so that he may initiate a search of the records ¹  of his predecessors ²  and discover in those records ³  that this city is rebellious ⁴  and injurious to both kings and provinces, producing internal revolts ⁵  from long ago. ⁶  It is for this very reason that this city was destroyed.

Vent your anger on the nations that do not acknowledge you. ¹  Vent it on the peoples ²  who do not worship you. ³  For they have destroyed the people of Jacob. ⁴  They have completely destroyed them ⁵  and left their homeland in utter ruin.

Finally the Lord could no longer endure your wicked deeds and the disgusting things you did. That is why your land has become the desolate, uninhabited ruin that it is today. That is why it has become a proverbial example used in curses. ¹ 

“This is what you must say to them, ‘This is what the sovereign Lord says: As surely as I live, those living in the ruins will die ¹  by the sword, those in the open field I will give to the wild beasts for food, and those who are in the strongholds and caves will die of disease.

to loot and plunder, to attack ¹  the inhabited ruins and the people gathered from the nations, who are acquiring cattle and goods, who live at the center ²  of the earth.”

I will destroy her vines and fig trees, about which she said, “These are my wages for prostitution ¹  that my lovers gave to me!” I will turn her cultivated vines and fig trees ²  into an uncultivated thicket, so that wild animals ³  will devour them.

All her carved idols will be smashed to pieces; all her metal cult statues will be destroyed by fire. ¹  I will make a waste heap ²  of all her images. Since ³  she gathered the metal ⁴  as a prostitute collects her wages, the idols will become a prostitute’s wages again.” ⁵ 

They will rule ¹  the land of Assyria with the sword, the land of Nimrod ²  with a drawn sword. ³  Our king ⁴  will rescue us from the Assyrians should they attempt to invade our land and try to set foot in our territory.

¹ Certainly you must have heard! ²  Long ago I worked it out, In ancient times I planned ³  it; and now I am bringing it to pass. The plan is this: Fortified cities will crash into heaps of ruins. ⁴ 

¹ Certainly you must have heard! ²  Long ago I worked it out, in ancient times I planned ³  it, and now I am bringing it to pass. The plan is this: Fortified cities will crash into heaps of ruins. ⁴ 

I made Jerusalem ¹  and the cities of Judah, its kings and its officials drink it. ²  I did it so Judah would become a ruin. I did it so Judah, its kings, and its officials would become an object ³  of horror and of hissing scorn, an example used in curses. ⁴  Such is already becoming the case! ⁵ 

So my anger and my wrath were poured out and burned like a fire through the towns of Judah and the streets of Jerusalem. That is why they have become the desolate ruins that they are today.’

For a nation from the north ¹  will attack Babylon. It will lay her land waste. People and animals will flee out of it. No one will inhabit it.’

“Son of man, the house of Israel has become slag to me. All of them are like bronze, tin, iron, and lead in the furnace; ¹  they are the worthless slag of silver.

“For this is what the sovereign Lord says: When I make you desolate like the uninhabited cities, when I bring up the deep over you and the surging ¹  waters overwhelm you,

Then you will know that I, the Lord, have heard all the insults you spoke against the mountains of Israel, saying, “They are desolate, they have been given to us for food.”

Egypt will be desolate and Edom will be a desolate wilderness, because of the violence they did to the people of Judah, ¹  in whose land they shed innocent blood.

Their wealth will be stolen and their houses ruined! They will not live in the houses they have built, nor will they drink the wine from the vineyards they have planted.

Listen to the howling of shepherds, because their magnificence has been destroyed. Listen to the roaring of young lions, because the thickets of the Jordan have been devastated.

because in a single hour such great wealth has been destroyed!” ¹  And every ship’s captain, ²  and all who sail along the coast ³  – seamen, and all who ⁴  make their living from the sea, stood a long way off