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The Destruction of Israel

9I saw the Lord standing beside^* the altar, and he said:
Strike the capitals until the thresholds shake,
   and shatter them on the heads of all the people;^*
and those who are left I will kill with the sword;
   not one of them shall flee away,
   not one of them shall escape.

² Though they dig into Sheol,
   from there shall my hand take them;
though they climb up to heaven,
   from there I will bring them down.
³ Though they hide themselves on the top of Carmel,
   from there I will search out and take them;
and though they hide from my sight at the bottom of the sea,
   there I will command the sea-serpent, and it shall bite them.
⁴ And though they go into captivity in front of their enemies,
   there I will command the sword, and it shall kill them;
and I will fix my eyes on them
   for harm and not for good.

⁵ The Lord, God of hosts,
he who touches the earth and it melts,
   and all who live in it mourn,
and all of it rises like the Nile,
   and sinks again, like the Nile of Egypt;
⁶ who builds his upper chambers in the heavens,
   and founds his vault upon the earth;
who calls for the waters of the sea,
   and pours them out upon the surface of the earth—
the Lord is his name.

⁷ Are you not like the Ethiopians^* to me,
   O people of Israel? says the Lord.
Did I not bring Israel up from the land of Egypt,
   and the Philistines from Caphtor and the Arameans from Kir?
⁸ The eyes of the Lord God are upon the sinful kingdom,
   and I will destroy it from the face of the earth
   —except that I will not utterly destroy the house of Jacob,

says the Lord.

⁹ For lo, I will command,
   and shake the house of Israel among all the nations
as one shakes with a sieve,
   but no pebble shall fall to the ground.
¹⁰ All the sinners of my people shall die by the sword,
   who say, ‘Evil shall not overtake or meet us.’

The Restoration of David’s Kingdom

¹¹ On that day I will raise up
   the booth of David that is fallen,
and repair its^* breaches,
   and raise up its^* ruins,
   and rebuild it as in the days of old;
¹² in order that they may possess the remnant of Edom
   and all the nations who are called by my name,
   says the Lord who does this.

¹³ The time is surely coming, says the Lord,
   when the one who ploughs shall overtake the one who reaps,
   and the treader of grapes the one who sows the seed;
the mountains shall drip sweet wine,
   and all the hills shall flow with it.
¹⁴ I will restore the fortunes of my people Israel,
   and they shall rebuild the ruined cities and inhabit them;
they shall plant vineyards and drink their wine,
   and they shall make gardens and eat their fruit.
¹⁵ I will plant them upon their land,
   and they shall never again be plucked up
   out of the land that I have given them,

says the Lord your God.

Thanksgiving and Praise

12You will say on that day:
I will give thanks to you, O Lord,
   for though you were angry with me,
your anger turned away,
   and you comforted me.

² Surely God is my salvation;
   I will trust, and will not be afraid,
for the Lord God ^* is my strength and my might;
   he has become my salvation.

3 With joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation. ⁴And you will say on that day:
Give thanks to the Lord,
   call on his name;
make known his deeds among the nations;
   proclaim that his name is exalted.

⁵ Sing praises to the Lord, for he has done gloriously;
   let this be known^* in all the earth.
⁶ Shout aloud and sing for joy, O royal^* Zion,
   for great in your midst is the Holy One of Israel.

Judgement on the Nations

34Draw near, O nations, to hear;
   O peoples, give heed!
Let the earth hear, and all that fills it;
   the world, and all that comes from it.
² For the Lord is enraged against all the nations,
   and furious against all their hordes;
   he has doomed them, has given them over for slaughter.
³ Their slain shall be cast out,
   and the stench of their corpses shall rise;
   the mountains shall flow with their blood.
⁴ All the host of heaven shall rot away,
   and the skies roll up like a scroll.
All their host shall wither
   like a leaf withering on a vine,
   or fruit withering on a fig tree.

⁵ When my sword has drunk its fill in the heavens,
   lo, it will descend upon Edom,
   upon the people I have doomed to judgement.
⁶ The Lord has a sword; it is sated with blood,
   it is gorged with fat,
   with the blood of lambs and goats,
   with the fat of the kidneys of rams.
For the Lord has a sacrifice in Bozrah,
   a great slaughter in the land of Edom.
⁷ Wild oxen shall fall with them,
   and young steers with the mighty bulls.
Their land shall be soaked with blood,
   and their soil made rich with fat.

⁸ For the Lord has a day of vengeance,
   a year of vindication by Zion’s cause.^*
9 And the streams of Edom^* shall be turned into pitch,
   and her soil into sulphur;
   her land shall become burning pitch.
¹⁰ Night and day it shall not be quenched;
   its smoke shall go up for ever.
From generation to generation it shall lie waste;
   no one shall pass through it for ever and ever.
¹¹ But the hawk^* and the hedgehog^* shall possess it;
   the owl^* and the raven shall live in it.
He shall stretch the line of confusion over it,
   and the plummet of chaos over^* its nobles.
¹² They shall name it No Kingdom There,
   and all its princes shall be nothing.
¹³ Thorns shall grow over its strongholds,
   nettles and thistles in its fortresses.
It shall be the haunt of jackals,
   an abode for ostriches.
¹⁴ Wildcats shall meet with hyenas,
   goat-demons shall call to each other;
there too Lilith shall repose,
   and find a place to rest.
¹⁵ There shall the owl nest
   and lay and hatch and brood in its shadow;
there too the buzzards shall gather,
   each one with its mate.
¹⁶ Seek and read from the book of the Lord:
   Not one of these shall be missing;
   none shall be without its mate.
For the mouth of the Lord has commanded,
   and his spirit has gathered them.
¹⁷ He has cast the lot for them,
   his hand has portioned it out to them with the line;
they shall possess it for ever,
   from generation to generation they shall live in it.

The Return of the Redeemed to Zion

35The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad,
   the desert shall rejoice and blossom;
like the crocus ²it shall blossom abundantly,
   and rejoice with joy and singing.
The glory of Lebanon shall be given to it,
   the majesty of Carmel and Sharon.
They shall see the glory of the Lord,
   the majesty of our God.

³ Strengthen the weak hands,
   and make firm the feeble knees.
⁴ Say to those who are of a fearful heart,
   ‘Be strong, do not fear!
Here is your God.
   He will come with vengeance,
with terrible recompense.
   He will come and save you.’

⁵ Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened,
   and the ears of the deaf unstopped;
⁶ then the lame shall leap like a deer,
   and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy.
For waters shall break forth in the wilderness,
   and streams in the desert;
⁷ the burning sand shall become a pool,
   and the thirsty ground springs of water;
the haunt of jackals shall become a swamp,^*
   the grass shall become reeds and rushes.

⁸ A highway shall be there,
   and it shall be called the Holy Way;
the unclean shall not travel on it,^*
   but it shall be for God’s people;^*
   no traveller, not even fools, shall go astray.
⁹ No lion shall be there,
   nor shall any ravenous beast come up on it;
they shall not be found there,
   but the redeemed shall walk there.
¹⁰ And the ransomed of the Lord shall return,
   and come to Zion with singing;
everlasting joy shall be upon their heads;
   they shall obtain joy and gladness,
   and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.