I have held, to subdue nations before him, and strip kings of their armor; to open the doors before him, and the gates shall not be shut: ² "I will go before you, and make the mountains level. I will break the doors of bronze in pieces, and cut apart the bars of iron. ³ I will give you the treasures of darkness, and hidden riches of secret places, that you may know that it is I, the LORD, who call you by your name, even the God of Israel. ⁴ For Jacob my servant's sake, and Israel my chosen, I have called you by your name. I have surnamed you, though you have not known me.

¹⁴ I will make you serve your enemies in a land which you do not know; for a fire is kindled in my anger, which shall burn on you."

³ For out of the north there comes up a nation against her, which shall make her land desolate, and none shall dwell in it: they are fled, they are gone, both man and animal.

¹⁴ "Set yourselves in array against Babylon all around, all you who bend the bow; shoot at her, spare no arrows: for she has sinned against the LORD.

²¹ "Go up against the land of Merathaim, even against it, and against the inhabitants of Pekod: kill and utterly destroy after them," says the LORD, "and do according to all that I have commanded you.

²⁶ Come against her from the utmost border; open her storehouses; cast her up as heaps, and destroy her utterly; let nothing of her be left.

²⁹ "Call together the archers against Babylon, all those who bend the bow; camp against her all around; let none of it escape: recompense her according to her work; according to all that she has done, do to her; for she has been proud against the LORD, against the Holy One of Israel.

⁴¹ "Look, a people comes from the north; and a great nation and many kings shall be stirred up from the uttermost parts of the earth. ⁴² They lay hold on bow and spear; they are cruel, and have no mercy; their voice roars like the sea; and they ride on horses, everyone set in array, as a man to the battle, against you, daughter of Babylon.

¹ Thus says the LORD: "Look, I will raise up against Babylon, and against those who dwell in Lebkamai, a destroying wind. ² I will send to Babylon foreigners who shall winnow her; and they shall empty her land: for in the day of trouble they shall be against her around. ³ Do not let him who bends the bow bend it; nor not let him rise up in his armor. And do not spare her young men; utterly destroy all her army. ⁴ They shall fall down slain in the land of the Chaldeans, and thrust through in her streets.

²⁷ Set up a standard in the land, blow the trumpet among the nations, prepare the nations against her, call together against her the kingdoms of Ararat, Minni, and Ashkenaz: appoint a marshal against her; cause the horses to come up as the rough canker worm. ²⁸ Prepare against her the nations, the kings of the Medes, its governors, and all its deputies, and all the land of their dominion.

⁴ Your spoil will be gathered as the caterpillar gathers. Men will leap on it as locusts leap.

²³ Your rigging is untied. They couldn't strengthen the foot of their mast. They couldn't spread the sail. Then the prey of a great spoil was divided. The lame took the prey.

³ I will give you the treasures of darkness, and hidden riches of secret places, that you may know that it is I, the LORD, who call you by your name, even the God of Israel.

¹² It shall happen, when seventy years are accomplished, that I will punish the king of Babylon, and that nation, says the LORD, for their iniquity, and the land of the Chaldeans; and I will make it desolate forever.

¹⁶ The ten horns which you saw, and the beast, these will hate the prostitute, and will make her desolate and naked, and will eat her flesh, and will burn her utterly with fire.

¹⁵ But Jacob ate his fill. Jeshurun grew fat, and kicked. You have grown fat. You have grown thick. You have become sleek. Then he forsook God who made him, and lightly esteemed the Rock of his salvation.

¹² Many bulls have surrounded me. Mighty ones of Bashan have encircled me.

² Remember your congregation, which you purchased of old, which you have redeemed to be the tribe of your inheritance; Mount Zion, in which you have lived. ³ Lift up your feet to the perpetual ruins, all the evil that the enemy has done in the sanctuary. ⁴ Your adversaries have roared in the midst of your assembly. They have set up their standards as signs. ⁵ They behaved like men wielding axes, cutting through a thicket of trees. ⁶ Now they break all its carved work down with hatchet and hammers. ⁷ They have burned your sanctuary to the ground. They have profaned the dwelling place of your Name. ⁸ They said in their heart, "We will crush them completely." They have burned up all the places in the land where God was worshiped.

¹ [A Psalm by Asaph.] God, the nations have come into your inheritance. They have defiled your holy temple. They have laid Jerusalem in heaps. ² They have given the dead bodies of your servants to be food for the birds of the sky, the flesh of your faithful to the animals of the earth. ³ Their blood they have shed like water around Jerusalem. There was no one to bury them. ⁴ We have become objects of contempt to our neighbors, mocked and ridiculed by those who are around us.

¹ [A song. A Psalm by Asaph.] God, do not keep silent. Do not keep silent, and do not be still, God. ² For, look, your enemies are stirred up. Those who hate you have lifted up their heads. ³ They conspire with cunning against your people. They plot against your cherished ones. ⁴ "Come," they say, "and let's destroy them as a nation, that the name of Israel may be remembered no more." ⁵ For they have conspired together with one mind. They form an alliance against you.

⁵ Whoever mocks the poor reproaches his Maker. He who is glad at calamity shall not be unpunished.

⁶ I will send him against a profane nation, and against the people who anger me will I give him a command to take the spoil and to take the prey, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets. ⁷ However he doesn't mean so, neither does his heart think so; but it is in his heart to destroy, and to cut off not a few nations.

⁸ They were as fed horses roaming at large: everyone neighed after his neighbor's wife.

²⁸ They have grown fat. They shine; yes, they excel in deeds of wickedness. They do not plead the cause, the cause of the fatherless, that they may prosper; and they do not judge the right of the needy.

²¹ Also her hired men in the midst of her are like calves of the stall; for they also are turned back, they are fled away together, they did not stand: for the day of their calamity has come on them, the time of their visitation.

²⁷ Kill all her bulls; let them go down to the slaughter. Woe to them, their day has come, the time of their visitation."

³⁴ 'Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon has devoured me, he has crushed me, he has made me an empty vessel, he has, like a monster, swallowed me up, he has filled his maw with my delicacies; he has cast me out. ³⁵ The violence done to me and to my flesh be on Babylon,' shall the inhabitant of Zion say; and, 'My blood be on the inhabitants of Chaldea,' shall Jerusalem say.

²¹ They have heard that I groan; there is none to comfort me. All my enemies have heard of my trouble; they are glad that you have done it. Bring the day that you have proclaimed, so that they shall end up like me.

¹⁵ All that pass by clap their hands at you, they hiss and wag their head at the daughter of Jerusalem, saying, "Is this the city that men called 'The perfection of beauty,' 'The joy of the whole earth'?" ¹⁶ All your enemies have opened wide their mouth against you. They hiss and gnash the teeth; they say, "We have swallowed her up. Certainly this is the day that we looked for; we have found, we have seen it."

²¹ Rejoice and be glad, daughter of Edom, that dwell in the land of Uz. The cup shall pass through to you also; you will get drunk, and shall make yourself naked. ²² The punishment of your iniquity is accomplished, daughter of Zion; he will no more carry you away into captivity. He will visit your iniquity, daughter of Edom; he will uncover your sins.

³ and tell the people of Ammon, 'Hear the word of the Lord GOD: Thus says the Lord GOD, "Because you said, 'Aha,' against my sanctuary, when it was profaned; and against the land of Israel, when it was made desolate; and against the house of Judah, when they went into captivity: ⁴ therefore, look, I will deliver you to the people of the east for a possession, and they shall set their encampments in you, and make their dwellings in you; they shall eat your fruit, and they shall drink your milk. ⁵ I will make Rabbah a stable for camels, and the people of Ammon a resting place for flocks: and you shall know that I am the LORD." ⁶ For thus says the Lord GOD: "Because you have clapped your hands, and stamped with the feet, and rejoiced with all the despite of your soul against the land of Israel; ⁷ therefore, look, I have stretched out my hand on you, and will deliver you for a spoil to the nations; and I will cut you off from the peoples, and I will cause you to perish out of the countries: I will destroy you; and you shall know that I am the LORD."'" ⁸ "Thus says the Lord GOD: 'Because Moab and Seir say, "Look, the house of Judah is like all the nations";

¹⁵ "Thus says the Lord GOD: 'Because the Philistines have dealt by revenge, and have taken vengeance with despite of soul to destroy with perpetual enmity; ¹⁶ therefore thus says the Lord GOD, Look, I will stretch out my hand on the Philistines, and I will cut off the Cherethites, and destroy the remnant of the sea coast. ¹⁷ I will execute great vengeance on them with wrathful rebukes; and they shall know that I am the LORD, when I shall lay my vengeance on them.'"

² "Son of man, because Tyre has said against Jerusalem, 'Aha, she is broken: the gate of the peoples; she is turned to me; I shall be replenished, now that she is laid waste': ³ therefore thus says the Lord GOD, 'Look, I am against you, Tyre, and will cause many nations to come up against you, as the sea causes its waves to come up.'

¹¹ Ephraim is a trained heifer that loves to thresh; so I will put a yoke on her beautiful neck. I will set a rider on Ephraim. Judah will plow. Jacob will break his clods.

¹ Listen to this word, you cows of Bashan, who are on the mountain of Samaria, who oppress the poor, who crush the needy, who tell their husbands, "Bring us something to drink."

¹² But do not look down on your brother in the day of his disaster, and do not rejoice over the people of Judah in the day of their destruction. Do not speak proudly in the day of distress.

⁸ For thus says the LORD of hosts: 'For honor he has sent me to the nations which plundered you; for he who touches you touches the apple of my eye. ⁹ For, look, I will shake my hand over them, and they will be a spoil to those who served them; and you will know that the LORD of hosts has sent me.

¹ Look, a day of the LORD comes, when your spoil will be divided in your midst. ² For I will gather all nations against Jerusalem to battle; and the city will be taken, the houses rifled, and the women ravished. Half of the city will go out into captivity, and the rest of the people will not be cut off from the city. ³ Then the LORD will go out and fight against those nations, as when he fought in the day of battle.

¹² This will be the plague with which the LORD will strike all the peoples who have warred against Jerusalem: their flesh will consume away while they stand on their feet, and their eyes will consume away in their sockets, and their tongue will consume away in their mouth.

²² "I will rise up against them," says the LORD of hosts, "and cut off from Babylon name and remnant, and son and son's son," says the LORD.

²⁶ and all the kings of the north, far and near, one with another; and all the kingdoms of the world, which are on the surface of the earth: and the king of Sheshach shall drink after them.

² Therefore look, the days come,' says the LORD, 'that I will cause an alarm of war to be heard against Rabbah of the people of Ammon; and it shall become a desolate heap, and her daughters shall be burned with fire: then shall Israel possess those who possessed him,' says the LORD.

³⁵ A sword is on the Chaldeans," says the LORD, "and on the inhabitants of Babylon, and on her officials, and on her wise men. ³⁶ A sword is on the boasters, and they shall become fools; a sword is on her mighty men, and they shall be dismayed. ³⁷ A sword is on their horses, and on their chariots, and on all the mixed people who are in the midst of her; and they shall become as women: a sword is on her treasures, and they shall be robbed. ³⁸ A drought is on her waters, and they shall be dried up; for it is a land of engraved images, and they glory over idols. ³⁹ Therefore the wild animals of the desert with the wolves shall dwell there, and the ostriches shall dwell in it: and it shall be no more inhabited forever; neither shall it be lived in from generation to generation. ⁴⁰ As when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah and the neighbor cities of it," says the LORD, "so shall no man dwell there, neither shall any son of man live in it."

²⁵ "Look, I am against you, destroying mountain," says the LORD, "which destroys all the earth; and I will stretch out my hand on you, and roll you down from the rocks, and will make you a burnt mountain. ²⁶ They shall not take of you a stone for a corner, nor a stone for foundations; but you shall be desolate for ever," says the LORD.

⁴³ Her cities are become a desolation, a dry land, and a desert, a land in which no man dwells, neither does any son of man pass thereby.

⁶² and say, 'LORD, you have spoken concerning this place, to cut it off, that none shall dwell in it, neither man nor animal, but that it shall be desolate forever.' ⁶³ It shall be, when you have made an end of reading this scroll, that you shall bind a stone to it, and cast it into the midst of the Perath: ⁶⁴ and you shall say, 'Thus shall Babylon sink, and shall not rise again because of the evil that I will bring on her; and they shall be weary.'" Thus far are the words of Jeremiah.

²⁶ But the Jerusalem that is above is free, and she is our mother.

⁵ And on her forehead a name was written, "MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF THE PROSTITUTES AND OF THE ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH."

²³ Men shall clap their hands at him, and shall hiss him out of his place.

⁴ that you will take up this parable against the king of Babylon, and say, "How the oppressor has ceased. How the attacker has ceased." ⁵ The LORD has broken the staff of the wicked, the scepter of the rulers, ⁶ who struck the peoples in wrath with a continual stroke, who ruled the nations in anger, with a persecution that none restrained. ⁷ The whole earth is at rest, and is quiet. They break out song. ⁸ Yes, the fir trees rejoice with you, with the cedars of Lebanon, saying, "Since you are humbled, no lumberjack has come up against us." ⁹ Sheol from beneath has moved for you to meet you at your coming. It stirs up the dead for you, even all the rulers of the earth. It has raised up from their thrones all the kings of the nations. ¹⁰ They all will answer and ask you, "Have you also become as weak as we are? Have you become like us?" ¹¹ Your pomp is brought down to Sheol, with the sound of your stringed instruments. Maggots are spread out under you, and worms cover you. ¹² How you have fallen from heaven, morning star, son of the dawn. How you are cut down to the ground, who laid the nations low. ¹³ You said in your heart, "I will ascend into heaven. I will exalt my throne above the stars of God. I will sit on the mountain of assembly, in the far north. ¹⁴ I will ascend above the heights of the clouds. I will make myself like the Most High." ¹⁵ Yet you shall be brought down to Sheol, to the depths of the Pit. ¹⁶ Those who see you will stare at you. They will ponder you, saying, "Is this the man who made the earth to tremble, who shook kingdoms; ¹⁷ who made the world like a wilderness, and overthrew its cities; who did not release his prisoners to their home?"

¹⁶ to make their land an astonishment, and a perpetual hissing; everyone who passes thereby shall be astonished, and shake his head.

⁸ I will make this city an astonishment, and a hissing; everyone who passes thereby shall be astonished and hiss because of all its plagues.

¹⁷ "Edom shall become an astonishment: everyone who passes by it shall be astonished, and shall hiss at all its plagues.

³⁷ Babylon shall become heaps, a dwelling place for jackals, an astonishment, and a hissing, without inhabitant.

⁶ Won't all these take up a parable against him, and a taunting proverb against him, and say, 'Woe to him who increases that which is not his, and who enriches himself by extortion. How long?' ⁷ Won't your debtors rise up suddenly, and wake up those who make you tremble, and you will be their victim? ⁸ Because you have plundered many nations, all the remnant of the peoples will plunder you, because of men's blood, and for the violence done to the land, to the city and to all who dwell in it. ⁹ Woe to him who gets an evil gain for his house, that he may set his nest on high, that he may be delivered from the hand of evil. ¹⁰ You have devised shame to your house, by cutting off many peoples, and have sinned against your soul. ¹¹ For the stone will cry out of the wall, and the beam out of the woodwork will answer it. ¹² Woe to him who builds a town with blood, and establishes a city by iniquity. ¹³ Look, isn't it of the LORD of hosts that the peoples labor for the fire, and the nations weary themselves for vanity? ¹⁴ For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea. ¹⁵ "Woe to him who gives his neighbor drink, pouring your inflaming wine until they are drunk, so that you may gaze at their naked bodies. ¹⁶ You are filled with shame, and not glory. You will also drink, and be exposed. The cup of the LORD's right hand will come around to you, and disgrace will cover your glory. ¹⁷ For the violence done to Lebanon will overwhelm you, and the destruction of the animals, which made them afraid; because of men's blood, and for the violence done to the land, to every city and to those who dwell in them. ¹⁸ "What value does the engraved image have, that its maker has engraved it; the molten image, even the teacher of lies, that he who fashions its form trusts in it, to make mute idols?

¹⁵ This is the joyous city that lived carelessly, that said in her heart, "I am, and there is none besides me." How she has become a desolation, a place for animals to lie down in. Everyone who passes by her will hiss, and shake their fists.

²⁰ David rose up early in the morning, and left the sheep with a keeper, and took, and went, as Jesse had commanded him; and he came to the place of the wagons, as the army which was going forth to the fight shouted for the battle.

⁹ Now when Joab saw that the battle was set against him before and behind, he chose of all the choice men of Israel, and put them in array against the Arameans:

⁴ Against you, and you only, have I sinned, and done that which is evil in your sight; that you may be proved right when you speak, and justified when you judge.

²⁸ whose arrows are sharp, and all their bows bent. Their horses' hoofs will be like flint, and their wheels like a whirlwind.

⁴ The noise of a multitude is in the mountains, as of a great people; the noise of an uproar of the kingdoms of the nations gathered together. The LORD of hosts is mustering the army for the battle.

⁹ Go up, you horses; and rage, you chariots; and let the mighty men go forth: Cush and Put, who handle the shield; and the Ludim, who handle and bend the bow.

³⁵ "Thus says the LORD of hosts: 'Look, I will break the bow of Elam, the chief of their might.

⁷ All who found them have devoured them; and their adversaries said, "We are not guilty, because they have sinned against the LORD, the habitation of righteousness, even the LORD, the hope of their fathers."

¹¹ Because you are glad, because you rejoice, O you who plunder my heritage, because you are wanton as a heifer that treads out the grain, and neigh as strong horses;

⁴² They lay hold on bow and spear; they are cruel, and have no mercy; their voice roars like the sea; and they ride on horses, everyone set in array, as a man to the battle, against you, daughter of Babylon.

² I will send to Babylon foreigners who shall winnow her; and they shall empty her land: for in the day of trouble they shall be against her around.

¹¹ Make sharp the arrows; hold firm the shields: the LORD has stirred up the spirit of the kings of the Medes; because his purpose is against Babylon, to destroy it: for it is the vengeance of the LORD, the vengeance of his temple. ¹² Set up a standard against the walls of Babylon, make the watch strong, set the watchmen, prepare the ambushes; for the LORD has both purposed and done that which he spoke concerning the inhabitants of Babylon.

²⁷ Set up a standard in the land, blow the trumpet among the nations, prepare the nations against her, call together against her the kingdoms of Ararat, Minni, and Ashkenaz: appoint a marshal against her; cause the horses to come up as the rough canker worm.

⁸ Because you have plundered many nations, all the remnant of the peoples will plunder you, because of men's blood, and for the violence done to the land, to the city and to all who dwell in it.

¹⁷ For the violence done to Lebanon will overwhelm you, and the destruction of the animals, which made them afraid; because of men's blood, and for the violence done to the land, to every city and to those who dwell in them.

³⁵ Vengeance is mine, I will repay, at the time when their foot slides; for the day of their calamity is near, and the things to come hasten upon them."

⁴¹ if I sharpen my flashing sword and my hand takes hold on judgment; I will render vengeance to my adversaries, and will recompense those who hate me.

⁴³ Rejoice, O heavens, with him, and let all the angels of God worship him. Rejoice, O nations, with his people, and let all the children of God strengthen themselves in him. For he will avenge the blood of his children, and he will render vengeance to his enemies, and he will recompense them that hate him, and he atones for the land of his people.

⁵ It shall be that when they make a long blast with the ram's horn, and when you hear the sound of the trumpet, all the people shall shout with a great shout; and the wall of the city shall fall down flat, and the people shall go up every man straight before him."

²⁰ So the people shouted, and the priests blew the trumpets. It happened, when the people heard the sound of the trumpet, that the people shouted with a great shout, and the wall fell down flat, so that the people went up into the city, every man straight before him, and they took the city.

⁶ But Adoni-Bezek fled; and they pursued after him, and caught him, and cut off his thumbs and his great toes. ⁷ Adoni-Bezek said, "Seventy kings, having their thumbs and their great toes cut off, scavenged under my table: as I have done, so God has requited me." They brought him to Jerusalem, and he died there.

³³ Samuel said, "As your sword has made women childless, so your mother will be childless among women." Samuel cut Agag in pieces before the LORD in Gilgal.

²⁴ And all the leaders, the mighty men, and also all of the sons of king David submitted themselves to Solomon the king.

⁸ Now do not be stiff-necked, as your fathers were; but yield yourselves to the LORD, and enter into his sanctuary, which he has sanctified forever, and serve the LORD your God, that his fierce anger may turn away from you.

¹ LORD, you God to whom vengeance belongs, you God to whom vengeance belongs, shine forth.

⁷ To execute vengeance on the nations, and punishments on the peoples;

¹⁷ He put on righteousness as a breastplate, and a helmet of salvation on his head; and he put on garments of vengeance for clothing, and was clad with zeal as a mantle.

² to proclaim the year of the LORD's favor, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn;

¹⁰ For that day is of the Lord, the LORD of hosts, a day of vengeance, that he may avenge him of his adversaries: and the sword shall devour and be satiate, and shall drink its fill of their blood; for the Lord, the LORD of hosts, has a sacrifice in the north country by the river Perath.

²⁸ The voice of those who flee and escape out of the land of Babylon, to declare in Zion the vengeance of the LORD our God, the vengeance of his temple. ²⁹ "Call together the archers against Babylon, all those who bend the bow; camp against her all around; let none of it escape: recompense her according to her work; according to all that she has done, do to her; for she has been proud against the LORD, against the Holy One of Israel.

¹⁴ The LORD of hosts has sworn by himself, saying, "Surely I will fill you with men, as with the canker worm; and they shall lift up a shout against you."

²⁵ "Look, I am against you, destroying mountain," says the LORD, "which destroys all the earth; and I will stretch out my hand on you, and roll you down from the rocks, and will make you a burnt mountain.

³⁶ Therefore thus says the LORD: "Look, I will plead your cause, and take vengeance for you; and I will dry up her sea, and make her fountain dry.

⁵⁸ Thus says the LORD of hosts: "The broad walls of Babylon shall be utterly overthrown, and her high gates shall be burned with fire; and the peoples shall labor for vanity, and the nations for the fire; and they shall be weary."

⁶⁴ and you shall say, 'Thus shall Babylon sink, and shall not rise again because of the evil that I will bring on her; and they shall be weary.'" Thus far are the words of Jeremiah.

⁶ We have submitted to the Egyptians and to the Assyrians, to get enough bread.

¹⁸ For he has despised the oath by breaking the covenant; and look, he had given his hand, and yet has done all these things; he shall not escape.'

²² In his right hand was the divination for Jerusalem, to set battering rams, to open the mouth in the slaughter, to lift up the voice with shouting, to set battering rams against the gates, to cast up mounds, to build forts.

² The LORD is a jealous God and avenges. The LORD avenges and is full of wrath. The LORD takes vengeance on his adversaries, and he maintains wrath against his enemies.

² For with whatever judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with whatever measure you measure, it will be measured to you.

²² For these are days of vengeance, that all things which are written may be fulfilled.

⁵ But if our unrighteousness commends the righteousness of God, what will we say? Is God unrighteous who inflicts wrath? (I am speaking in human terms).

¹⁹ Do not seek revenge yourselves, beloved, but leave room for the wrath. For it is written, "Vengeance belongs to me; I will repay, says the Lord."

⁸ giving vengeance to those who do not know God, and to those who do not obey the Good News of our Lord Jesus,

¹³ For judgment is without mercy to him who has shown no mercy. Mercy triumphs over judgment.

⁶ For they poured out the blood of the saints and the prophets, and you have given them blood to drink. They deserve this."

⁶ Return to her just as she returned, and repay her double as she did, and according to her works. In the cup which she mixed, mix to her double.

² for true and righteous are his judgments. For he has judged the great prostitute, who corrupted the earth with her sexual immorality, and he has avenged the blood of his servants at her hand."

¹⁴ It will happen that like a hunted gazelle, and like sheep that no one gathers, they will each turn to their own people, and will each flee to their own land.

³⁸ He has left his covert, as the lion; for their land has become an astonishment, because of the sword of the oppressor, and because of his fierce anger."

¹⁶ He made many to stumble, yes, they fell one on another: and they said, 'Arise, and let us go again to our own people, and to the land of our birth, from the oppressing sword.'

⁹ 'We would have healed Babylon, but she is not healed: forsake her, and let us go everyone into his own country; for her judgment reaches to heaven, and is lifted up even to the skies.'

²³ and with you will I break in pieces the shepherd and his flock; and with you will I break in pieces the farmer and his yoke; and with you will I break in pieces governors and deputies.

¹¹ Be confounded, you farmers. Wail, you vineyard keepers; for the wheat and for the barley; for the harvest of the field has perished.

¹⁶ Therefore thus says the LORD, the God of hosts: "Wailing will be in all the broad ways; and they will say in all the streets, 'Alas. Alas.' and they will call the farmer to mourning, and those who are skillful in lamentation to wailing.

²⁹ In the days of Pekah king of Israel came Tiglath Pileser king of Assyria, and took Ijon, and Abel Beth Maacah, and Janoah, and Kedesh, and Hazor, and Gilead, and Galilee, all the land of Naphtali; and he carried them captive to Assyria.

⁶ In the ninth year of Hoshea the king of Assyria took Samaria, and carried Israel away to Assyria, and placed them in Halah, and on the Habor, the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes. ⁷ It was so, because the children of Israel had sinned against the LORD their God, who brought them up out of the land of Egypt from under the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and had feared other gods, ⁸ and walked in the statutes of the nations, whom the LORD cast out from before the children of Israel, and of the kings of Israel, which they made. ⁹ The children of Israel did secretly things that were not right against the LORD their God: and they built them high places in all their cities, from the tower of the watchmen to the fortified city; ¹⁰ and they set them up pillars and Asherim on every high hill, and under every green tree; ¹¹ and there they burnt incense in all the high places, as did the nations whom the LORD carried away before them; and they worked wicked things to provoke the LORD to anger; ¹² and they served idols, of which the LORD had said to them, "You shall not do this thing." ¹³ Yet the LORD testified to Israel, and to Judah, by every prophet, and every seer, saying, "Turn from your evil ways, and keep my commandments and my statutes, according to all the law which I commanded your fathers, and which I sent to you by my servants the prophets." ¹⁴ Notwithstanding, they would not listen, but hardened their neck, like the neck of their fathers, who did not believe in the LORD their God. ¹⁵ They rejected his statutes, and his covenant that he made with their fathers, and his testimonies which he testified to them; and they followed vanity, and became vain, and followed the nations that were around them, concerning whom the LORD had commanded them that they should not do like them. ¹⁶ They forsook all the commandments of the LORD their God, and made them molten images, even two calves, and made an Asherah, and worshiped all the host of heaven, and served Baal. ¹⁷ They caused their sons and their daughters to pass through the fire, practiced divination and sorcery, and sold themselves to do that which was evil in the sight of the LORD, to provoke him to anger. ¹⁸ Therefore the LORD was very angry with Israel, and removed them out of his sight: there was none left but the tribe of Judah only. ¹⁹ Also Judah did not keep the commandments of the LORD their God, but walked in the statutes of Israel which they made. ²⁰ The LORD rejected all the descendants of Israel, and afflicted them, and delivered them into the hand of plunderers, until he had cast them out of his sight. ²¹ For he tore Israel from the house of David; and they made Jeroboam the son of Nebat king: and Jeroboam drove Israel from following the LORD, and made them sin a great sin. ²² The children of Israel walked in all the sins of Jeroboam which he did; they did not depart from them; ²³ until the LORD removed Israel out of his sight, as he spoke by all his servants the prophets. So Israel was carried away out of their own land to Assyria to this day.

⁹ It happened in the fourth year of king Hezekiah, which was the seventh year of Hoshea son of Elah king of Israel, that Shalmaneser king of Assyria came up against Samaria, and besieged it. ¹⁰ At the end of three years they took it: in the sixth year of Hezekiah, which was the ninth year of Hoshea king of Israel, Samaria was taken. ¹¹ The king of Assyria carried Israel away to Assyria, and put them in Halah, and on the Habor, the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes, ¹² because they did not obey the voice of the LORD their God, but transgressed his covenant, even all that Moses the servant of the LORD commanded, and would not hear it, nor do it. ¹³ Now in the fourteenth year of king Hezekiah, Sennacherib king of Assyria came up against all the fortified cities of Judah, and took them.

¹ In his days Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came up, and Jehoiakim became his servant three years: then he turned and rebelled against him. ² The LORD sent against him bands of the Chaldeans, and bands of the Arameans, and bands of the Moabites, and bands of the people of Ammon, and sent them against Judah to destroy it, according to the word of the LORD, which he spoke by his servants the prophets. ³ Surely at the commandment of the LORD this came on Judah, to remove them out of his sight, for the sins of Manasseh, according to all that he did, ⁴ and also for the innocent blood that he shed; for he filled Jerusalem with innocent blood: and the LORD would not pardon. ⁵ Now the rest of the acts of Jehoiakim, and all that he did, aren't they written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah? ⁶ So Jehoiakim slept with his fathers; and Jehoiachin his son reigned in his place. ⁷ The king of Egypt did not come again out of his land any more; for the king of Babylon had taken, from the Wadi of Egypt to the river Perath, all that pertained to the king of Egypt.

¹ It happened in the ninth year of his reign, in the tenth month, in the tenth day of the month, that Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came, he and all his army, against Jerusalem, and camped against it; and they built forts against it around it. ² So the city was besieged to the eleventh year of king Zedekiah. ³ On the ninth day of the fourth month the famine was severe in the city, so that there was no bread for the people of the land. ⁴ Then a breach was made in the city, and all the men of war fled by night by the way of the gate between the two walls, which was by the king's garden (now the Chaldeans were against the city around it); and they went by the way of the Arabah. ⁵ But the army of the Chaldeans pursued after the king, and overtook him in the plains of Jericho; and all his army was scattered from him. ⁶ Then they took the king, and carried him up to the king of Babylon to Riblah; and they gave judgment on him. ⁷ They killed the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes, and put out the eyes of Zedekiah, and bound him in fetters, and carried him to Babylon.

²⁰ Tilgath Pilneser king of Assyria came to him, and distressed him, but did not strengthen him.

¹ After these things, and this faithfulness, Sennacherib king of Assyria came, and entered into Judah, and camped against the fortified cities, and thought to win them for himself. ² When Hezekiah saw that Sennacherib had come, and that he intended to fight against Jerusalem, ³ he took counsel with his princes and his mighty men to stop the waters of the springs which were outside of the city; and they helped him. ⁴ So many people gathered together, and they stopped all the springs, and the brook that flowed through the midst of the land, saying, "Why should the kings of Assyria come, and find much water?" ⁵ He took courage, and built up all the wall that was broken down, and raised towers upon it, and the other wall outside, and strengthened Millo in the City of David, and made weapons and shields in abundance. ⁶ He set captains of war over the people, and gathered them together to him in the broad place at the gate of the city, and spoke comfortably to them, saying, ⁷ "Be strong and courageous, do not be afraid nor dismayed for the king of Assyria, nor for all the multitude who is with him; for there is a greater with us than with him. ⁸ With him is an arm of flesh; but with us is the LORD our God to help us, and to fight our battles." The people rested themselves on the words of Hezekiah king of Judah. ⁹ After this, Sennacherib king of Assyria sent his servants to Jerusalem, (now he was before Lachish, and all his power with him), to Hezekiah king of Judah, and to all Judah who were at Jerusalem, saying, ¹⁰ Thus says Sennacherib king of Assyria, "In whom do you trust, that you remain under siege in Jerusalem? ¹¹ Doesn't Hezekiah persuade you, to give you over to die by famine and by thirst, saying, 'The LORD our God will deliver us out of the hand of the king of Assyria?' ¹² Hasn't the same Hezekiah taken away his high places and his altars, and commanded Judah and Jerusalem, saying, 'You shall worship before one altar, and on it you shall burn incense?' ¹³ Do you not know what I and my fathers have done to all the peoples of the lands? Were the gods of the nations of the lands in any way able to deliver their land out of my hand? ¹⁴ Who was there among all the gods of those nations which my fathers utterly destroyed, that could deliver his people out of my hand, that your God should be able to deliver you out of my hand? ¹⁵ Now therefore do not let Hezekiah deceive you, nor persuade you in this way, neither believe him; for no god of any nation or kingdom was able to deliver his people out of my hand, and out of the hand of my fathers. How much less will your God deliver you out of my hand?" ¹⁶ His servants spoke yet more against the LORD God, and against his servant Hezekiah. ¹⁷ He also wrote letters insulting the LORD, the God of Israel, and to speak against him, saying, "As the gods of the nations of the lands, which have not delivered their people out of my hand, so shall the God of Hezekiah not deliver his people out of my hand." ¹⁸ They cried with a loud voice in the Jews' language to the people of Jerusalem who were on the wall, to frighten them, and to trouble them; that they might take the city. ¹⁹ They spoke of the God of Jerusalem, as of the gods of the peoples of the earth, which are the work of men's hands. ²⁰ Hezekiah the king, and Isaiah the prophet the son of Amoz, prayed because of this, and cried to heaven. ²¹ The LORD sent an angel, who cut off all the mighty men of valor, and the leaders and captains, in the camp of the king of Assyria. So he returned with shame of face to his own land. When he had come into the house of his god, some of his own offspring killed him there with the sword. ²² Thus the LORD saved Hezekiah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem from the hand of Sennacherib the king of Assyria, and from the hand of all others, and gave them rest on every side. ²³ Many brought gifts to the LORD to Jerusalem, and precious things to Hezekiah king of Judah; so that he was exalted in the sight of all nations from thenceforth.

¹¹ Therefore the LORD brought on them the captains of the army of the king of Assyria, who took Manasseh in chains, and bound him with fetters, and carried him to Babylon.

¹ Then the people of the land took Jehoahaz the son of Josiah, and they anointed him and made him king in his father's place in Jerusalem. ² Joahaz was twenty-three years old when he began to reign; and he reigned three months in Jerusalem. ³ The king of Egypt deposed him at Jerusalem, and fined the land one hundred talents of silver and a talent of gold. ⁴ The king of Egypt made Eliakim his brother king over Judah and Jerusalem, and changed his name to Jehoiakim. Neco took Joahaz his brother, and carried him to Egypt. ⁵ Jehoiakim was twenty-five years old when he began to reign; and he reigned eleven years in Jerusalem: and he did that which was evil in the sight of the LORD his God. ⁶ Against him came up Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and bound him in fetters, to carry him to Babylon. ⁷ Nebuchadnezzar also carried of the vessels of the house of the LORD to Babylon, and put them in his temple at Babylon. ⁸ Now the rest of the acts of Jehoiakim, and his abominations which he did, and that which was found in him, look, they are written in the book of the kings of Israel and Judah: and Jehoiachin his son reigned in his place. ⁹ Jehoiachin was eighteen years old when he began to reign; and he reigned three months and ten days in Jerusalem: and he did that which was evil in the sight of the LORD. ¹⁰ At the return of the year king Nebuchadnezzar sent, and brought him to Babylon, with the goodly vessels of the house of the LORD, and made Zedekiah his relative king over Judah and Jerusalem. ¹¹ Zedekiah was twenty-one years old when he began to reign; and he reigned eleven years in Jerusalem: ¹² and he did that which was evil in the sight of the LORD his God; he did not humble himself before Jeremiah the prophet speaking from the mouth of the LORD. ¹³ He also rebelled against king Nebuchadnezzar, who had made him swear by God: but he stiffened his neck, and hardened his heart against turning to the LORD, the God of Israel. ¹⁴ Moreover all the chiefs of the priests, and the people, trespassed very greatly after all the abominations of the nations; and they polluted the house of the LORD which he had made holy in Jerusalem. ¹⁵ The LORD, the God of their fathers, sent to them by his messengers, rising up early and sending, because he had compassion on his people, and on his dwelling place: ¹⁶ but they mocked the messengers of God, and despised his words, and scoffed at his prophets, until the wrath of the LORD arose against his people, until there was no remedy. ¹⁷ Therefore he brought on them the king of the Chaldeans, who killed their young men with the sword in the house of their sanctuary, and had no compassion on young man or virgin, old man or gray-headed: he gave them all into his hand. ¹⁸ All the vessels of God's house, great and small, and the treasures of the house of the LORD, and the treasures of the king, and of his officials, all these he brought to Babylon. ¹⁹ They burnt God's house, and broke down the wall of Jerusalem, and burnt all its palaces with fire, and destroyed all the goodly vessels of it. ²⁰ He carried those who had escaped from the sword away to Babylon; and they were servants to him and his sons until the reign of the kingdom of Persia: ²¹ to fulfill the word of the LORD by the mouth of Jeremiah, until the land had enjoyed its Sabbaths. As long as it lay desolate it kept Sabbath, to fulfill seventy years. ²² Now in the first year of Koresh king of Persia, that the word of the LORD by the mouth of Jeremiah might be accomplished, the LORD stirred up the spirit of Koresh king of Persia, so that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom, and put it also in writing, saying, ²³ "Thus says Koresh king of Persia, 'The LORD, the God of heaven, has given all the kingdoms of the earth to me; and he has commanded me to build him a house in Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Whoever there is among you of all his people, the LORD his God be with him, and let him go up.'"

¹⁷ The LORD will bring on you, on your people, and on your father's house, days that have not come, from the day that Ephraim departed from Judah; even the king of Assyria. ¹⁸ It will happen in that day that the LORD will whistle for the fly that is in the uttermost part of the rivers of Egypt, and for the bee that is in the land of Assyria. ¹⁹ They shall come, and shall all rest in the desolate valleys, in the clefts of the rocks, on all thorn hedges, and on all pastures. ²⁰ In that day the Lord will shave with a razor that is hired in the parts beyond the River, even with the king of Assyria, the head and the hair of the feet; and it shall also consume the beard.

⁷ now therefore, look, the LORD brings upon them the mighty flood waters of the River: the king of Assyria and all his glory. It will come up over all its channels, and go over all its banks. ⁸ It will sweep onward into Judah. It will overflow and pass through; it will reach even to the neck; and the stretching out of its wings will fill the breadth of your land, Immanuel.

⁵ Alas Assyrian, the rod of my anger, the staff in whose hand is my indignation.

¹ Now it happened in the fourteenth year of king Hezekiah, that Sennacherib king of Assyria attacked all of the fortified cities of Judah, and captured them. ² The king of Assyria sent Rabshakeh from Lachish to Jerusalem to king Hezekiah with a large army. He stood by the aqueduct from the upper pool on the highway to the Launderers' Field. ³ Then Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, and Shebna the scribe, and Joah, the son of Asaph, the recorder came out to him. ⁴ Rabshakeh said to them, "Now tell Hezekiah, 'Thus says the great king, the king of Assyria, "What confidence is this in which you trust? ⁵ Do you think that empty words are strategy and power for war? Now in whom do you trust, that you have rebelled against me? ⁶ Look, you trust in the staff of this bruised reed, even in Egypt, which if a man leans on it, it will go into his hand and pierce it. So is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all who trust in him. ⁷ But if you tell me, 'We trust in the LORD our God,' isn't that he whose high places and whose altars Hezekiah has taken away, and has said to Judah and to Jerusalem, 'You shall worship before this altar?'" ⁸ Now therefore, please make a pledge to my master the king of Assyria, and I will give you two thousand horses, if you are able on your part to set riders on them. ⁹ How then can you turn away the face of one captain of the least of my master's servants, and put your trust on Egypt for chariots and for horsemen? ¹⁰ Have I come up now without the LORD against this land to destroy it? The LORD said to me, "Go up against this land, and destroy it."'" ¹¹ Then Eliakim, Shebna and Joah said to Rabshakeh, "Please speak to your servants in Aramaic, for we understand it; and do not speak to us in the Jews' language in the hearing of the people who are on the wall." ¹² But Rabshakeh said, "Has my master sent me only to your master and to you, to speak these words, and not to the men who sit on the wall, who will eat their own dung and drink their own urine with you?" ¹³ Then Rabshakeh stood, and called out with a loud voice in the Jews' language, and said, "Hear the words of the great king, the king of Assyria. ¹⁴ Thus says the king, 'Do not let Hezekiah deceive you; for he will not be able to deliver you. ¹⁵ Do not let Hezekiah make you trust in the LORD, saying, "The LORD will surely deliver us. This city won't be given into the hand of the king of Assyria."' ¹⁶ Do not listen to Hezekiah, for thus says the king of Assyria, 'Make your peace with me, and come out to me; and each of you eat from his vine, and each one from his fig tree, and each one of you drink the waters of his own cistern; ¹⁷ until I come and take you away to a land like your own land, a land of grain and new wine, a land of bread and vineyards. ¹⁸ Beware lest Hezekiah persuade you, saying, "The LORD will deliver us." Have any of the gods of the nations delivered their lands from the hand of the king of Assyria? ¹⁹ Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Iwah? Have they delivered Samaria from my hand? ²⁰ Who are they among all the gods of these countries that have delivered their country out of my hand, that the LORD should deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?'" ²¹ But they remained silent, and said nothing in reply, for the king's commandment was, "Do not answer him." ²² Then Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, and Shebna the scribe, and Joah, the son of Asaph, the recorder, came to Hezekiah with their clothes torn, and told him the words of Rabshakeh.

¹⁵ The young lions have roared at him, and yelled. They have made his land waste. His cities are burned up, without inhabitant.

⁷ A lion is gone up from his thicket, and a destroyer of nations; he is on his way, he is gone forth from his place, to make your land desolate, that your cities be laid waste, without inhabitant.

⁶ Therefore a lion out of the forest shall kill them, a wolf of the evenings shall destroy them, a leopard shall watch against their cities; everyone who goes out there shall be torn in pieces; because their transgressions are many, and their backsliding is increased.

¹ "Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture." says the LORD. ² Therefore thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, against the shepherds who feed my people: "You have scattered my flock, and driven them away, and have not visited them; look, I will visit on you the evil of your doings," says the LORD.

¹ It happened when Jerusalem was taken, (in the ninth year of Zedekiah king of Judah, in the tenth month, came Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon and all his army against Jerusalem, and besieged it; ² in the eleventh year of Zedekiah, in the fourth month, the ninth day of the month, a breach was made in the city). ³ Then all the officials of the king of Babylon came in, and sat in the Middle Gate, Nergal-sar-ezer of Samgar, Nebu-sar-sekim the Rab-saris, Nergal-sar-ezer the Rab-mag, with all the rest of the officers of the king of Babylon. ⁴ It happened that, when Zedekiah the king of Judah and all the men of war saw them, then they fled, and went forth out of the city by night, by the way of the king's garden, through the gate between the two walls; and he went out toward the Arabah. ⁵ But the army of the Chaldeans pursued after them, and overtook Zedekiah in the plains of Jericho: and when they had taken him, they brought him up to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon to Riblah in the land of Hamath; and he gave judgment on him. ⁶ Then the king of Babylon killed the sons of Zedekiah in Riblah before his eyes: also the king of Babylon killed all the nobles of Judah. ⁷ Moreover he put out Zedekiah's eyes, and bound him in fetters, to carry him to Babylon. ⁸ The Chaldeans burned the king's house, and the houses of the people, with fire, and broke down the walls of Jerusalem.

¹⁹ Look, he shall come up like a lion from the pride of the Jordan against the strong habitation: for I will suddenly make them run away from it; and whoever is chosen, him will I appoint over it: for who is like me? And who will appoint me a time? And who is the shepherd who will stand before me?

⁶ My people have been lost sheep: their shepherds have caused them to go astray; they have turned them away on the mountains; they have gone from mountain to hill; they have forgotten their resting place.

³⁸ They shall roar together like young lions; they shall growl as lions' cubs.

¹ Zedekiah was twenty-one years old when he began to reign; and he reigned eleven years in Jerusalem: and his mother's name was Hamutal the daughter of Jeremiah of Libnah.

⁵ They were scattered, because there was no shepherd; and they became food to all the animals of the field, and were scattered. ⁶ My sheep wandered through all the mountains, and on every high hill: yes, my sheep were scattered on all the surface of the earth; and there was none who searched or sought."'

¹² As a shepherd seeks out his flock in the day that he is among his sheep that are scattered abroad, so will I seek out my sheep; and I will deliver them out of all places where they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day.

²⁴ The king commanded, and they brought those men who had accused Daniel, and they cast them into the den of lions, them, their children, and their wives; and the lions overpowered them, and broke all their bones in pieces, before they came to the bottom of the den.

² I will gather all nations, and will bring them down into the Valley of Jehoshaphat; and I will execute judgment on them there for my people, and for my heritage, Israel, whom they have scattered among the nations. They have divided my land,

³⁶ But when he saw the crowds, he was moved with compassion for them, because they were harassed and scattered, like sheep without a shepherd. ³⁷ Then he said to his disciples, "The harvest indeed is plentiful, but the laborers are few. ³⁸ Pray therefore that the Lord of the harvest will send out laborers into his harvest."

⁴ "Which one of you, if you had one hundred sheep, and lost one of them, would not leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness, and go after the one that was lost, until he found it? ⁵ When he has found it, he carries it on his shoulders, rejoicing. ⁶ When he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors, saying to them, 'Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which was lost.'

¹⁰ The thief only comes to steal, kill, and destroy. I came that they may have life, and may have it abundantly. ¹¹ I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. ¹² He who is a hired hand and not a shepherd, who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away; and the wolf snatches them and scatters them.

¹² Therefore it will happen that, when the Lord has performed his whole work on Mount Zion and on Jerusalem, he will punish the fruit of the willful proud heart of the king of Assyria, and the insolence of his haughty looks.

³⁶ The angel of the LORD went out and struck one hundred and eighty-five thousand men in the camp of the Assyrians. When men arose early in the morning, look, these were all dead bodies. ³⁷ So Sennacherib king of Assyria departed, went away, returned to Nineveh, and stayed there. ³⁸ It happened, as he was worshipping in the house of Nisroch his god, that Adrammelech and Sharezer his sons struck him with the sword; and they escaped into the land of Ararat. Esarhaddon his son reigned in his place.

³ Look, the Assyrian was a cedar in Lebanon with beautiful branches, and with a forest-like shade, and of high stature; and its top was among the thick boughs. ⁴ The waters nourished it, the deep made it to grow: its rivers ran all around its plantation; and it sent out its channels to all the trees of the field. ⁵ Therefore its stature was exalted above all the trees of the field; and its boughs were multiplied, and its branches became long by reason of many waters, when it shot them forth. ⁶ All the birds of the sky made their nests in its boughs; and under its branches all the animals of the field brought forth their young; and all great nations lived under its shadow. ⁷ Thus was it beautiful in its greatness, in the length of its branches; for its root was by many waters. ⁸ The cedars in the garden of God could not hide it; the fir trees were not like its boughs, and the plane trees were not as its branches; nor was any tree in the garden of God like it in its beauty. ⁹ I made it beautiful by the multitude of its branches, so that all the trees of Eden, that were in the garden of God, envied it.' ¹⁰ "Therefore thus said the Lord GOD: 'Because you are exalted in stature, and he has set his top among the thick boughs, and his heart is lifted up in his height; ¹¹ I will even deliver him into the hand of the mighty one of the nations; he shall surely deal with him; I have driven him out for his wickedness. ¹² Strangers, the terrible of the nations, have cut him off, and have left him: on the mountains and in all the valleys his branches are fallen, and his boughs are broken by all the watercourses of the land; and all the peoples of the earth are gone down from his shadow, and have left him. ¹³ On his ruin all the birds of the sky shall dwell, and all the animals of the field shall be on his branches; ¹⁴ to the end that none of all the trees by the waters exalt themselves in their stature, neither set their top among the thick boughs, nor that their mighty ones stand up on their height, even all who drink water: for they are all delivered to death, to the lower parts of the earth, among human beings who go down to the pit.' ¹⁵ "Thus says the Lord GOD: 'In the day when he went down to Sheol I caused a mourning: I covered the deep for him, and I restrained its rivers; and the great waters were stayed; and I caused Lebanon to mourn for him, and all the trees of the field fainted for him. ¹⁶ I made the nations to shake at the sound of his fall, when I cast him down to Sheol with those who descend into the pit; and all the trees of Eden, the choice and best of Lebanon, all that drink water, were comforted in the lower parts of the earth. ¹⁷ They also went down into Sheol with him to those who are slain by the sword; yes, those who were his arm, that lived under his shadow in the midst of the nations.

¹ An oracle about Nineveh. The book of the vision of Nahum the Elkoshite. ² The LORD is a jealous God and avenges. The LORD avenges and is full of wrath. The LORD takes vengeance on his adversaries, and he maintains wrath against his enemies. ³ The LORD is slow to anger, and great in power, and will by no means leave the guilty unpunished. The LORD has his way in the whirlwind and in the storm, and the clouds are the dust of his feet.

¹³ He will stretch out his hand against the north, destroy Assyria, and will make Nineveh a desolation, as dry as the wilderness. ¹⁴ Herds will lie down in the midst of her, all the animals of the nations. Both the pelican and the porcupine will lodge in its capitals. Their calls will echo through the windows. Desolation will be in the thresholds, for he has laid bare the cedar beams. ¹⁵ This is the joyous city that lived carelessly, that said in her heart, "I am, and there is none besides me." How she has become a desolation, a place for animals to lie down in. Everyone who passes by her will hiss, and shake their fists.

¹ Now the people of Reuben and the people of Gad had a very great multitude of livestock: and when they saw the land of Jazer, and the land of Gilead, that look, the place was a place for livestock;

¹⁵ Joshua said to them, "If you are a great people, go up to the forest, and clear land for yourself there in the land of the Perizzites and of the Rephaim; since the hill country of Ephraim is too narrow for you."

⁵ Turn away your eyes from me, for they have overcome me. Your hair is like a flock of goats, that lie along the side of Gilead.

⁹ The land mourns and languishes. Lebanon is confounded and withers away. Sharon is like a desert, and Bashan and Carmel are stripped bare.

² It will blossom abundantly, and rejoice even with joy and singing. Lebanon's glory Lebanon will be given to it, the excellence of Carmel and Sharon. They will see the LORD's glory, the excellence of our God.

⁹ And I will bring forth offspring from Jacob, and from Judah they shall inherit my mountains; and my chosen shall inherit it, and my servants shall dwell there. ¹⁰ Sharon shall be a fold of flocks, and the Valley of Achor a place for herds to lie down in, for my people who have sought me.

¹⁸ In those days the house of Judah shall walk with the house of Israel, and they shall come together out of the land of the north to the land that I gave for an inheritance to your fathers.

³ "I will gather the remnant of my flock out of all the countries where I have driven them, and will bring them again to their folds; and they shall be fruitful and multiply.

⁶ For I will set my eyes on them for good, and I will bring them again to this land: and I will build them, and not pull them down; and I will plant them, and not pluck them up. ⁷ I will give them a heart to know me, that I am the LORD: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God; for they shall return to me with their whole heart.'

¹⁰ Therefore do not be afraid, O Jacob my servant, says the LORD; neither be dismayed, Israel: for, look, I will save you from afar, and your descendants from the land of their captivity; and Jacob shall return, and shall be quiet and at ease, and none shall make him afraid.

¹⁸ Thus says the LORD: "Look, I will turn again the captivity of Jacob's tents, and have compassion on his dwelling places; and the city shall be built on its own hill, and the palace shall be inhabited in its own way.

⁶ For there shall be a day, that the watchmen on the hills of Ephraim shall cry, "Arise, and let us go up to Zion to the LORD our God."'"

⁸ 'Look, I will bring them from the north country, and gather them from the uttermost parts of the earth, along with the blind and the lame, the woman with child and her who travails with child together: a great company shall they return here.

¹⁴ I will satiate the soul of the priests with fatness, and my people shall be satisfied with my goodness," says the LORD.

²⁵ For I have satisfied the weary soul, and I have filled every sorrowful soul."

³⁷ 'Look, I will gather them out of all the countries, where I have driven them in my anger, and in my wrath, and in great indignation; and I will bring them again to this place, and I will cause them to dwell safely:

⁷ I will cause the captivity of Judah and the captivity of Israel to return, and will build them, as at the first. ⁸ I will cleanse them from all their iniquity, by which they have sinned against me; and I will pardon all their iniquities, by which they have sinned against me, and by which they have transgressed against me. ⁹ This city shall be to me for a name of joy, for a praise and for a glory, before all the nations of the earth, which shall hear all the good that I do to them, and shall fear and tremble for all the good and for all the peace that I procure to it.' ¹⁰ "Thus says the LORD: 'Yet again there shall be heard in this place, about which you say, "It is waste, without man and without animal," even in the cities of Judah, and in the streets of Jerusalem, that are desolate, without man and without inhabitant and without animal, ¹¹ the voice of joy and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, the voice of those who say, "Give thanks to the LORD of hosts, for the LORD is good, for his loving kindness endures forever; who bring thanksgiving into the house of the LORD." For I will cause the captivity of the land to return as at the first,' says the LORD. ¹² Thus says the LORD of hosts: 'Yet again shall there be in this place, which is waste, without man and without animal, and in all its cities, a habitation of shepherds causing their flocks to lie down.

⁴ In those days, and in that time,' says the LORD, 'the children of Israel shall come, they and the people of Judah together; they shall go on their way weeping, and shall seek the LORD their God. ⁵ They shall inquire concerning Zion with their faces turned toward it. They will come and join themselves to the LORD in an everlasting covenant that shall not be forgotten.

¹⁷ Therefore say, 'Thus says the Lord GOD: "I will gather you from the peoples, and assemble you out of the countries where you have been scattered, and I will give you the land of Israel."

¹³ I will bring them out from the peoples, and gather them from the countries, and will bring them into their own land; and I will feed them on the mountains of Israel, by the watercourses, and in all the inhabited places of the country. ¹⁴ I will feed them with good pasture; and on the mountains of the height of Israel shall their fold be: there shall they lie down in a good fold; and on fat pasture shall they feed on the mountains of Israel.

²⁴ For I will take you from among the nations, and gather you out of all the countries, and will bring you into your own land.

³³ "Thus says the Lord GOD: 'In the day that I cleanse you from all your iniquities, I will cause the cities to be inhabited, and the waste places shall be built.

⁸ After many days you shall be visited: in the latter years you shall come into the land that is brought back from the sword, that is gathered out of many peoples, on the mountains of Israel, which have been a continual waste; but it is brought forth out of the peoples, and they shall dwell securely, all of them.

²⁵ "Therefore thus says the Lord GOD: 'Now will I bring back the captivity of Jacob, and have mercy on the whole house of Israel; and I will be jealous for my holy name. ²⁶ They shall bear their shame, and all their trespasses by which they have trespassed against me, when they shall dwell securely in their land, and none shall make them afraid; ²⁷ when I have brought them back from the peoples, and gathered them out of their enemies' lands, and am sanctified in them in the sight of many nations. ²⁸ They shall know that I am the LORD their God, in that I caused them to go into captivity among the nations, and have gathered them to their own land; and I will leave none of them any more there; ²⁹ neither will I hide my face any more from them; for I have poured out my Spirit on the house of Israel,' says the Lord GOD."

¹⁴ I will bring my people Israel back from captivity, and they will rebuild the ruined cities, and inhabit them; and they will plant vineyards, and drink wine from them. They shall also make gardens, and eat the fruit of them. ¹⁵ I will plant them on their land, and they will no more be plucked up out of their land which I have given them," says the LORD your God.

¹⁷ But in Mount Zion, there will be those who escape, and it will be holy. The house of Jacob will possess those who dispossessed them. ¹⁸ The house of Jacob will be a fire, the house of Joseph a flame, and the house of Esau for stubble. They will burn among them, and devour them. There will not be any remaining to the house of Esau." Indeed, the LORD has spoken. ¹⁹ Those of the Negev will possess the mountain of Esau, and those of the lowland, the Philistines. They will possess the field of Ephraim, and the field of Samaria. Benjamin will possess Gilead. ²⁰ The captives of this army of the children of Israel, who are among the Canaanites, will possess even to Zarephath; and the captives of Jerusalem, who are in Sepharad, will possess the cities of the Negev. ²¹ Those who have been saved will go up on Mount Zion to judge the mountains of Esau, and the kingdom will be the LORD's.

¹⁴ Shepherd your people with your staff, the flock of your heritage, who dwell by themselves in a forest, in the midst of fertile pasture land, let them feed; in Bashan and Gilead, as in the days of old.

¹⁸ Who is a God like you, who pardons iniquity, and passes over the disobedience of the remnant of his heritage? He doesn't retain his anger forever, because he delights in loving kindness.

²¹ He has not seen iniquity in Jacob. Neither has he seen perverseness in Israel. The LORD his God is with him. The shout of a king is among them.

¹² As far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.

⁹ Unless the LORD of hosts had left us a few survivors, we would have been as Sodom, and we would have been like Gomorrah.

¹ A branch will come out of the stock of Jesse, and a shoot out of his roots will bear fruit. ² The Spirit of the LORD will rest on him: the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD.

²⁵ I, even I, am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake; and I will not remember your sins.

²² I have blotted out, as a thick cloud, your transgressions, and, as a cloud, your sins. Return to me, for I have redeemed you.

³⁴ and they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, 'Know the LORD'; for they shall all know me, from their least to their greatest,for I will forgive their iniquity, and their sins I will remember no more."

¹⁴ so that none of the remnant of Judah, who have gone into the land of Egypt to live there, shall escape or be left, to return into the land of Judah, to which they have a desire to return to dwell there: for none shall return save such as shall escape.'"

⁴ In those days, and in that time,' says the LORD, 'the children of Israel shall come, they and the people of Judah together; they shall go on their way weeping, and shall seek the LORD their God.

¹⁹ He will again have compassion on us. He will tread our iniquities under foot; and you will cast all their sins into the depths of the sea.

¹⁹ "Repent therefore, and turn again, that your sins may be blotted out, so that there may come times of refreshing from the presence of the Lord,

²⁶ God, having raised up his Servant, sent him to you first, to bless you, in turning away everyone of you from your wickedness."

¹⁶ The gift is not as through one who sinned: for the judgment came by one to condemnation, but the free gift came of many trespasses to justification.

¹³ Neither present your members to sin as instruments of unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God, as alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God.

³³ Who could bring a charge against God's chosen ones? It is God who justifies. ³⁴ Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and more than that, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us.

⁶ And if by grace, then it is no longer of works; otherwise grace is no longer grace.

²⁶ and so all Israel will be saved. Even as it is written, "There will come out of Zion the Deliverer; he will turn away ungodliness from Jacob. ²⁷ This is my covenant to them, when I will take away their sins."

¹⁰ "For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel. After those days," says the Lord; "I will put my laws into their mind, I will also write them on their heart. I will be their God, and they will be my people. ¹¹ They will not teach each one his fellow citizen, and each one his brother, saying, 'Know the Lord,' for all will know me, from the least of them to the greatest of them. ¹² For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness. I will remember their sins no more."

¹⁷ "And I will remember their sins and their iniquities no more." ¹⁸ Now where forgiveness of these is, there is no more offering for sin.

¹⁵ Regard the patience of our Lord as salvation; even as our beloved brother Paul also, according to the wisdom given to him, wrote to you;

¹⁴ Moses was angry with the officers of the army, the captains of thousands and the captains of hundreds, who came from the service of the war. ¹⁵ Moses said to them, "Have you saved all the women alive? ¹⁶ Look, these caused the children of Israel, through the counsel of Balaam, to commit trespass against the LORD in the matter of Peor, and so the plague was among the congregation of the LORD. ¹⁷ Now therefore kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman who has known man by lying with him. ¹⁸ But all the girls, who have not known man by lying with him, keep alive for yourselves.

³ Now go and strike Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and do not spare them; but kill both man and woman, infant and nursing baby, ox and sheep, camel and donkey.'"

¹¹ "It grieves me that I have made Saul king; for he has turned back from following me, and has not carried out my commandments." And Samuel was angry; and he cried to the LORD all night. ¹² And Samuel rose early to meet Saul in the morning; and it was told Samuel, saying, "Saul came to Carmel, and look, he set up a monument for himself, and turned, and passed on, and went down to Gilgal." And Samuel came to Saul, and look, he was offering up a burnt offering to the LORD, the best of the spoils which he had brought from Amalek. ¹³ And Samuel came to Saul; and Saul said to him, "You are blessed by the LORD. I have performed the commandment of the LORD." ¹⁴ Samuel said, "Then what does this bleating of the sheep in my ears, and the lowing of the cattle which I hear mean?" ¹⁵ And Saul said, "I have brought them from Amalek; for the people spared the best of the sheep and the cattle to sacrifice to the LORD your God, and I have utterly destroyed the rest." ¹⁶ Then Samuel said to Saul, "Stay, and I will tell you what the LORD has said to me last night." He said to him, "Say on." ¹⁷ Samuel said, "Though you were little in your own sight, weren't you made the head of the tribes of Israel? The LORD anointed you king over Israel; ¹⁸ and the LORD sent you on a journey, and said to you, 'Go, and utterly destroy the sinners the Amalekites, and fight against them until you have destroyed them.' ¹⁹ Why then did you not obey the voice of the LORD, but took the spoils, and did that which was evil in the sight of the LORD?" ²⁰ Saul said to Samuel, "But I have obeyed the voice of the LORD, and have gone the way which the LORD sent me, and have brought Agag the king of Amalek, and have utterly destroyed the Amalekites. ²¹ But the people took of the spoil, sheep and cattle, the chief of the devoted things, to sacrifice to the LORD your God in Gilgal." ²² Samuel said, "Has the LORD as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the LORD? Look, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to listen than the fat of rams. ²³ For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as idolatry and teraphim. Because you have rejected the word of the LORD, he has also rejected you from being king." ²⁴ Saul said to Samuel, "I have sinned; for I have transgressed the commandment of the LORD, and your words, because I feared the people, and obeyed their voice.

¹¹ David said to Abishai, and to all his servants, "Look, my son, who came forth from my bowels, seeks my life. How much more this Benjamite, now? Leave him alone, and let him curse; for the LORD has invited him.

²⁵ Have I now come up without the LORD against this place to destroy it? The LORD said to me, 'Go up against this land, and destroy it.'"'"

²³ "Thus says Koresh king of Persia, 'The LORD, the God of heaven, has given all the kingdoms of the earth to me; and he has commanded me to build him a house in Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Whoever there is among you of all his people, the LORD his God be with him, and let him go up.'"

⁶ I will send him against a profane nation, and against the people who anger me will I give him a command to take the spoil and to take the prey, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets.

²⁸ Who says of Koresh, 'He is my shepherd, and shall perform all my pleasure,' even saying of Jerusalem, 'She will be built;' and of the temple, 'Your foundation will be laid.'"

¹⁴ "Let all of them assemble and hear; who among them has declared these things? He whom the LORD loves shall perform his pleasure on Babylon, and his arm shall be on the Chaldeans.

²² Look, I will command, says the LORD, and cause them to return to this city; and they shall fight against it, and take it, and burn it with fire: and I will make the cities of Judah a desolation, without inhabitant."'"

¹⁰ Cursed is he who does the work of the LORD negligently; and cursed is he who keeps back his sword from blood.

¹⁵ Shout against her all around: she has submitted herself; her towers are fallen, her walls are thrown down; for it is the vengeance of the LORD: take vengeance on her; as she has done, do to her.

²³ the Babylonians and all the Chaldeans, Pekod and Shoa and Koa, and all the Assyrians with them; desirable young men, all of them governors and officials, officers and men of renown, all of them riding on horses.

² A grievous vision is declared to me. The treacherous man deals treacherously, and the destroyer destroys. Go up, Elam; attack. I have stopped all of Media's sighing. ³ Therefore my thighs are filled with anguish. Pains have taken hold on me, like the pains of a woman in labor. I am in so much pain that I can't hear. I so am dismayed that I can't see. ⁴ My heart flutters. Horror has frightened me. The twilight that I desired has been turned into trembling for me.

¹⁹ My anguish, my anguish. I am pained at my very heart; my heart is disquieted in me; I can't hold my peace; because you have heard, O my soul, the sound of the trumpet, the alarm of war. ²⁰ Destruction on destruction is proclaimed; for the whole land is laid waste: suddenly are my tents destroyed, and my curtains in a moment. ²¹ How long shall I see the standard, and hear the sound of the trumpet?

⁵⁴ "The sound of a cry from Babylon, and of great destruction from the land of the Chaldeans." ⁵⁵ For the LORD lays Babylon waste, and destroys out of her the great voice; and their waves roar like many waters; the noise of their voice is uttered: ⁵⁶ for the destroyer has come on her, even on Babylon, and her mighty men are taken, their bows are broken in pieces; for the LORD is a God of recompenses, he will surely requite.

⁴ that you will take up this parable against the king of Babylon, and say, "How the oppressor has ceased. How the attacker has ceased." ⁵ The LORD has broken the staff of the wicked, the scepter of the rulers, ⁶ who struck the peoples in wrath with a continual stroke, who ruled the nations in anger, with a persecution that none restrained.

²⁰ "You are my battle axe and weapons of war: and with you will I break in pieces the nations; and with you will I destroy kingdoms; ²¹ and with you will I break in pieces the horse and his rider; and with you will I break in pieces the chariot and its rider. ²² And with you will I break in pieces man and woman; and with you will I break in pieces the old man and the youth; and with you will I break in pieces the young man and the virgin; ²³ and with you will I break in pieces the shepherd and his flock; and with you will I break in pieces the farmer and his yoke; and with you will I break in pieces governors and deputies. ²⁴ I will render to Babylon and to all the inhabitants of Chaldea all their evil that they have done in Zion in your sight," says the LORD.

¹⁶ saying, 'Woe, woe, the great city, she who was dressed in fine linen, purple, and scarlet, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls.

³ Moses and Aaron went in to Pharaoh, and said to him, "This is what the LORD, the God of the Hebrews, says: 'How long will you refuse to humble yourself before me? Let my people go, that they may serve me.

⁴ For he is wise in heart, and mighty in strength: who has hardened himself against him, and prospered?

² "Shall he who argues contend with Shaddai? He who argues with God, let him answer it."

⁹ Or do you have an arm like God? Can you thunder with a voice like him?

¹² For man also doesn't know his time. As the fish that are taken in an evil net, and as the birds that are caught in the snare, even so are the sons of men snared in an evil time, when it falls suddenly on them.

¹¹ I will punish the world for their evil, and the wicked for their iniquity. I will cause the arrogance of the proud to cease, and will humble the haughtiness of the terrible.

³ Therefore my thighs are filled with anguish. Pains have taken hold on me, like the pains of a woman in labor. I am in so much pain that I can't hear. I so am dismayed that I can't see. ⁴ My heart flutters. Horror has frightened me. The twilight that I desired has been turned into trembling for me. ⁵ They prepare the table. They set the watch. They eat. They drink. Rise up, you princes, oil the shield.

⁹ Woe to him who strives with his Maker, a clay pot among the clay pots of the earth. Shall the clay ask him who fashions it, 'What are you making?' or your work, 'He has no hands?'

³¹ One runner will run to meet another, and one messenger to meet another, to show the king of Babylon that his city is taken on every quarter: ³² and the passages are seized, and the reeds they have burned with fire, and the men of war are frightened. ³³ For thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: "The daughter of Babylon is like a threshing floor at the time when it is trodden; yet a little while, and the time of harvest shall come for her. ³⁴ 'Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon has devoured me, he has crushed me, he has made me an empty vessel, he has, like a monster, swallowed me up, he has filled his maw with my delicacies; he has cast me out. ³⁵ The violence done to me and to my flesh be on Babylon,' shall the inhabitant of Zion say; and, 'My blood be on the inhabitants of Chaldea,' shall Jerusalem say. ³⁶ Therefore thus says the LORD: "Look, I will plead your cause, and take vengeance for you; and I will dry up her sea, and make her fountain dry. ³⁷ Babylon shall become heaps, a dwelling place for jackals, an astonishment, and a hissing, without inhabitant. ³⁸ They shall roar together like young lions; they shall growl as lions' cubs. ³⁹ When they are heated, I will make their feast, and I will make them drunk, that they may rejoice, and sleep a perpetual sleep, and not wake," says the LORD.

⁵⁷ "I will make drunk her officials and her wise men, her governors and her deputies, and her mighty men; and they shall sleep a perpetual sleep, and not wake up," says the King, whose name is the LORD of hosts.

³⁰ In that night Belshazzar the Chaldean King was slain. ³¹ Daryavesh the Mede received the kingdom, being about sixty-two years old.

⁴ he who opposes and exalts himself against all that is called God or that is worshiped; so that he sits in the temple of God, setting himself up as God.

⁷ However much she glorified herself, and grew wanton, so much give her of torment and mourning. For she says in her heart, 'I sit a queen, and am no widow, and will in no way see mourning.' ⁸ Therefore in one day her plagues will come: death, mourning, and famine; and she will be utterly burned with fire; for the Lord God who has judged her is strong.

³ Gird your sword on your thigh, mighty one: your splendor and your majesty.

⁵ Your arrows are sharp. The nations fall under you, with arrows in the heart of the king's enemies.

⁷ When he sees chariots, horsemen in pairs, riders on donkeys, riders on camels, let him listen diligently, very diligently." ⁸ Then the lookout shouted: "Lord, I stand continually on the watchtower in the daytime, and every night I stay at my post. ⁹ Look, here comes a troop of men, horsemen in pairs." He answered, "Fallen, fallen is Babylon; and all the engraved images of her gods are broken to the ground.

¹⁰ declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things that are not yet done; saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure; ¹¹ calling a ravenous bird from the east, the man of my counsel from a far country; yes, I have spoken, I will also bring it to pass; I have purposed, I will also do it.

¹⁴ "Let all of them assemble and hear; who among them has declared these things? He whom the LORD loves shall perform his pleasure on Babylon, and his arm shall be on the Chaldeans. ¹⁵ I, even I, have spoken; yes, I have called him; I have brought him, and he shall make his way prosperous.

³⁵ A sword is on the Chaldeans," says the LORD, "and on the inhabitants of Babylon, and on her officials, and on her wise men. ³⁶ A sword is on the boasters, and they shall become fools; a sword is on her mighty men, and they shall be dismayed. ³⁷ A sword is on their horses, and on their chariots, and on all the mixed people who are in the midst of her; and they shall become as women: a sword is on her treasures, and they shall be robbed. ³⁸ A drought is on her waters, and they shall be dried up; for it is a land of engraved images, and they glory over idols.

²⁰ "You are my battle axe and weapons of war: and with you will I break in pieces the nations; and with you will I destroy kingdoms;

⁵⁵ For the LORD lays Babylon waste, and destroys out of her the great voice; and their waves roar like many waters; the noise of their voice is uttered:

⁶ Does the trumpet alarm sound in a city, without the people being afraid? Does disaster happen to a city, unless the LORD has done it?

⁸ Therefore in one day her plagues will come: death, mourning, and famine; and she will be utterly burned with fire; for the Lord God who has judged her is strong.

²⁶ He will lift up a banner to the nations from far, and he will whistle for them from the far regions of the earth. Look, they will come speedily and swiftly.

²³ "I will also make it a possession for the porcupine, and pools of water. I will sweep it with the broom of destruction," says the LORD of hosts.

¹⁰ For in this mountain the hand of the LORD will rest. Moab will be trodden down in his place, even like straw is trodden down in a dunghill.

³ "I have trodden the winepress alone; and of the peoples there was no man with me: yes, I trod them in my anger, and trampled them in my wrath; and their lifeblood is sprinkled on my garments, and I have stained all my clothing. ⁴ For the day of vengeance was in my heart, and the year of my redeemed has come.

¹⁰ Chaldea shall be a prey: all who prey on her shall be satisfied,' says the LORD.'

¹³ Because of the wrath of the LORD she shall not be inhabited, but she shall be wholly desolate: everyone who goes by Babylon shall be astonished, and hiss at all her plagues.

²³ How is the hammer of the whole earth cut apart and broken. How is Babylon become a desolation among the nations.

⁴¹ "Look, a people comes from the north; and a great nation and many kings shall be stirred up from the uttermost parts of the earth.

²⁵ "Look, I am against you, destroying mountain," says the LORD, "which destroys all the earth; and I will stretch out my hand on you, and roll you down from the rocks, and will make you a burnt mountain. ²⁶ They shall not take of you a stone for a corner, nor a stone for foundations; but you shall be desolate for ever," says the LORD.

¹⁰ Then my enemy will see it, and shame will cover her who said to me, where is the LORD your God? Then my enemy will see me and will cover her shame. Now she will be trodden down like the mire of the streets.

¹⁹ The angel thrust his sickle into the earth, and gathered the vintage of the earth, and threw it into the great winepress of the wrath of God.

¹⁵ Out of his mouth proceeds a sharp sword, that with it he should strike the nations. He will rule them with an iron scepter. He treads the winepress of the fierceness of the wrath of the God of hosts.

¹³ The Lord will laugh at him, for he sees that his day is coming.

⁷ The wild oxen will come down with them, and the young bulls with the mighty bulls; and their land will be soaked with blood, and their dust made greasy with fat.

⁴⁴ He who flees from the fear shall fall into the pit; and he who gets up out of the pit shall be taken in the snare: for I will bring on him, even on Moab, the year of their visitation,' says the LORD.

³¹ "Look, I am against you, you proud one," says the Lord, the LORD of hosts; for your day has come, the time that I will visit you.

⁵ "Thus says the Lord GOD: 'A disaster, a unique disaster; look, it comes. ⁶ An end has come, the end has come; it awakes against you; look, it comes. ⁷ Your doom has come to you, inhabitant of the land: the time has come, the day is near, a day of tumult, and not of joyful shouting, on the mountains.

¹⁷ "You, son of man, thus says the Lord GOD: Speak to the birds of every sort, and to every animal of the field, 'Assemble yourselves, and come; gather yourselves on every side to my sacrifice that I do sacrifice for you, even a great sacrifice on the mountains of Israel, that you may eat flesh and drink blood. ¹⁸ You shall eat the flesh of the mighty, and drink the blood of the princes of the earth, of rams, of lambs, and of goats, of bulls, all of them fatlings of Bashan. ¹⁹ You shall eat fat until you be full, and drink blood until you are drunk, of my sacrifice which I have sacrificed for you. ²⁰ You shall be filled at my table with horses and chariots, with mighty men, and with all men of war,' says the Lord GOD.

¹⁷ The seventh poured out his bowl into the air. A loud voice came forth out of the temple, from the throne, saying, "It is done." ¹⁸ There were lightnings, voices, and peals of thunder; and there was a great earthquake, such as was not since man was on the earth, so great an earthquake, so mighty. ¹⁹ The great city was divided into three parts, and the cities of the nations fell. Babylon the great was remembered in the sight of God, to give to her the cup of the wine of the fierceness of his wrath.

¹⁰ standing far away for the fear of her torment, saying, 'Woe, woe, the great city, Babylon, the strong city. For your judgment has come in one hour.'

¹⁷ I saw an angel standing in the sun. He shouted with a loud voice, saying to all the birds that fly in the sky, "Come. Be gathered together to the great supper of God,

⁶ May the high praises of God be in their mouths, and a two-edged sword in their hand; ⁷ To execute vengeance on the nations, and punishments on the peoples; ⁸ To bind their kings with chains, and their nobles with fetters of iron; ⁹ to execute on them the written judgment. All his faithful ones have this honor. Praise the LORD.

¹⁰ 'The LORD has brought forth our righteousness: come, and let us declare in Zion the work of the LORD our God.' ¹¹ Make sharp the arrows; hold firm the shields: the LORD has stirred up the spirit of the kings of the Medes; because his purpose is against Babylon, to destroy it: for it is the vengeance of the LORD, the vengeance of his temple.

⁵⁰ You who have escaped the sword, go, do not stand still; remember the LORD from afar, and let Jerusalem come into your mind. ⁵¹ "We are confounded, because we have heard reproach; confusion has covered our faces: for strangers have come into the sanctuaries of the LORD's house."

¹⁰ The adversary has spread out his hand on all her precious things: for she has seen that the nations have entered into her sanctuary, concerning whom you commanded that they should not enter into your assembly.

⁶ He has done violence to his temple, as if it were a vineyard; he has destroyed his place of assembly. The LORD has caused solemn assembly and Sabbath to be forgotten in Zion, and he has spurned in his fierce anger king and priest and prince. ⁷ The LORD has rejected his altar, he has disowned his sanctuary, and has given up into the hand of the enemy the walls of her palaces. They have made a shout in the house of the LORD, as in the day of a solemn assembly.

³ Then they brought the gold and silver vessels that were taken out of the temple of the house of God which was at Jerusalem; and the king and his lords, his wives and his secondary wives, drank from them. ⁴ They drank wine, and praised the gods of gold, and of silver, of bronze, of iron, of wood, and of stone. ⁵ In the same hour came forth the fingers of a man's hand, and wrote over against the lampstand on the plaster of the wall of the king's palace: and the king saw the part of the hand that wrote.

²³ but have lifted up yourself against the Lord of heaven. And they have brought the vessels of his house before you, and you and your lords, your wives and your secondary wives, have drunk wine from them. And you have praised the gods of silver and gold, of bronze, iron, wood, and stone, which do not see, nor hear, nor know. And the God in whose hand your breath is, and whose are all your ways, you have not glorified.

² "Look, I will make Jerusalem a cup of reeling to all the surrounding peoples, and on Judah also will it be in the siege against Jerusalem. ³ It will happen in that day, that I will make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all the peoples. All who burden themselves with it will be severely wounded, and all the nations of the earth will be gathered together against it.

¹³ You said in your heart, "I will ascend into heaven. I will exalt my throne above the stars of God. I will sit on the mountain of assembly, in the far north. ¹⁴ I will ascend above the heights of the clouds. I will make myself like the Most High."

²³ Whom have you defied and blasphemed? Against whom have you exalted your voice and lifted up your eyes on high? Against the Holy One of Israel.

¹⁰ For you have trusted in your wickedness; you have said, No one sees me; your wisdom and your knowledge, it has perverted you, and you have said in your heart, 'I am, and there is no other besides me.'

¹⁴ "Set yourselves in array against Babylon all around, all you who bend the bow; shoot at her, spare no arrows: for she has sinned against the LORD. ¹⁵ Shout against her all around: she has submitted herself; her towers are fallen, her walls are thrown down; for it is the vengeance of the LORD: take vengeance on her; as she has done, do to her.

²⁴ I have laid a snare for you, and you are also taken, Babylon, and you weren't aware: you are found, and also caught, because you have striven against the LORD.

³² The proud one shall stumble and fall, and none shall raise him up; and I will kindle a fire in his cities, and it shall devour all who are around him."

⁵⁶ for the destroyer has come on her, even on Babylon, and her mighty men are taken, their bows are broken in pieces; for the LORD is a God of recompenses, he will surely requite.

³⁷ Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise and extol and honor the King of heaven; for all his works are truth, and his ways justice; and those who walk in pride he is able to humble."

³⁶ And the king shall do as he pleases. And he shall exalt and magnify himself above every god, and shall speak outrageous things against the God of gods. And he shall prosper until the indignation is accomplished; for that which is decreed shall be done.

⁵ A mouth was given to him speaking proud words and blasphemies. There was given to him authority to act for forty-two months. ⁶ He opened his mouth for blasphemies against God, to blaspheme his name, and his dwelling, those who dwell in heaven.

¹⁵ Everyone who is found will be thrust through. Everyone who is captured will fall by the sword. ¹⁶ Their infants also will be dashed in pieces before their eyes. Their houses will be ransacked, and their wives raped.

²¹ 'For death has come up into our windows, it is entered into our palaces; to cut off the children from outside, and the young men from the streets.'

²¹ Therefore deliver up their children to the famine, and give them over to the power of the sword; and let their wives become childless, and widows; and let their men be slain of death, and their young men struck of the sword in battle.

¹⁵ Moab is laid waste, and they are gone up into his cities, and his chosen young men are gone down to the slaughter,' says the King, whose name is the LORD of hosts.

²⁶ Therefore her young men shall fall in her streets, and all the men of war shall be brought to silence in that day," says the LORD of hosts.

³⁶ A sword is on the boasters, and they shall become fools; a sword is on her mighty men, and they shall be dismayed.

⁵⁶ for the destroyer has come on her, even on Babylon, and her mighty men are taken, their bows are broken in pieces; for the LORD is a God of recompenses, he will surely requite. ⁵⁷ "I will make drunk her officials and her wise men, her governors and her deputies, and her mighty men; and they shall sleep a perpetual sleep, and not wake up," says the King, whose name is the LORD of hosts.

¹⁵ The kings of the earth, the princes, the commanding officers, the rich, the strong, and every slave and free person, hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains.

¹⁸ that you may eat the flesh of kings, the flesh of captains, the flesh of mighty people, and the flesh of horses and of those who sit on them, and the flesh of all people both free and slave, and small and great."

¹¹ Pour out the fury of your anger. Look at everyone who is proud, and bring him low. ¹² Look at everyone who is proud, and humble him. Crush the wicked in their place.

¹³ Look, I am against you, O inhabitant of the valley, and of the rock of the plain," says the LORD; "you that say, 'Who shall come down against us? Or who shall enter into our habitations?'

²⁹ We have heard of the pride of Moab--he is very proud--of his pride, and his vanity, and his arrogance, and the haughtiness of his heart.

¹⁶ As for your terror, the pride of your heart has deceived you, O you who dwell in the clefts of the rock, who hold the height of the hill: though you should make your nest as high as the eagle, I will bring you down from there," says the LORD.

⁸ therefore thus says the Lord GOD: 'Look, I, even I, am against you; and I will execute judgments in the midst of you in the sight of the nations.

³ Speak and say, 'Thus says the Lord GOD: "Look, I am against you, Pharaoh king of Egypt, the great monster that lies in the midst of his rivers, that has said, 'My river is my own, and I have made it for myself.'

⁹ The land of Egypt shall be a desolation and a waste; and they shall know that I am the LORD. Because he has said, 'The river is mine, and I have made it;' ¹⁰ therefore, look, I am against you, and against your rivers, and I will make the land of Egypt an utter waste and desolation, from the tower of Syene even to the border of Ethiopia.

³ and say, 'Thus says the Lord GOD: "Look, I am against you, Gog, prince of Rosh, Meshech, and Tubal:

¹ "You, son of man, prophesy against Gog, and say, 'Thus says the Lord GOD: "Look, I am against you, Gog, prince of Rosh, Meshech, and Tubal:

³⁰ The king spoke and said, "Is not this great Babylon, which I have built for the royal dwelling place, by the might of my power and for the glory of my majesty?" ³¹ While the word was in the king's mouth, there fell a voice from the sky, saying, "O king Nebuchadnezzar, to you it is spoken. The kingdom has departed from you,

¹³ "Look, I am against you," says the LORD of hosts, "and I will burn her chariots in the smoke, and the sword will devour your young lions; and I will cut off your prey from the earth, and the voice of your messengers will no longer be heard."

⁵ "Look, I am against you," says the LORD of hosts, "and I will lift your skirts over your face. I will show the nations your nakedness, and the kingdoms your shame.

⁴ Look, if he holds back, my soul has no pleasure in him, but the righteous will live by faith. ⁵ And moreover, wealth is treacherous; a proud man will not endure. He enlarges his desire as Sheol, and he is like death, and canʼt be satisfied. He gathers all nations to himself, and collects to himself all peoples.

⁶ But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.

⁵ Likewise, you younger ones, be subject to the elder. Yes, all of you clothe yourselves with humility, towards one another; for God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.

²² For a fire is kindled in my anger, and burns to the lowest Sheol, and devours the earth with its increase, and sets the foundations of the mountains on fire.

¹⁸ Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.

¹² Before destruction the heart of man is proud, but before honor is humility.

¹² Therefore it will happen that, when the Lord has performed his whole work on Mount Zion and on Jerusalem, he will punish the fruit of the willful proud heart of the king of Assyria, and the insolence of his haughty looks. ¹³ For he has said, "By the strength of my hand I have done it, and by my wisdom; for I have understanding: and I have removed the boundaries of the peoples, and have robbed their treasures. Like a valiant man I have brought down their rulers. ¹⁴ My hand has found the riches of the peoples like a nest, and like one gathers eggs that are abandoned, have I gathered all the earth. There was no one who moved their wing, or that opened their mouth, or chirped." ¹⁵ Should an axe brag against him who chops with it? Should a saw exalt itself above him who saws with it? As if a rod should lift those who lift it up, or as if a staff should lift up someone who is not wood.

¹³ You said in your heart, "I will ascend into heaven. I will exalt my throne above the stars of God. I will sit on the mountain of assembly, in the far north. ¹⁴ I will ascend above the heights of the clouds. I will make myself like the Most High." ¹⁵ Yet you shall be brought down to Sheol, to the depths of the Pit.

¹⁴ I will punish you according to the fruit of your doings," says the LORD; "and I will kindle a fire in her forest, and it shall devour all that is around her."'"

²⁷ "I will kindle a fire in the wall of Damascus, and it shall devour the palaces of Ben Hadad."

²⁶ They shall not take of you a stone for a corner, nor a stone for foundations; but you shall be desolate for ever," says the LORD.

² "Son of man, tell the prince of Tyre, 'Thus says the Lord GOD: "Because your heart is lifted up, and you have said, 'I am a god, I sit in the seat of God, in the midst of the seas'; yet you are man, and not God, though you set your heart as the heart of God— ³ look, you are wiser than Daniel; there is no secret that is hidden from you; ⁴ by your wisdom and by your understanding you have gotten yourself riches, and have gotten gold and silver into your treasures; ⁵ by your great wisdom and by your traffic you have increased your riches, and your heart is lifted up because of your riches"— ⁶ therefore thus says the Lord GOD: "Because you have set your heart as the heart of God, ⁷ therefore, look, I will bring strangers on you, the terrible of the nations; and they shall draw their swords against the beauty of your wisdom, and they shall defile your brightness. ⁸ They shall bring you down to the pit; and you shall die the death of those who are slain, in the heart of the seas. ⁹ Will you yet say before him who kills you, 'I am a god'? But you are a man, and not a god, in the hand of him who wounds you.

²⁰ But when his heart was lifted up, and his spirit was hardened so that he dealt proudly, he was removed from his kingly throne, and they took his glory from him.

²³ but have lifted up yourself against the Lord of heaven. And they have brought the vessels of his house before you, and you and your lords, your wives and your secondary wives, have drunk wine from them. And you have praised the gods of silver and gold, of bronze, iron, wood, and stone, which do not see, nor hear, nor know. And the God in whose hand your breath is, and whose are all your ways, you have not glorified. ²⁴ Then was the part of the hand sent from before him, and this writing was inscribed. ²⁵ This is the writing that was inscribed: MENE, MENE, TEKEL, UPHARSIN. ²⁶ This is the interpretation of the thing: MENE; God has numbered your kingdom, and brought it to an end; ²⁷ TEKEL; you are weighed in the balances, and are found wanting. ²⁸ PERES; your kingdom is divided, and given to the Medes and Persians." ²⁹ Then commanded Belshazzar, and they clothed Daniel with purple, and put a chain of gold about his neck, and made proclamation concerning him, that he should be the third ruler in the kingdom. ³⁰ In that night Belshazzar the Chaldean King was slain.

⁴ but I will send a fire into the house of Hazael, and it will devour the palaces of Ben Hadad.

⁷ but I will send a fire on the wall of Gaza, and it will devour its palaces.

¹⁰ but I will send a fire on the wall of Tyre, and it will devour its palaces."

¹² but I will send a fire on Teman, and it will devour the palaces of Bozrah."

¹⁴ But I will kindle a fire in the wall of Rabbah, and it will devour its palaces, with shouting in the day of battle, with a storm in the day of the whirlwind;

² but I will send a fire on Moab, and it will devour the palaces of Kerioth; and Moab will die with tumult, with shouting, and with the sound of the trumpet;

⁵ But I will send a fire on Judah, and it will devour the palaces of Jerusalem."

² Pharaoh said, "Who is the LORD, that I should listen to his voice to let Israel go? I do not know the LORD, and moreover I will not let Israel go."

² If you refuse to let them go, look, I will plague all your borders with frogs:

² For if you refuse to let them go, and hold them still, ³ look, the hand of the LORD is on your livestock which are in the field, on the horses, on the donkeys, on the camels, on the herds, and on the flocks with a very grievous pestilence.

¹⁷ as you still exalt yourself against my people, that you won't let them go. ¹⁸ Look, tomorrow about this time I will cause it to rain a very grievous hail, such as has not been in Egypt since the day it was founded even until now.

¹⁷ who made the world like a wilderness, and overthrew its cities; who did not release his prisoners to their home?"

²⁴ Shall the prey be taken from the mighty, or the captives of a tyrant be delivered? ²⁵ But thus says the LORD, "Even the captives of the mighty shall be taken away, and the prey of the tyrant shall be delivered; for I will contend with him who contends with you, and I will save your children. ²⁶ I will feed those who oppress you with their own flesh; and they shall be drunk with their own blood, as with sweet wine: and all flesh shall know that I, the LORD, am your Savior, and your Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob."

²³ and I will put it into the hand of those who afflict you, who have said to your soul, 'Bow down, that we may walk over you;' and you have laid your back as the ground, and as the street, to those who walk over."

⁴ For thus says the LORD, "My people went down at the first into Egypt to live there, and the Assyrian oppressed them without cause. ⁵ "Now therefore, what do I do here," says the LORD, "seeing that my people are taken away for nothing? Those who rule over them mock," says the LORD. "Because of you, my name is continually all the day blasphemed among the nations. ⁶ Therefore my people shall know my name; in that day they will know that I am he who speaks; look, it is I."

⁶ "Isn't this the fast that I have chosen: to release the bonds of wickedness, to undo the bands of the yoke, and to let the oppressed go free, and that you break every yoke?

¹⁵ You had now turned, and had done that which is right in my eyes, in proclaiming liberty every man to his neighbor; and you had made a covenant before me in the house which is called by my name: ¹⁶ but you turned and profaned my name, and caused every man his servant, and every man his handmaid, whom you had let go free at their pleasure, to return; and you brought them into subjection, to be to you for servants and for handmaids. ¹⁷ Therefore thus says the LORD: "You have not listened to me, to proclaim liberty, every man to his brother, and every man to his neighbor: look, I proclaim to you a liberty, says the LORD, to the sword, to the pestilence, and to the famine; and I will make you to be tossed back and forth among all the kingdoms of the earth. ¹⁸ I will give the men who have transgressed my covenant, who have not performed the words of the covenant which they made before me, when they cut the calf in two and passed between its parts;

¹⁷ 'Israel is a hunted sheep; the lions have driven him away: first, the king of Assyria devoured him; and now at last Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon has broken his bones. ¹⁸ Therefore thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: "Look, I will punish the king of Babylon and his land, as I have punished the king of Assyria.

³⁴ 'Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon has devoured me, he has crushed me, he has made me an empty vessel, he has, like a monster, swallowed me up, he has filled his maw with my delicacies; he has cast me out. ³⁵ The violence done to me and to my flesh be on Babylon,' shall the inhabitant of Zion say; and, 'My blood be on the inhabitants of Chaldea,' shall Jerusalem say. ³⁶ Therefore thus says the LORD: "Look, I will plead your cause, and take vengeance for you; and I will dry up her sea, and make her fountain dry.

¹⁵ I am very angry with the nations that are at ease; for I was but only a little angry, but they added to the calamity." ¹⁶ Therefore thus says the LORD: "I have returned to Jerusalem with mercy. My house will be built in it," says the LORD of hosts, "and a line shall be stretched forth over Jerusalem."'

⁶ Therefore tell the children of Israel, 'I am the LORD, and I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, and I will rid you out of their bondage, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm, and with great judgments:

¹ [By David.] Contend, LORD, with those who contend with me. Fight against those who fight against me.

¹ Vindicate me, God, and plead my cause against a faithless nation. Oh, deliver me from the deceitful and unjust man.

²³ for the LORD will plead their case, and plunder the life of those who plunder them.

¹¹ for their Defender is strong. He will plead their case against you.

³ It will happen in the day that the LORD will give you rest from your sorrow, from your trouble, and from the hard service in which you were made to serve, ⁴ that you will take up this parable against the king of Babylon, and say, "How the oppressor has ceased. How the attacker has ceased." ⁵ The LORD has broken the staff of the wicked, the scepter of the rulers, ⁶ who struck the peoples in wrath with a continual stroke, who ruled the nations in anger, with a persecution that none restrained. ⁷ The whole earth is at rest, and is quiet. They break out song.

¹⁴ Do not be afraid, you worm Jacob, and you men of Israel. I will help you," says the LORD, "and your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel.

¹⁴ Thus says the LORD, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel: "For your sake, I have sent to Babylon, and I will bring all of them down as fugitives, even the Chaldeans, in the ships of their rejoicing.

⁶ This is what the LORD, the King of Israel, and his Redeemer, the LORD of hosts, says: "I am the first, and I am the last; and besides me there is no God.

²³ Sing, you heavens, for the LORD has done it. Shout, you lower parts of the earth. Break out into singing, you mountains, O forest, all of your trees, for the LORD has redeemed Jacob, and will glorify himself in Israel. ²⁴ Thus says the LORD, your Redeemer, and he who formed you from the womb: "I am the LORD, who makes all things; who alone stretches out the heavens; who spreads out the earth by myself;

⁴ says our Redeemer; the LORD of hosts is his name, the Holy One of Israel.

²² Thus says your Lord, the LORD, and your God who pleads the cause of his people, "Look, I have taken out of your hand the cup of staggering, even the bowl of the cup of my wrath; you shall no more drink it again:

⁵ For your husband is your Creator; the LORD of hosts is his name: and the Holy One of Israel is your Redeemer; the God of the whole earth shall he be called.

²¹ "I will deliver you out of the hand of the wicked, and I will redeem you out of the hand of the terrible."

¹⁹ The portion of Jacob is not like these, for he is the maker of all things; and Israel is the tribe of his inheritance; the LORD of hosts is his name.

¹⁰ Be in pain, and labor to bring forth, daughter of Zion, like a woman in travail; for now you will go forth out of the city, and will dwell in the field, and will come even to Babylon. There you will be rescued. There the LORD will redeem you from the hand of your enemies.

⁹ I will bear the indignation of the LORD, because I have sinned against him, until he pleads my case, and executes judgment for me. He will bring me forth to the light. I will see his righteousness.

⁶ Since it is a righteous thing with God to repay affliction to those who afflict you, ⁷ and to give relief to you who are afflicted with us, when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire,

¹ After these things I heard something like a loud voice of a great multitude in heaven, saying, "Hallelujah. Salvation, glory, and power belong to our God: ² for true and righteous are his judgments. For he has judged the great prostitute, who corrupted the earth with her sexual immorality, and he has avenged the blood of his servants at her hand." ³ A second said, "Hallelujah. Her smoke goes up forever and ever."

²⁵ I will bring a sword upon you, that will execute the vengeance of the covenant; and you will be gathered together within your cities: and I will send the pestilence among you; and you will be delivered into the hand of the enemy.

¹¹ The princes of Zoan are utterly foolish. The counsel of the wisest counselors of Pharaoh has become stupid. How do you say to Pharaoh, "I am the son of the wise, the son of ancient kings?" ¹² Where then are your sages? And let them tell you now; and let them know what the LORD of hosts has purposed concerning Egypt. ¹³ The princes of Zoan have become fools. The princes of Memphis are deceived. They have caused Egypt to go astray, who are the cornerstone of her tribes.

¹⁴ Therefore, look, I will again do a marvelous work among this people, even a marvelous work and a wonder; and I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the discernment of the discerning I will nullify."

²⁵ who foils the omens of the empty talkers, and makes fools of diviners; who turns sages back, and makes their knowledge foolish;

¹³ You are wearied in the multitude of your counsels; those who conjure the heavens, the stargazers, the monthly prognosticators, stand up, and save you from the things that shall come on you. ¹⁴ Look, they shall be as stubble; the fire shall burn them; they shall not deliver themselves from the power of the flame: it shall not be a coal to warm at, nor a fire to sit before.

¹⁶ For by fire will the LORD execute judgment, and by his sword, on all flesh; and the slain of the LORD shall be many.

⁹ The wise men are disappointed, they are dismayed and taken: look, they have rejected the word of the LORD; and what kind of wisdom is in them?

⁷ Who should not fear you, King of the nations? For it appertains to you; because among all the wise men of the nations, and in all their royal estate, there is none like you.

⁶ You sword of the LORD, "how long will it be before you be quiet? Put yourself into your sheath; rest, and be still."

³⁰ Therefore her young men will fall in her streets, and all her men of war will be brought to silence in that day," says the LORD.

³⁹ When they are heated, I will make their feast, and I will make them drunk, that they may rejoice, and sleep a perpetual sleep, and not wake," says the LORD.

² The word of the LORD came to me, saying,

¹ Belshazzar the king made a great feast to a thousand of his lords, and drank wine before the thousand. ² Belshazzar, while he tasted the wine, commanded to bring the golden and silver vessels which Nebuchadnezzar his father had taken out of the temple which was in Jerusalem; that the king and his lords, his wives and his secondary wives, might drink from them.

⁷ The king cried aloud to bring in the enchanters, the Chaldeans, and the diviners. The king spoke and said to the wise men of Babylon, "Whoever shall read this writing, and show me its interpretation, shall be clothed with purple, and have a chain of gold about his neck, and shall be the third ruler in the kingdom." ⁸ Then came in all the king's wise men; but they could not read the writing, nor make known to the king the interpretation.

³⁰ In that night Belshazzar the Chaldean King was slain.

⁶ The sword will fall on their cities, and will destroy the bars of their gates, and will put an end to their plans.

¹⁷ Woe to the worthless shepherd who leaves the flock. The sword will be on his arm, and on his right eye. His arm will be completely withered, and his right eye will be totally blinded."

³¹ And it had been told to David, saying, "Ahithophel is among the conspirators with Absalom." David said, "LORD, please turn the counsel of Ahithophel into foolishness."

¹⁴ Absalom and all the men of Israel said, "The counsel of Hushai the Archite is better than the counsel of Ahithophel." For the LORD had ordained to defeat the good counsel of Ahithophel, to the intent that the LORD might bring evil on Absalom.

¹⁶ It happened, as he talked with him, that the king said to him, "Have we made you one of the king's counselors? Stop. Why should you be struck down?" Then the prophet stopped, and said, "I know that God has determined to destroy you, because you have done this, and have not listened to my counsel."

³⁰ I know his wrath,' says the LORD, 'that it is nothing; his boastings have worked nothing.

²² Look, he shall come up and fly as the eagle, and spread out his wings against Bozrah: and the heart of the mighty men of Edom at that day shall be as the heart of a woman in her pangs."

³⁰ The mighty men of Babylon have forborne to fight, they remain in their strongholds; their might has failed; they are become as women: her dwelling places are set on fire; her bars are broken.

³² and the passages are seized, and the reeds they have burned with fire, and the men of war are frightened.

⁸ But Nineveh has been from of old like a pool of water, yet they flee away. "Stop. Stop." they cry, but no one looks back.

⁷ It will happen that all those who look at you will flee from you, and say, 'Nineveh is laid waste. Who will mourn for her?' Where will I seek comforters for you?"

¹³ Look, your troops in your midst are women. The gates of your land are set wide open to your enemies. The fire has devoured your bars.

¹⁷ Your guards are like the locusts, and your officials like the swarms of locusts, which settle on the walls on a cold day, but when the sun appears, they flee away, and their place is not known where they are. ¹⁸ Your shepherds slumber, king of Assyria. Your nobles lie down. Your people are scattered on the mountains, and there is no one to gather them.

⁹ even he whose coming is according to the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders, ¹⁰ and with all deception of wickedness for those who are perishing, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved. ¹¹ And because of this, God sends them a strong delusion, that they should believe the lie,

² through the hypocrisy of liars, branded in their own conscience as with a hot iron;

⁴ he is conceited, knowing nothing, but obsessed with arguments, disputes, and word battles, from which come envy, strife, reviling, evil suspicions,

²⁰ The beast was taken, and with him the false prophet who worked the signs in his sight, with which he deceived those who had received the mark of the beast and those who worshiped his image. These two were thrown alive into the lake of fire that burns with sulfur.

⁸ But to the cowards, and unbelieving, and detestable, and murderers, and sexually immoral, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death."

¹⁵ Outside are the dogs, the sorcerers, the sexually immoral, the murderers, the idolaters, and everyone who loves and practices falsehood.

⁷ Some [trust] in chariots, and some in horses, but we trust the name of the LORD our God. ⁸ They are bowed down and fallen, but we rise up, and stand upright.

⁹ He makes wars cease throughout the earth. He breaks the bow, and shatters the spear. He burns the chariots in the fire.

⁶ At your rebuke, God of Jacob, both chariot and horse are cast into a deep sleep.

¹⁶ In that day the Egyptians will be like women. They will tremble and fear because of the shaking of the hand of the LORD of hosts, which he shakes over them.

²⁰ and all the mixed people, and all the kings of the land of the Uz, and all the kings of the Philistines, and Ashkelon, and Gaza, and Ekron, and the remnant of Ashdod;

²⁴ and all the kings of Arabia, [and all the kings of the mixed people] who dwell in the wilderness;

⁴¹ Kerioth is taken, and the strongholds are seized, and the heart of the mighty men of Moab at that day shall be as the heart of a woman in her pangs.

²¹ and with you will I break in pieces the horse and his rider; and with you will I break in pieces the chariot and its rider.

⁵ Ethiopia, and Put, and Lud, and all the mixed people, and Cub, and the children of the land that is allied with them, shall fall with them by the sword."'

²⁰ You shall be filled at my table with horses and chariots, with mighty men, and with all men of war,' says the Lord GOD.

² For the LORD restores the excellency of Jacob, as the excellency of Israel; for the destroyers have destroyed them, and ruined their vine branches. ³ The shield of his mighty men is made red. The valiant men are in scarlet. The chariots flash with steel in the day of his preparation, and the pine spears are brandished. ⁴ The chariots rage in the streets. They rush back and forth in the broad ways. Their appearance is like torches. They run like the lightnings.

²² I will overthrow the throne of kingdoms. I will destroy the strength of the kingdoms of the nations. I will overthrow the chariots, and those who ride in them. The horses and their riders will come down, everyone by the sword of his brother.

²⁷ who says to the deep, 'Be dry,' and 'I will dry up your rivers;'

¹ Bel bows down, Nebo stoops; their idols are on the animals, and on the livestock: the things that you carried about are made a load, a burden to the weary. ² They stoop, they bow down together; they could not deliver the burden, but they have gone into captivity. ³ "Listen to me, house of Jacob, and all the remnant of the house of Israel, that have been borne from their birth, that have been carried from the womb; ⁴ and even to old age I am he, and even to gray hairs will I carry you. I have made, and I will bear; yes, I will carry, and will deliver. ⁵ "To whom will you liken me, and make me equal, and compare me, that we may be like? ⁶ Some pour out gold from the bag, and weigh silver in the balance. They hire a goldsmith, and he makes it a god. They fall down—yes, they worship. ⁷ They bear it on the shoulder, they carry it, and set it in its place, and it stands, from its place it shall not move: yes, one may cry to it, yet it can not answer, nor save him out of his trouble.

² "Declare among the nations and publish, and set up a standard; publish, and do not conceal: say, 'Babylon is taken, Bel is disappointed, Marduk is dismayed; her images are disappointed, her idols are dismayed.

¹² your mother shall be utterly disappointed; she who bore you shall be confounded: look, she shall be the least of the nations, a wilderness, a dry land, and a desert.

⁷ Babylon has been a golden cup in the LORD's hand, who made all the earth drunk: the nations have drunk of her wine; therefore the nations are mad.

³² and the passages are seized, and the reeds they have burned with fire, and the men of war are frightened. ³³ For thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: "The daughter of Babylon is like a threshing floor at the time when it is trodden; yet a little while, and the time of harvest shall come for her.

¹ Nebuchadnezzar the king made an image of gold, whose height was eighty-eight feet seven inches, and its breadth eight feet ten inches: he set it up in the plain of Dura, in the province of Babylon. ² Then Nebuchadnezzar the king sent to gather together the satraps, the prefects, and the governors, the judges, the treasurers, the counselors, the magistrates, and all the rulers of the provinces, to come to the dedication of the image which Nebuchadnezzar the king had set up. ³ Then the satraps, the prefects, and the governors, the judges, the treasurers, the counselors, the magistrates, and all the rulers of the provinces, were gathered together to the dedication of the image that Nebuchadnezzar the king had set up; and they stood before the image that Nebuchadnezzar had set up. ⁴ Then the herald cried aloud, "To you it is commanded, peoples, nations, and languages, ⁵ that whenever you hear the sound of the horn, flute, zither, lyre, harp, pipe, and all kinds of music, you fall down and worship the golden image that Nebuchadnezzar the king has set up; ⁶ and whoever doesn't fall down and worship shall the same hour be cast into the midst of a burning fiery furnace." ⁷ Therefore at that time, when all the peoples heard the sound of the horn, flute, zither, lyre, harp, pipe, and all kinds of music, all the peoples, the nations, and the languages, fell down and worshiped the golden image that Nebuchadnezzar the king had set up. ⁸ Therefore at that time certain Chaldeans came near, and brought accusation against the Jews. ⁹ They answered Nebuchadnezzar the king, "O king, live for ever. ¹⁰ You, O king, have made a decree, that every man that shall hear the sound of the horn, flute, zither, lyre, harp, pipe, and all kinds of music, shall fall down and worship the golden image; ¹¹ and whoever doesn't fall down and worship shall be cast into the midst of a burning fiery furnace. ¹² There are certain Jews whom you have appointed over the affairs of the province of Babylon: Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. These men, O king, have not regarded you: they do not serve your gods, nor worship the golden image which you have set up." ¹³ Then Nebuchadnezzar in his rage and fury commanded to bring Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. Then they brought these men before the king. ¹⁴ Nebuchadnezzar answered them, "Is it on purpose, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, that you do not serve my god, nor worship the golden image which I have set up? ¹⁵ Now if you are ready whenever you hear the sound of the horn, flute, zither, lyre, harp, pipe, and all kinds of music to fall down and worship the image which I have made, well: but if you do not worship, you shall be cast the same hour into the midst of a burning fiery furnace; and who is that god that shall deliver you out of my hands?" ¹⁶ Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego answered the king, "Nebuchadnezzar, we have no need to answer you in this matter. ¹⁷ If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace; and he will deliver us out of your hand, O king. ¹⁸ But if not, be it known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods, nor worship the golden image which you have set up." ¹⁹ Then was Nebuchadnezzar full of fury, and the expression of his face was changed against Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. Therefore he spoke, and commanded that they should heat the furnace seven times more than it was usually heated. ²⁰ He commanded certain mighty men who were in his army to bind Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, and to cast them into the burning fiery furnace. ²¹ Then these men were bound in their cloaks, trousers, their turbans, and their other garments, and were cast into the midst of the burning fiery furnace. ²² Therefore because the king's commandment was urgent, and the furnace exceeding hot, the flame of the fire killed those men who took up Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. ²³ These three men, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, fell down bound into the midst of the burning fiery furnace. ²⁴ Then Nebuchadnezzar the king was astonished, and rose up quickly. He spoke and said to his ministers, "Did we not cast three men bound into the midst of the fire?" They answered the king, "True, O king." ²⁵ He answered, "Look, I see four men loose, walking in the midst of the fire, and they are unharmed; and the aspect of the fourth is like a son of the gods." ²⁶ Then Nebuchadnezzar came near to the mouth of the burning fiery furnace. He spoke and said, "Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, you servants of the Most High God, come forth, and come here." Then Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego came forth out of the midst of the fire. ²⁷ The satraps, the prefects, and the governors, and the king's ministers, being gathered together, saw these men, that the fire had no power on their bodies, nor was the hair of their head singed, neither were their trousers changed, nor had the smell of fire passed on them. ²⁸ Nebuchadnezzar spoke and said, "Blessed be the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, who has sent his angel, and delivered his servants who trusted in him, and have changed the king's word, and have yielded their bodies, that they might not serve nor worship any god, except their own God. ²⁹ Therefore I make a decree, that every people, nation, and language, which speak anything evil against the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, shall be cut in pieces, and their houses shall be reduced to rubble; because there is no other god who is able to deliver in this way." ³⁰ Then the king promoted Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego in the province of Babylon.

⁴ They drank wine, and praised the gods of gold, and of silver, of bronze, of iron, of wood, and of stone.

¹⁸ "What value does the engraved image have, that its maker has engraved it; the molten image, even the teacher of lies, that he who fashions its form trusts in it, to make mute idols? ¹⁹ Woe to him who says to the wood, 'Awake.' or to the mute stone, 'Arise.' Shall this teach? Look, it is overlaid with gold and silver, and there is no breath at all in its midst.

¹⁶ Now while Paul waited for them at Athens, his spirit was provoked within him as he saw the city full of idols.

¹² The sixth poured out his bowl on the great river, the Euphrates. Its water was dried up, that the way might be made ready for the kings that come from the sunrise.

¹⁵ He said to me, "The waters which you saw, where the prostitute sits, are peoples, multitudes, nations, and languages. ¹⁶ The ten horns which you saw, and the beast, these will hate the prostitute, and will make her desolate and naked, and will eat her flesh, and will burn her utterly with fire.

¹¹ But the pelican and the porcupine will possess it. The owl and the raven will dwell in it. He will stretch the line of confusion over it, and the plumb line of emptiness. ¹² They shall call its nobles to the kingdom, but none shall be there; and all its princes shall be nothing. ¹³ Thorns will come up in its palaces, nettles and thistles in its fortresses; and it will be a habitation of jackals, a court for ostriches. ¹⁴ And the wildcats will meet with the hyenas, and the wild goat will cry to his fellow. There too, nocturnal animals shall settle, and shall find themselves a place of rest. ¹⁵ The owl will make her nest there, and lay, hatch, and gather under her shade. Yes, the vultures will be gathered there, every one with her mate. ¹⁶ Search in the scroll of the LORD, and read: not one of these will be missing. None will lack her mate. For my mouth has commanded, and his Spirit has gathered them. ¹⁷ He has cast the lot for them, and his hand has divided it to them with a measuring line. They shall possess it forever. From generation to generation they will dwell in it.

³⁷ Babylon shall become heaps, a dwelling place for jackals, an astonishment, and a hissing, without inhabitant. ³⁸ They shall roar together like young lions; they shall growl as lions' cubs.

²⁴ Then the LORD rained on Sodom and on Gomorrah sulfur and fire from the sky. ²⁵ He overthrew those cities, and all the plain, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and that which grew on the ground.

²³ and that the whole land of it is sulfur, salt, and burning, that it is not sown, nor bears, nor any grass grows in it, like the overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrah, Admah and Zeboiim, which the LORD overthrew in his anger, and in his wrath:

¹⁹ Babylon, the glory of kingdoms, the beauty of the Chaldeans' pride, will be like when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah. ²⁰ It will never be inhabited, neither will it be lived in from generation to generation. The Arabian will not pitch a tent there, neither will shepherds make their flocks lie down there.

¹⁸ As in the overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrah and the neighbor cities of it," says the LORD, "no man shall dwell there, neither shall any son of man live in it.

⁸ "How can I give you up, Ephraim? How can I hand you over, Israel? How can I make you like Admah? How can I make you like Zeboiim? My heart is turned within me, my compassion is aroused. ⁹ I will not execute the fierceness of my anger. I will not return to destroy Ephraim: for I am God, and not man; the Holy One in the midst of you; and I will not come in wrath.

¹¹ "I have overthrown some of you, as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, and you were like a burning stick plucked out of the fire; yet you haven't returned to me," says the LORD.

⁹ Therefore as I live, says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, surely Moab will be as Sodom, and the people of Ammon as Gomorrah, a possession of nettles, and salt pits, and a perpetual desolation. The remnant of my people will plunder them, and the survivors of my nation will inherit them.

²⁸ Likewise, even as it happened in the days of Lot: they ate, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they built; ²⁹ but in the day that Lot went out from Sodom, it rained fire and sulfur from the sky, and destroyed them all. ³⁰ It will be the same way in the day that the Son of Man is revealed.

⁶ and turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, condemned them to destruction, having made them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly;

⁷ Even as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities around them, having, in the same way as these, given themselves over to sexual immorality and gone after strange flesh, are set forth as an example, suffering the punishment of everlasting fire.

⁸ Their dead bodies will be in the street of the great city, which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also their Lord was crucified.

⁸ Therefore in one day her plagues will come: death, mourning, and famine; and she will be utterly burned with fire; for the Lord God who has judged her is strong. ⁹ The kings of the earth, who committed sexual immorality and lived wantonly with her, will weep and wail over her, when they look at the smoke of her burning,

²² "Thus says the LORD, 'Look, a people comes from the north country. A great nation shall be stirred up from the uttermost parts of the earth. ²³ They take hold of bow and spear. They are cruel, and have no mercy. Their voice roars like the sea, and they ride on horses, everyone set in array, as a man to the battle, against you, daughter of Zion.'"

¹⁴ For many nations and great kings shall make bondservants of them, even of them; and I will recompense them according to their deeds, and according to the work of their hands.'"

² "Declare among the nations and publish, and set up a standard; publish, and do not conceal: say, 'Babylon is taken, Bel is disappointed, Marduk is dismayed; her images are disappointed, her idols are dismayed. ³ For out of the north there comes up a nation against her, which shall make her land desolate, and none shall dwell in it: they are fled, they are gone, both man and animal.

¹ Thus says the LORD: "Look, I will raise up against Babylon, and against those who dwell in Lebkamai, a destroying wind. ² I will send to Babylon foreigners who shall winnow her; and they shall empty her land: for in the day of trouble they shall be against her around.

² Therefore we won't be afraid, though the earth changes, though the mountains are shaken into the heart of the seas; ³ though its waters roar and are troubled, though the mountains tremble with their swelling. Selah.

⁶ The nations raged. The kingdoms were moved. He lifted his voice, and the earth melted.

²⁰ Honor your covenant, for haunts of violence fill the dark places of the earth.

³⁰ They will roar against them in that day like the roaring of the sea. If one looks to the land look, darkness and distress. The light is darkened in its clouds.

⁶ who struck the peoples in wrath with a continual stroke, who ruled the nations in anger, with a persecution that none restrained.

¹⁶ The snorting of his horses is heard from Dan: at the sound of the neighing of his strong ones the whole land trembles; for they have come, and have devoured the land and all that is in it; the city and those who dwell in it.

³ At the noise of the stamping of the hoofs of his strong ones, at the rushing of his chariots, at the rumbling of his wheels, the fathers do not look back to their children for feebleness of hands;

⁶ For, look, I raise up the Chaldeans, that bitter and hasty nation, that march through the breadth of the earth, to possess dwelling places not his own. ⁷ He is feared and dreaded. His judgment will be from himself, and his authority will come from himself. ⁸ His horses also are swifter than leopards, and are more fierce than the evening wolves. And their horsemen press proudly on, and, their horsemen come from afar. They fly as an eagle that hurries to devour.

¹⁴ The armies which are in heaven followed him on white horses, clothed in white, pure, fine linen. ¹⁵ Out of his mouth proceeds a sharp sword, that with it he should strike the nations. He will rule them with an iron scepter. He treads the winepress of the fierceness of the wrath of the God of hosts. ¹⁶ He has on his garment and on his thigh a name written, "King of kings, and Lord of lords." ¹⁷ I saw an angel standing in the sun. He shouted with a loud voice, saying to all the birds that fly in the sky, "Come. Be gathered together to the great supper of God, ¹⁸ that you may eat the flesh of kings, the flesh of captains, the flesh of mighty people, and the flesh of horses and of those who sit on them, and the flesh of all people both free and slave, and small and great."

⁶ Wail; for the day of the LORD is at hand. It will come as destruction from Shaddai. ⁷ Therefore all hands will be feeble, and everyone's heart will melt. ⁸ They will be dismayed. Pangs and sorrows will seize them. They will be in pain like a woman in labor. They will look in amazement one at another. Their faces will be faces of flame.

²⁴ Damascus has grown feeble, she turns herself to flee, and trembling has seized on her: anguish and sorrows have taken hold of her, as of a woman in travail.

⁵ In the same hour came forth the fingers of a man's hand, and wrote over against the lampstand on the plaster of the wall of the king's palace: and the king saw the part of the hand that wrote. ⁶ Then the king's face was turned pale, and his thoughts troubled him; and the joints of his thighs gave way, and his knees began knocking together.

¹¹ Who is like you, LORD, among the gods? Who is like you, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders?

⁵ and he spoke to Korah and to all his company, saying, "In the morning the LORD will show who are his, and who is holy, and will bring him near to him. The one whom he has chosen he will bring near to him.

¹⁰ None is so fierce that he dare stir him up. Who then is he who can stand before me? ¹¹ Who has confronted me, that I should repay? Everything under the heavens is mine.

⁶ For who in the skies can be compared to the LORD? Who among the sons of God is like the LORD,

⁸ LORD, God of hosts, who is a mighty one like you, LORD? Your faithfulness is around you.

¹⁸ To whom then will you liken God? Or what likeness will you compare to him?

²⁵ "To whom then will you liken me? Who is my equal?" says the Holy One.

¹⁰ "You are my witnesses," says the LORD, "With my servant whom I have chosen; that you may know and believe me, and understand that I am he. Before me there was no God formed, neither will there be after me.

⁹ Remember the former things of old: for I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like me;

¹¹ calling a ravenous bird from the east, the man of my counsel from a far country; yes, I have spoken, I will also bring it to pass; I have purposed, I will also do it.

¹⁹ Look, he shall come up like a lion from the pride of the Jordan against the strong habitation: for I will suddenly make them run away from it; and whoever is chosen, him will I appoint over it: for who is like me? And who will appoint me a time? And who is the shepherd who will stand before me? ²⁰ Therefore hear the counsel of the LORD, that he has taken against Edom; and his purposes, that he has purposed against the inhabitants of Teman: Surely they shall drag them away, the little ones of the flock; surely he shall make their habitation desolate over them. ²¹ The earth trembles at the noise of their fall; there is a cry, the noise which is heard in the Sea at the End.

¹⁰ The LORD nullifies the counsel of the nations. He makes the thoughts of the peoples to be of no effect. ¹¹ The counsel of the LORD stands fast forever, the thoughts of his heart to all generations.

²⁴ The LORD of hosts has sworn, saying, "Surely, as I have thought, so shall it happen; and as I have purposed, so shall it stand: ²⁵ that I will break the Assyrian in my land, and tread him under foot on my mountains. Then his yoke will leave them, and his burden leave their shoulders. ²⁶ This is the plan that is determined for the whole earth. This is the hand that is stretched out over all the nations. ²⁷ For the LORD of hosts has planned, and who can stop it? His hand is stretched out, and who can turn it back?"

¹⁰ For though you had struck the whole army of the Chaldeans who fight against you, and there remained but wounded men among them, yes would they rise up every man in his tent, and burn this city with fire."'"

²⁰ Therefore hear the counsel of the LORD, that he has taken against Edom; and his purposes, that he has purposed against the inhabitants of Teman: Surely they shall drag them away, the little ones of the flock; surely he shall make their habitation desolate over them.

²⁸ to do whatever your hand and your council foreordained to happen.

¹¹ in whom also we were assigned an inheritance, having been foreordained according to the purpose of him who works all things after the counsel of his will;

¹⁶ The ten horns which you saw, and the beast, these will hate the prostitute, and will make her desolate and naked, and will eat her flesh, and will burn her utterly with fire. ¹⁷ For God has put in their hearts to do what he has in mind, and to be of one mind, and to give their kingdom to the beast, until the words of God should be accomplished.

⁹ Sheol from beneath has moved for you to meet you at your coming. It stirs up the dead for you, even all the rulers of the earth. It has raised up from their thrones all the kings of the nations. ¹⁰ They all will answer and ask you, "Have you also become as weak as we are? Have you become like us?"

²¹ The earth trembles at the noise of their fall; there is a cry, the noise which is heard in the Sea at the End.

¹⁸ Now shall the islands tremble in the day of your fall; yes, the islands that are in the sea shall be dismayed at your departure."'

¹⁶ I made the nations to shake at the sound of his fall, when I cast him down to Sheol with those who descend into the pit; and all the trees of Eden, the choice and best of Lebanon, all that drink water, were comforted in the lower parts of the earth.

¹⁰ Yes, I will make many peoples amazed at you, and their kings shall be horribly afraid for you, when I shall brandish my sword before them; and they shall tremble at every moment, every man for his own life, in the day of your fall.'

⁹ The kings of the earth, who committed sexual immorality and lived wantonly with her, will weep and wail over her, when they look at the smoke of her burning, ¹⁰ standing far away for the fear of her torment, saying, 'Woe, woe, the great city, Babylon, the strong city. For your judgment has come in one hour.' ¹¹ The merchants of the earth weep and mourn over her, for no one buys their merchandise any more; ¹² merchandise of gold, silver, precious stones, pearls, fine linen, purple, silk, scarlet, all expensive wood, every vessel of ivory, every vessel made of most precious wood, and of bronze, and iron, and marble; ¹³ and cinnamon, spice, incense, perfume, frankincense, wine, olive oil, fine flour, wheat, cattle, sheep, horses, chariots, slaves and human lives. ¹⁴ The fruits which your soul lusted after have been lost to you, and all things that were luxury and splendor have perished from you, and you will never ever find them again. ¹⁵ The merchants of these things, who were made rich by her, will stand far away for the fear of her torment, weeping and mourning; ¹⁶ saying, 'Woe, woe, the great city, she who was dressed in fine linen, purple, and scarlet, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls. ¹⁷ For in an hour such great riches are made desolate.' Every shipmaster, and everyone who sails anywhere, and mariners, and as many as gain their living by sea, stood far away, ¹⁸ and exclaimed as they looked at the smoke of her burning, saying, 'What is like the great city?' ¹⁹ They cast dust on their heads, and shouting, weeping and mourning, saying, 'Woe, woe, the great city, in which all who had their ships in the sea were made rich by reason of her great wealth.' For in one hour is she made desolate.