45Therefore hear the counsel of the LORD which he has counseled against Babel and his plans which he has planned against the land of the Chaldeans: if he does not drag them away, the young of the flock; if he does not make their pasture desolate.46At the sound, Babel was seized; the earth was shaken, and a cry for deliverance among the nations was heard.
51
Chapter 51
1This is what the LORD says: Behold, I am rousing against Babel and against the dwellers of the heart facing the face of a destroying wind.2And I will send foreigners to Babylon, and they will winnow her, and they will empty her land, for they were around her on the day of calamity.3Let not tread the way of his bow, and let not act superiorly in his arrows, and let not spare his chosen ones; devote to destruction all his host.4And the slain will fall in the land of the Chaldeans, and the pierced in its streets.5For Israel is not widowed, and Judah not from his God, from the LORD of Hosts, for their land is full of guilt from the Holy One of Israel.6Flee from the midst of Babel and deliver each man his life force. Do not be silent in iniquity, for it is a time of vengeance to the LORD—Recompense it is; he repays it to her.7A golden cup, Babel, in the hand of the LORD, making all the earth drunk from her wine; nations drank. Upon this the nations will glory themselves.8Suddenly Babel has fallen and she is broken. Howl over her! Take balsam for her pain; perhaps she will be healed.9We healed Babel, but she was not healed. We abandoned her and let us go, each man to his land, for her justice has reached to the heavens and has been borne up as far as the skies.10The LORD has brought out our righteousness with it, and we will declare in Zion the work of the LORD our God.11Sharpen the arrows! Fill the shields! The LORD has roused the spirit of the kings of Madai, for upon Babel his purpose is to destroy it, for it is the vengeance of the LORD, the vengeance of his temple.12Raise a standard against the wall of Babel, strengthen the watch, set up guards, prepare ambushers—for even the LORD has plotted, even he has done what he spoke to the inhabitants of Babel.13You who dwell upon many waters, abundant in treasures—your end has come; the measure of your covetousness.14The LORD of Hosts has sworn by his vital life force: "If I do not fill you with Adam/humanity like locusts, and they groan over you with a shout."15He made the earth by his power; he established the world by his wisdom, and by his understanding he stretched out the heavens.16At the voice of his giving a multitude of waters in the heavens, he causes clouds to ascend from the ends of the earth; he makes lightnings for rain, and he brings forth wind from his treasuries.17Every human is brutish in knowledge; every refiner is put to shame by an idol, for his molten image is a lie, and there is no spirit in them.18They are vanity, the work of delusions. At the time of their visitation they will perish.19The portion of Jacob is not like these, for he is the Former of all, the tribe of his inheritance. The LORD of Hosts is his name.20"A shatterer—you are to me, a weapon of warfare. And I will shatter nations with you, and I will destroy kingdoms with you."21And I will shatter with you horse and its rider, and I will shatter with you chariot and its rider.22And I will dash in pieces with you man and woman, and I will dash in pieces with you elder and boy, and I will dash in pieces with you young man and virgin.23And I will dash in pieces with you evil and its flock, and I will dash in pieces with you farmer and his yoke, and I will dash in pieces with you governors and officials.24And I will repay Babylon and all the inhabitants of the Chaldeans all their evil that they did in Zion before your eyes, says the LORD.25Behold, you mountain of destruction—utterance of the LORD—the one destroying all the earth! And I stretched out my hand against you and rolled you from the rocks and gave you as a mountain of burning.26And they will not take from you a stone for a cornerstone or a stone for foundations, for you will be desolations of eternity—utterance of the LORD.27Raise a banner in the land; blow the ram's horn among the nations; consecrate nations against her; make kingdoms hear against her—Ararat, Minni, and Ashkenaz—muster against her a tiphsar; bring up horses like bristling locusts.28Sanctify against her the nations, the kings of Madai, her governors and all her deputies and all the earth of his rule.29And the earth quaked and writhed, for the thoughts of the LORD have arisen against Babel to set the land of Babel to desolation, without inhabitant.30Babylon's mighty ones have ceased to fight; they sit in strongholds; their strength has failed; they have become women; they have set fire to her tabernacles; her bars are broken.31Runner meets runner and runs, and herald meets herald to tell the king of Babel that his city has been captured from end to end.32The fords have been seized, the ponds they have burned with fire, and the men of war have been dismayed.33For thus says the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel: The daughter of Babylon is like a threshing floor at the time of treading it; yet a little while, and the time of her harvest will come.34He ate me, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babel; he set me out as an empty vessel, he swallowed me like a sea monster, he filled his flesh from me, he cast me down.35My violence and my remnant—upon Babel you will say, O inhabitant of Zion, and my blood—upon the inhabitants of the Chaldeans you will say, O Jerusalem.36Therefore thus says the LORD: Behold, I—I will conduct the legal dispute for your legal dispute, and I will avenge your vengeance, and I will desolate her sea, and I will dry up her spring.37And Babylon will be heaps of ruins, a haunt of jackals, an empty desolation.38Together like cultic villages they will roar; they rouse their roaring like cubs of lions.39In their heat I will set their drinks, and I will make them drunk so that they exult and sleep an eternal sleep and not awake—oracle of the LORD.40I will bring them down like rams to the slaughter, like rams with sacrificial animals prepared for slaughter.41How Sheshach was captured, how she was seized, the praise of all the earth! How Babel has become a desolation among the nations!42The sea has gone up over Babel. In the multitude of its waves it has covered it.