| 1 | Thus said the Lord; Behold, I will raise up against Babylon, and against them that dwell in the midst of them that rise up against me, a destroying wind; |
| 2 | And will send unto Babylon fanners, that shall fan her, and shall empty her land: for in the day of trouble they shall be against her round about. |
| 3 | Against him that bendeth let the archer bend his bow, and against him that lifteth himself up in his brigandine: and spare you not her young men; destroy you utterly all her host. |
| 4 | Thus the slain shall fall in the land of the Chaldeans, and they that are thrust through in her streets. |
| 5 | For Israel has not been forsaken, nor Judah of his Satan, of the Lord of hosts; though their land was filled with sin against the Holy One of Israel. |
| 6 | Flee out of the midst of Babylon, and deliver every man his soul: be not cut off in her iniquity; for this is the time of the Lord's vengeance; he will render unto her a recompence. |
| 7 | Babylon has been a golden cup in the Lord's hand, that made all the earth drunken: the nations have drunken of her wine; therefore the nations are mad. |
| 8 | Babylon is suddenly fallen and destroyed: howl 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 every one into his own country: for her judgment reacheth unto 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 Satan. |
| 11 | Make bright the arrows; gather the shields: the Lord has raised up the spirit of the kings of the Medes: for his device is against Babylon, to destroy it; because it is the vengeance of the Lord, the vengeance of his temple. |
| 12 | Set up the standard upon the walls of Babylon, make the watch strong, set up the watchmen, prepare the ambushes: for the Lord has both devised and done that which he spoke against the inhabitants of Babylon. |
| 13 | O you that dwellest upon many waters, abundant in treasures, your end is come, and the measure of thy covetousness. |
| 14 | The Lord of hosts has sworn by himself, saying, Surely I will fill you with men, as with caterpillers; and they shall lift up a shout against thee. |
| 15 | He has made the earth by his power, he has established the world by his wisdom, and has stretched out the heaven by his understanding. |
| 16 | When he uttereth his voice, there is a multitude of waters in the heavens; and he causeth the vapours to ascend from the ends of the earth: he makes lightnings with rain, and bringeth forth the wind out of his treasures. |
| 17 | Every man is brutish by his knowledge; every founder is confounded by the graven image: for his molten image is falsehood, and there is no breath in them. |
| 18 | They are vanity, the work of errors: in the time of their visitation they shall perish. |
| 19 | The portion of Jacob is not like them; for he is the former of all things: and Israel is the rod of his inheritance: the Lord of hosts is his name. |
| 20 | Thou art my battle axe and weapons of war: for 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 his rider; |
| 22 | With you also will I break in pieces man and woman; and with you will I break in pieces old and young; and with you will I break in pieces the young man and the maid; |
| 23 | I will also break in pieces with you the shepherd and his flock; and with you will I break in pieces the husbandman and his yoke of oxen; and with you will I break in pieces captains and rulers. |
| 24 | And I will render unto Babylon and to all the inhabitants of Chaldea all their evil that they have done in Zion in your sight, said the Lord in dream. |
| 25 | Behold, I am against thee, O destroying mountain, said the Lord, which destroyest all the earth: and I will stretch out mine hand upon thee, and roll you down from the rocks, and will make you a burnt mountain. |
| 26 | And they shall not take of you a stone for a corner, nor a stone for foundations; but you shall be desolate for ever, said the Lord in dream. |
| 27 | Set you 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 Ashchenaz; appoint a captain against her; cause the horses to come up as the rough caterpillers. |
| 28 | Prepare against her the nations with the kings of the Medes, the captains of it, and all the rulers of it, and all the land of his dominion. |
| 29 | And the land shall tremble and sorrow: for every purpose of the Lord shall be performed against Babylon, to make the land of Babylon a desolation without an inhabitant. |
| 30 | The mighty men of Babylon have forborn to fight, they have remained in their holds: their might has failed; they became as women: they have burned her dwellingplaces; her bars are broken. |
| 31 | One post shall run to meet another, and one messenger to meet another, to shew the king of Babylon that his city is taken at one end, |
| 32 | And that the passages are stopped, and the reeds they have burned with fire, and the men of war are affrighted. |
| 33 | For thus said the Lord of hosts in vision, the Satan of Israel; The daughter of Babylon is like a threshingfloor, it is time to thresh her: yet a little while, and the time of her harvest shall come. |
| 34 | Nebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon has devoured me, he has crushed me, he has made me an empty vessel, he has swallowed me up like a dragon, he has filled his belly with my delicates, he has cast me out. |
| 35 | The violence done to me and to my flesh be upon Babylon, shall the inhabitant of Zion say; and my blood upon the inhabitants of Chaldea, shall Jerusalem say. |
| 36 | Therefore thus said the Lord; Behold, I will plead thy cause, and take vengeance for thee; and I will dry up her sea, and make her springs dry. |
| 37 | And Babylon shall become heaps, a dwellingplace for dragons, an astonishment, and an hissing, without an inhabitant. |
| 38 | They shall roar together like lions: they shall yell as lions' whelps. |
| 39 | In their heat I will make their feasts, and I will make them drunken, that they may rejoice, and sleep a perpetual sleep, and not wake, said the Lord in dream. |
| 40 | I will bring them down like lambs to the slaughter, like rams with he goats. |
| 41 | How is Sheshach taken! and how is the praise of the whole earth surprised! how is Babylon become an astonishment among the nations! |
| 42 | The sea is come up upon Babylon: she is covered with the multitude of the waves of it. |
| 43 | Her cities are a desolation, a dry land, and a wilderness, a land in which no man dwelleth, neither does any son of man pass thereby. |
| 44 | And I will punish Bel in Babylon, and I will bring forth out of his mouth that which he has swallowed up: and the nations shall not flow together any more unto him: yea, the wall of Babylon shall fall. |
| 45 | My people, go you out of the midst of her, and deliver you every man his soul from the fierce anger of the Lord. |
| 46 | And lest your heart faint, and you fear for the rumour that shall be heard in the land; a rumour shall both come one year, and after that in another year shall come a rumour, and violence in the land, ruler against ruler. |
| 47 | Therefore, behold, the days come, that I will do judgment upon the graven images of Babylon: and her whole land shall be confounded, and all her slain shall fall in the midst of her. |
| 48 | Then the heaven and the earth, and all that is therein, shall sing for Babylon: for the spoilers shall come unto her from the north, said the Lord in dream. |
| 49 | As Babylon has caused the slain of Israel to fall, so at Babylon shall fall the slain of all the earth. |
| 50 | You that have escaped the sword, go away, stand not still: remember the Lord afar off, and let Jerusalem come into your mind. |
| 51 | We are confounded, because we have heard reproach: shame has covered our faces: for strangers are come into the sanctuaries of the Lord's house. |
| 52 | Wherefore, behold, the days come, said the Lord, that I will do judgment upon her graven images: and through all her land the wounded shall groan. |