1 Thus says Yahweh: Behold, I will raise up against Babylon, and against
those who dwell in Lebkamai, a destroying wind. 2 I will send to Babylon
strangers, who shall winnow her; and they shall empty her land: for in the
day of trouble they shall be against her round about. 3 Against him
who bends let the archer bend his bow, and against him who lifts
himself up in his coat of mail: and don’t you spare her young men;
destroy you utterly all her host. 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 Yahweh 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; don’t be cut off in her iniquity: for
it is the time of Yahweh’s vengeance; he will render to her a recompense.
7 Babylon has been a golden cup in Yahweh’s hand, who made all the earth
drunken: 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 Yahweh has brought forth our righteousness: come, and let us declare in
Zion the work of Yahweh our God. 11 Make sharp the arrows; hold firm the
shields: Yahweh 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
Yahweh, 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 Yahweh 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 is come, the measure of your covetousness.
14 Yahweh 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. 15 He has made the earth by his power, he has established the
world by his wisdom, and by his understanding has he stretched out the
heavens: 16 when he utters his voice, there is a tumult of waters in the
heavens, and he causes the vapors to ascend from the ends of the earth; he
makes lightnings for the rain, and brings forth the wind out of his
treasuries. 17 Every man is become brutish and is without
knowledge; every goldsmith is disappointed by his image; for his molten image
is falsehood, and there is no breath in them. 18 They are vanity, a work
of delusion: in the time of their visitation they shall perish. 19 The
portion of Jacob is not like these; for he is the former of all things; and
Israel is the tribe of his inheritance: Yahweh of Hosts is his name.
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; 22 and with you will I
break in pieces the chariot and him who rides therein; 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 of oxen;
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 Yahweh. 25 Behold, I am against
you, destroying mountain, says Yahweh, which destroy 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
Yahweh. 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, the governors of it, and all the deputies of
it, and all the land of their dominion. 29 The land trembles and is in
pain; for the purposes of Yahweh against Babylon do stand, to make the land
of Babylon a desolation, without inhabitant. 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. 31 One post shall run to meet another, and one messenger
to met 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 Yahweh 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 Nebuchadrezzar 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 Yahweh: Behold, 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 drunken, that they
may rejoice, and sleep a perpetual sleep, and not wake, says Yahweh. 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 is come up on
Babylon; she is covered with the multitude of the waves of it. 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. 45 My people, go you out of the
midst of her, and save yourselves every man from the fierce anger of Yahweh.
46 Don’t let your heart faint, neither fear for the news that shall
be heard in the land; for news shall come one year, and after that in another
year shall come news, and violence in the land, ruler against ruler.
47 Therefore, behold, 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 therein, shall sing for joy over Babylon; for the
destroyers shall come to her from the north, says Yahweh. 49 As Babylon
has caused the slain of Israel to fall, so at Babylon shall fall the slain of
all the land. 50 You who have escaped the sword, go you, don’t
stand still; remember Yahweh 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 are come into the sanctuaries of Yahweh’s
house. 52 Therefore, behold, the days come, says Yahweh, that I will
execute judgment on her engraved images; and through all her land the wounded
shall groan. 53 Though Babylon should mount up to the sky, and though she
should fortify the height of her strength, yet from me shall destroyers come
to her, says Yahweh. 54 The sound of a cry from Babylon, and of great
destruction from the land of the Chaldeans! 55 For Yahweh 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 is
come on her, even on Babylon, and her mighty men are taken, their bows are
broken in pieces; for Yahweh is a God of recompenses, he will surely requite.
57 I will make drunk her princes 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 Yahweh of Hosts. 58 Thus says Yahweh
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. 59 The word which
Jeremiah the prophet commanded Seraiah the son of Neriah, the son of
Mahseiah, when he went with Zedekiah the king of Judah to Babylon in the
fourth year of his reign. Now Seraiah was chief chamberlain. 60 Jeremiah
wrote in a book all the evil that should come on Babylon, even all these
words that are written concerning Babylon. 61 Jeremiah said to Seraiah,
When you come to Babylon, then see that you read all these words, 62 and
say, Yahweh, you have spoken concerning this place, to cut it off, that
none shall dwell therein, neither man nor animal, but that it shall be
desolate forever. 63 It shall be, when you have made an end of reading
this book, that you shall bind a stone to it, and cast it into the midst of
the Euphrates: 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.
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