“Take up your battle positions all around Babylon, all you soldiers who are armed with bows. ¹  Shoot ²  all your arrows at her! Do not hold any back! ³  For she has sinned against the Lord.

Therefore the Lord says, “I will stand up for your cause. I will pay the Babylonians back for what they have done to you. ¹  I will dry up their sea. I will make their springs run dry. ² 

For a destroyer is attacking Babylon. ¹  Her warriors will be captured; their bows will be broken. ²  For the Lord is a God who punishes; ³  he pays back in full. ⁴ 

מ (Mem) He sent down fire ¹  into my bones, and it overcame ²  them. He spread out a trapper’s net ³  for my feet; he made me turn back. He has made me desolate; I am faint all day long.

In the middle ¹  of the living beings was something like ²  burning coals of fire ³  or like torches. It moved back and forth among the living beings. It was bright, and lightning was flashing out of the fire.

“Therefore say: ‘This is what the sovereign Lord says: When I regather you from the peoples and assemble you from the lands where you have been dispersed, I will give you back the country of Israel.’

does not oppress anyone, but gives the debtor back whatever was given in pledge, ¹  does not commit robbery, ²  but gives his bread to the hungry and clothes the naked,

I will restore the fortunes of Egypt, and will bring them back ¹  to the land of Pathros, to the land of their origin; there they will be an insignificant kingdom.

He ¹  returns what was taken in pledge, pays back what he has stolen, and follows the statutes that give life, ²  committing no iniquity. He will certainly live – he will not die.

You have not strengthened the weak, healed the sick, bandaged the injured, brought back the strays, or sought the lost, but with force and harshness ¹  you have ruled over them.

I will seek the lost and bring back the strays; I will bandage the injured and strengthen the sick, but the fat and the strong I will destroy. I will feed them – with judgment!

When I have brought them back from the peoples and gathered them from the countries of their enemies, I will magnify myself among them in the sight of many nations.

For they were in three stories and had no pillars like the pillars of the courts; therefore the upper chambers ¹  were set back from the ground more than the lower and upper ones.

At that very moment the fingers of a human hand appeared ¹  and wrote on the plaster of the royal palace wall, opposite the lampstand. ²  The king was watching the back ³  of the hand that was writing.

“After these things, ¹  as I was watching, another beast ²  like a leopard appeared, with four bird-like wings on its back. ³  This beast had four heads, ⁴  and ruling authority was given to it.

The ships of Kittim ¹  will come against him, leaving him disheartened. ²  He will turn back and direct his indignation against the holy covenant. He will return and honor ³  those who forsake the holy covenant.

Therefore, I will take back ¹  my grain during the harvest time ²  and my new wine when it ripens; ³  I will take away my wool and my flax which I had provided ⁴  in order to clothe her. ⁵ 

“But surely I gave ¹  you no food to eat in any of your cities; you lacked food everywhere you live. ²  Still you did not come back to me.” The Lord is speaking!

“I destroyed your crops ¹  with blight and disease. Locusts kept ²  devouring your orchards, ³  vineyards, fig trees, and olive trees. Still you did not come back to me.” The Lord is speaking!

“I overthrew some of you the way God ¹  overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah. ²  You were like a burning stick ³  snatched from the flames. Still you did not come back to me.” The Lord is speaking!