Jeremiah 50:3

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.’

Ge 6:7; Ex 12:12; Isa 13:5,17,18,20; Isa 13:6-10,19-22; Isa 14:22-24; Jer 7:20; Jer 21:6; Jer 50:9,41; Jer 50:12,13,35-40; Jer 51:8,9,25,26,37-44,62; Jer 51:11,27,48; Zep 1:3; Re 18:21-23

¹ sn A nation from the north refers to Medo-Persia which at the time of the conquest of Babylon in 539 b.c. had conquered all the nations to the north, the northwest, and the northeast of Babylon forming a vast empire to the north and east of Babylon. Contingents of these many nations were included in her army and reference is made to them in 50:9 and 51:27-28. There is also some irony involved here because the “enemy from the north” referred to so often in Jeremiah (cf. 1:14; 4:6; 6:1) has been identified with Babylon (cf. 25:9). Here in a kind of talionic justice Judah’s nemesis from the north will be attacked and devastated by an enemy from the north.