The Anselm Project

Chapter 50

¹ The word that the LORD spoke concerning Babylon, to the land of the Chaldeans, by the hand of Jeremiah the prophet. ² Declare among the nations and make it heard; lift up a banner, make it heard. Do not conceal it. Say: "Babel is captured, Bel is put to shame, Merodach is broken, her images are put to shame, her idols are broken." ³ For a nation from the north has come up against her. It will make her land a desolation, and there will be no inhabitant in it, neither man nor beast—they are fled, they are gone. ⁴ In those days and at that time, says the LORD, the sons of Israel and the sons of Judah will come together. They will go, weeping as they go, and they will seek the LORD their God. ⁵ They will ask the way to Zion; let them come and join themselves to the LORD in an everlasting covenant that he will not forget. ⁶ My people were lost sheep; their shepherds led them astray; mountains turned them back; from hill to hill they went; they forgot their resting place. ⁷ All who found them devoured them, and their adversaries said, "Not guilty," because they sinned against the LORD, the pasture of righteousness and hope of their fathers, the LORD. ⁸ Flee from the midst of Babel and go out from the land of the Chaldeans, and be like he-goats before the flock. ⁹ For behold, I am rousing and bringing up against Babylon an assembly of great nations from the land of the north, and they will array against her from there; it will capture her half like a mighty one discerning; it will not return empty. ¹⁰ And she will be plunder for the Chaldeans; they will be satisfied with all her plunder, says the LORD. ¹¹ Because you rejoice, because you exult, O plunderers of my inheritance, because you frolic like a heifer at grass and neigh like stallions. ¹² Shame—your mother has been greatly shamed, the one who bore you. Behold, the end of the nations: a wilderness, a wasteland, and a plain. ¹³ From the burning anger of the LORD she will not be inhabited, and she will be a desolation; every passerby over Babel will desolate her and whistle over all her strokes. ¹⁴ Set yourselves in order against Babel all around, all you bowmen of his hand. Shoot at her—do not spare! Shoot, because she has sinned against the LORD. ¹⁵ Shout against her all around; she has given her hand, her foundations have fallen, her walls have been destroyed. For it is the vengeance of the LORD; avenge yourselves on her as she has done—do to her! ¹⁶ Cut off the sower from Babylon and the one grasping the sickle at the time of harvest because of the sword of the oppressor—each man to his people they will turn, and each man to his land they will flee. ¹⁷ Israel is a scattered sheep; lions drove it away. The first one devoured it—the king of Assyria—and this last one crushed it—Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon. ¹⁸ Therefore, thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: Behold, I am visiting upon the king of Babylon and upon his land just as I visited upon the king of Assyria. ¹⁹ And I will return Israel to his pasture, and she will pasture on Carmel and Bashan, and on Mount Ephraim and Gilead his soul will be satisfied. ²⁰ In those days and at that time, says the LORD: He will seek the iniquity of Israel, and it will not be found; and the sins of Judah, and they will not be found; for I will forgive those whom I leave. ²¹ Against the land of Merathaim, go up against her, and against the inhabitants of Pekod: sword and devotion after them—oracle of the LORD—and do according to all that I have commanded you. ²² A sound of warfare in the land, and great breakage. ²³ How the hammer of all the earth is cut down and broken! How Babylon has become a desolation among the nations! ²⁴ I laid a snare for you, and you were captured, Babel, and you did not know; you were found, and you were seized, for you provoked the LORD. ²⁵ The LORD opened his treasury and brought out the vessels of his indignation, for it is the work of the Lord GOD of Hosts in the land of the Chaldeans. ²⁶ Come to her from the end, open her storehouses, pile her up like heaps, and devote her to destruction—let there not be for her a remnant. ²⁷ Cut off every heifer! They have gone down to the slaughterer. Woe to them, for their day has come, the time of your oversight of them. ²⁸ A voice of those who flee and escape from the land of Babylon to declare in Zion the vengeance of the LORD our God, the vengeance of his temple. ²⁹ Proclaim to Babylon, among many: all who bend the bow, encamp on her all around. Let there not be for her an escape. Confirm to her according to her deed; as all that she has done, do to her. For she has acted presumptuously against the LORD, against the Holy One of Israel. ³⁰ Therefore her young men will fall in her squares, and all her men of war will be silenced on that day, says the LORD. ³¹ Behold, presumptuous one—oracle of the Lord GOD of hosts—for your day has come, the time when I will visit you. ³² And the presumptuous rebellion stumbled and fell, and no one raises him up. I kindled fire in his cities, and it devoured all his surroundings. ³³ Thus says the LORD of hosts: The oppressed sons of Israel and sons of Judah together, and all their captors have held fast to them; they have refused to send them away. ³⁴ Their Redeemer is strong; the LORD of Hosts—his name—will contend; he will contend for their legal dispute, in order to give rest to the land and make the inhabitants of Babylon tremble. ³⁵ Sword against the Chaldeans—oracle of the LORD—and against those dwelling in Babel and against its chiefs and against its wise ones. ³⁶ Cut off to the babblers and they will be deceived; cut off to her mighty ones and they will be dismayed. ³⁷ A sword against his horses and against his chariot and against all the mixed multitude in her midst, and they will become women. A sword against her treasuries, and they will be plundered. ³⁸ A sword against its waters, and they dry up, for it is a land of cultic idols, and they boast in terrors. ³⁹ Therefore wildcats will dwell with island demons, and daughters of ostriches will dwell in her, but you will not dwell there again forever, nor will you dwell until generation and generation. ⁴⁰ As the overthrow by God of Sodom and of Gomorrah and of its neighbors, utterance of the LORD, no man will dwell there and no son of man will sojourn in it. ⁴¹ Look, a people comes from the north, and a great nation and many kings—they rouse from the ends of the earth. ⁴² They will hold bow and javelin; they are cruel, and they will have no compassion. Their voice will roar like the sea, and they will ride on horses, arrayed like a man for warfare against you, daughter of Babel. ⁴³ The king of Babel heard their report, and his hands grew slack; distress gripped him, might like a woman giving birth. ⁴⁴ Behold, like a lion he will go up from the pride of the Jordan to the enduring pasture. For I will suddenly make them run from her. Who is the chosen one whom I will appoint over her? For who is like me, and who will appoint me, and who is this shepherd who will stand before me? ⁴⁵ Therefore 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. ⁴⁶ At the sound, Babel was seized; the earth was shaken, and a cry for deliverance among the nations was heard.

Chapter 51

¹ This 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. ² And 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. ³ Let 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. ⁴ And the slain will fall in the land of the Chaldeans, and the pierced in its streets. ⁵ For 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. ⁶ Flee 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. ⁷ A 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. ⁸ Suddenly Babel has fallen and she is broken. Howl over her! Take balsam for her pain; perhaps she will be healed. ⁹ We 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. ¹⁰ The LORD has brought out our righteousness with it, and we will declare in Zion the work of the LORD our God. ¹¹ Sharpen 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. ¹² Raise 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. ¹³ You who dwell upon many waters, abundant in treasures—your end has come; the measure of your covetousness. ¹⁴ The 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." ¹⁵ He made the earth by his power; he established the world by his wisdom, and by his understanding he stretched out the heavens. ¹⁶ At 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. ¹⁷ Every 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. ¹⁸ They are vanity, the work of delusions. At the time of their visitation they will perish. ¹⁹ The 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." ²¹ And I will shatter with you horse and its rider, and I will shatter with you chariot and its rider. ²² And 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. ²³ And 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. ²⁴ And 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. ²⁵ Behold, 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. ²⁶ And 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. ²⁷ Raise 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. ²⁸ Sanctify against her the nations, the kings of Madai, her governors and all her deputies and all the earth of his rule. ²⁹ And 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. ³⁰ Babylon'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. ³¹ Runner meets runner and runs, and herald meets herald to tell the king of Babel that his city has been captured from end to end. ³² The fords have been seized, the ponds they have burned with fire, and the men of war have been dismayed. ³³ For 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. ³⁴ He 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. ³⁵ My 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. ³⁶ Therefore 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. ³⁷ And Babylon will be heaps of ruins, a haunt of jackals, an empty desolation. ³⁸ Together like cultic villages they will roar; they rouse their roaring like cubs of lions. ³⁹ In 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. ⁴⁰ I will bring them down like rams to the slaughter, like rams with sacrificial animals prepared for slaughter. ⁴¹ How Sheshach was captured, how she was seized, the praise of all the earth! How Babel has become a desolation among the nations! ⁴² The sea has gone up over Babel. In the multitude of its waves it has covered it. ⁴³ Her cities became a desolation, a land of thirst and a plain, a land—no man shall dwell in them, nor shall any man pass through them. ⁴⁴ And I will visit upon Bel in Babel, and I will bring out his Bel from his mouth, and nations will not stream to him anymore; also the wall of Babel has fallen. ⁴⁵ Go out from her midst, my people, and escape, each one his life from the burning of the anger of the LORD. ⁴⁶ And lest your hearts quiver and you fear at the report that is heard in the land, and it comes in the year—the report—and after it in the year—the report—and violence in the land, ruler over ruler. ⁴⁷ Therefore behold, days are coming, and I will visit the images of Babylon, and all its land will be ashamed, and all its slain ones will fall in her midst. ⁴⁸ And shout for joy over Babel, heavens and earth and all that is in them, for destroyers will come to her from the north, utterance of the LORD. ⁴⁹ Also Babel is for the falling of the slain of Israel; also to Babel have fallen the slain of all the earth. ⁵⁰ You who escaped the sword, go; do not stand still. Remember the LORD from afar, and let Jerusalem come up upon your heart. ⁵¹ We are ashamed, for we have heard reproach; shame has covered our faces, for foreigners have come into the sanctuaries of the house of the LORD. ⁵² Therefore behold, days are coming, says the LORD, and I will visit punishment upon its images, and in all the land the slain will groan. ⁵³ For Babel ascends to the heavens, and if she fortifies her strong height, from me devastators will come to her, says the LORD. ⁵⁴ A sound of outcry from Babylon! Great destruction from the land of the Chaldeans! ⁵⁵ For the LORD has devastated Babel and has destroyed from her a great voice, and their waves have roared like many waters; he has given uproar as their voice. ⁵⁶ For a destroyer has come upon her, upon Babel; her mighty ones were captured, their bows were broken—for the LORD, the God of recompenses, will surely repay. ⁵⁷ And I will make her nobles and her wise ones drunk, her governors and her officials and her mighty ones, and they will sleep a sleep of eternal age and not awake—oracle of the King, the LORD of heavenly hosts, his Name. ⁵⁸ This is what the LORD of Hosts says: The broad walls of Babel will totter; they will totter, and her exalted gates will be kindled in fire; and peoples will labor in vain, peoples in fire, and they will be weary. ⁵⁹ The word that Jeremiah the prophet commanded concerning Seraiah son of Neriah son of Mahseiah, when he went with Zedekiah king of Judah to Babylon in the fourth year of his reign. And Seraiah was a prince of rest. ⁶⁰ And Jeremiah wrote all the evil that would come upon Babylon in one book, all these words written against Babylon. ⁶¹ And Jeremiah said to Seraiah, "When you come to Babylon and see and read all these words," ⁶² And you shall say, "The LORD, you spoke concerning this place to cut it off, so that no inhabitant—man or beast—will be in it; it shall be desolations forever." ⁶³ And it will be when you finish reading this book, you will tie a stone to it and cast it into the midst of the Euphrates. ⁶⁴ And you shall say, "Thus Babel will sink and not rise from the evil that I am bringing upon her," and they will be exhausted until here, the words of Jeremiah.