Isaiah 13

¹The oracle concerning Babylon which Isaiah the son of Amoz saw.

²On a bare hill raise a signal;
cry aloud to them;
wave the hand for them to enter
the gates of the nobles.

³I myself have commanded my consecrated ones,
and have summoned my mighty men to execute my anger,
my proudly exulting ones.

⁴The sound of a tumult is on the mountains
as of a great multitude!
The sound of an uproar of kingdoms,
of nations gathering together!
The Lord of hosts is mustering
a host for battle.

⁵ They come from a distant land,
from the end of the heavens,
the Lord and the weapons of his indignation,
to destroy the whole land.

⁶ Wail, for the day of the Lord is near;
as destruction from the Almighty it will come!

⁷Therefore all hands will be feeble,
and every human heart will melt.

⁸They will be dismayed:
pangs and agony will seize them;
they will be in anguish like a woman in labor.
They will look aghast at one another;
their faces will be aflame.

⁹Behold, the day of the Lord comes,
cruel, with wrath and fierce anger,
to make the land a desolation
and to destroy its sinners from it.

¹⁰ For the stars of the heavens and their constellations
will not give their light;
the sun will be dark at its rising,
and the moon will not shed its light.

¹¹I will punish the world for its evil,
and the wicked for their iniquity;
I will put an end to the pomp of the arrogant,
and lay low the pompous pride of the ruthless.

¹²I will make people more rare than fine gold,
and mankind than the gold of Ophir.

¹³Therefore I will make the heavens tremble,
and the earth will be shaken out of its place,
at the wrath of the Lord of hosts
in the day of his fierce anger.

¹⁴And like a hunted gazelle,
or like sheep with none to gather them,
each will turn to his own people,
and each will flee to his own land.

¹⁵Whoever is found will be thrust through,
and whoever is caught will fall by the sword.

¹⁶ Their infants will be dashed in pieces
before their eyes;
their houses will be plundered
and their wives ravished.

¹⁷Behold, I am stirring up the Medes against them,
who have no regard for silver
and do not delight in gold.

¹⁸ Their bows will slaughter the young men;
they will have no mercy on the fruit of the womb;
their eyes will not pity children.

¹⁹And Babylon, the glory of kingdoms,
the splendor and pomp of the Chaldeans,
will be like Sodom and Gomorrah
when God overthrew them.

²⁰ It will never be inhabited
or lived in for all generations;
no Arab will pitch his tent there;
no shepherds will make their flocks lie down there.

²¹But wild animals will lie down there,
and their houses will be full of howling creatures;
there ostriches will dwell,
and there wild goats will dance.

²²Hyenas will cry in its towers,
and jackals in the pleasant palaces;
its time is close at hand
and its days will not be prolonged.

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