Her fortresses will be overgrown with thorns; thickets and weeds will grow ¹  in her fortified cities. Jackals will settle there; ostriches will live there. ² 

Pack your bags for exile, you inhabitants of poor dear Egypt. ¹  For Memphis will be laid waste. It will lie in ruins ²  and be uninhabited.

The towns of Babylonia have become heaps of ruins. She has become a dry and barren desert. No one lives in those towns any more. No one even passes through them. ¹ 

On its ruins all the birds of the sky will live, and all the wild animals ¹  will walk ²  on its branches.

I will lay waste your cities; and you will become desolate. Then you will know that I am the Lord!

The grains of seed ¹  have shriveled beneath their shovels. ²  Storehouses have been decimated and granaries have been torn down, for the grain has dried up.

Indeed, ¹  Gaza will be deserted ²  and Ashkelon will become a heap of ruins. ³  Invaders will drive away the people of Ashdod by noon, ⁴  and Ekron will be overthrown. ⁵ 

They come in as through a wide breach; amid the crash ¹  they come rolling in. ² 

For I am oppressed and needy, and my heart beats violently within me. ¹ 

A king brings stability ¹  to a land ²  by justice, but one who exacts tribute ³  tears it down.

Do not give your strength ¹  to women, nor your ways ²  to that which ruins ³  kings.

The fool folds his hands and does no work, ¹  so he has nothing to eat but his own flesh. ² 

Wail, you large ships, ¹  for your fortress is destroyed!

“Son of man, the ones living in these ruins in the land of Israel are saying, ‘Abraham was only one man, yet he possessed the land, but we are many; surely the land has been given to us for a possession.’ ¹ 

I will scatter you among the nations and unsheathe the sword ¹  after you, so your land will become desolate and your cities will become a waste.

Elijah then told all the people, “Approach me.” So all the people approached him. He repaired the altar of the Lord that had been torn down. ¹ 

Here is a message about Moab: Indeed, in a night it is devastated, Ar of Moab is destroyed! Indeed, in a night it is devastated, Kir of Moab is destroyed!

The day you begin cultivating, you do what you can to make it grow; ¹  the morning you begin planting, you do what you can to make it sprout. Yet the harvest will disappear ²  in the day of disease and incurable pain.

Indeed, ¹  you have made the city ²  into a heap of rubble, the fortified town into a heap of ruins; the fortress of foreigners ³  is no longer a city, it will never be rebuilt.

Come from far away and attack Babylonia! ¹  Open up the places where she stores her grain! Pile her up in ruins! ²  Destroy her completely! ³  Do not leave anyone alive! ⁴