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Proclamation against Egypt

29In the tenth year, in the tenth month, on the twelfth day of the month, the word of the Lord came to me: ²Mortal, set your face against Pharaoh king of Egypt, and prophesy against him and against all Egypt; ³speak, and say, Thus says the Lord God:
I am against you,
   Pharaoh king of Egypt,
the great dragon sprawling
   in the midst of its channels,
saying, ‘My Nile is my own;
   I made it for myself.’
⁴ I will put hooks in your jaws,
   and make the fish of your channels stick to your scales.
I will draw you up from your channels,
   with all the fish of your channels
   sticking to your scales.
⁵ I will fling you into the wilderness,
   you and all the fish of your channels;
you shall fall in the open field,
   and not be gathered and buried.
To the animals of the earth and to the birds of the air
   I have given you as food.
⁶ Then all the inhabitants of Egypt shall know
   that I am the Lord
because you^* were a staff of reed
   to the house of Israel;
⁷ when they grasped you with the hand, you broke,
   and tore all their shoulders;
and when they leaned on you, you broke,
   and made all their legs unsteady.^*

8 Therefore, thus says the Lord God: I will bring a sword upon you, and will cut off from you human being and animal; ⁹and the land of Egypt shall be a desolation and a waste. Then they shall know that I am the Lord.

Because you^* said, ‘The Nile is mine, and I made it’, ¹⁰therefore, I am against you, and against your channels, and I will make the land of Egypt an utter waste and desolation, from Migdol to Syene, as far as the border of Ethiopia.^{* 11}No human foot shall pass through it, and no animal foot shall pass through it; it shall be uninhabited for forty years. ¹²I will make the land of Egypt a desolation among desolated countries; and her cities shall be a desolation for forty years among cities that are laid waste. I will scatter the Egyptians among the nations, and disperse them among the countries.

13 Further, thus says the Lord God: At the end of forty years I will gather the Egyptians from the peoples among whom they were scattered; ¹⁴and I will restore the fortunes of Egypt, and bring them back to the land of Pathros, the land of their origin; and there they shall be a lowly kingdom. ¹⁵It shall be the most lowly of the kingdoms, and never again exalt itself above the nations; and I will make them so small that they will never again rule over the nations. ¹⁶The Egyptians^* shall never again be the reliance of the house of Israel; they will recall their iniquity, when they turned to them for aid. Then they shall know that I am the Lord God.

Babylonia Will Plunder Egypt

17 In the twenty-seventh year, in the first month, on the first day of the month, the word of the Lord came to me: ¹⁸Mortal, King Nebuchadrezzar of Babylon made his army labour hard against Tyre; every head was made bald and every shoulder was rubbed bare; yet neither he nor his army got anything from Tyre to pay for the labour that he had expended against it. ¹⁹Therefore, thus says the Lord God: I will give the land of Egypt to King Nebuchadrezzar of Babylon; and he shall carry off its wealth and despoil it and plunder it; and it shall be the wages for his army. ²⁰I have given him the land of Egypt as his payment for which he laboured, because they worked for me, says the Lord God.

21 On that day I will cause a horn to sprout up for the house of Israel, and I will open your lips among them. Then they shall know that I am the Lord.

Lamentation for Egypt

30The word of the Lord came to me: ²Mortal, prophesy, and say, Thus says the Lord God:
Wail, ‘Alas for the day!’
³   For a day is near,
   the day of the Lord is near;
it will be a day of clouds,
   a time of doom^* for the nations.
⁴ A sword shall come upon Egypt,
   and anguish shall be in Ethiopia,^*
when the slain fall in Egypt,
   and its wealth is carried away,
   and its foundations are torn down.
⁵Ethiopia,^* and Put, and Lud, and all Arabia, and Libya,^* and the people of the allied land^* shall fall with them by the sword.

⁶ Thus says the Lord:
Those who support Egypt shall fall,
   and its proud might shall come down;
from Migdol to Syene
   they shall fall within it by the sword,
says the Lord God.
⁷ They shall be desolated among other desolated countries,
   and their cities shall lie among cities laid waste.
⁸ Then they shall know that I am the Lord,
   when I have set fire to Egypt,
   and all who help it are broken.

9 On that day, messengers shall go out from me in ships to terrify the unsuspecting Ethiopians;^* and anguish shall come upon them on the day of Egypt’s doom;^* for it is coming!

10 Thus says the Lord God:
I will put an end to the hordes of Egypt,
   by the hand of King Nebuchadrezzar of Babylon.
¹¹ He and his people with him, the most terrible of the nations,
   shall be brought in to destroy the land;
and they shall draw their swords against Egypt,
   and fill the land with the slain.
¹² I will dry up the channels,
   and will sell the land into the hand of evildoers;
I will bring desolation upon the land and everything in it
   by the hand of foreigners;
I the Lord have spoken.

13 Thus says the Lord God:
I will destroy the idols
   and put an end to the images in Memphis;
there shall no longer be a prince in the land of Egypt;
   so I will put fear in the land of Egypt.
¹⁴ I will make Pathros a desolation,
   and will set fire to Zoan,
   and will execute acts of judgement on Thebes.
¹⁵ I will pour my wrath upon Pelusium,
   the stronghold of Egypt,
   and cut off the hordes of Thebes.
¹⁶ I will set fire to Egypt;
   Pelusium shall be in great agony;
Thebes shall be breached,
   and Memphis face adversaries by day.
¹⁷ The young men of On and of Pi-beseth shall fall by the sword;
   and the cities themselves^* shall go into captivity.
¹⁸ At Tehaphnehes the day shall be dark,
   when I break there the dominion of Egypt,
and its proud might shall come to an end;
   the city^* shall be covered by a cloud,
   and its daughter-towns shall go into captivity.
¹⁹ Thus I will execute acts of judgement on Egypt.
   Then they shall know that I am the Lord.

Proclamation against Pharaoh

20 In the eleventh year, in the first month, on the seventh day of the month, the word of the Lord came to me: ²¹Mortal, I have broken the arm of Pharaoh king of Egypt; it has not been bound up for healing or wrapped with a bandage, so that it may become strong to wield the sword. ²²Therefore, thus says the Lord God: I am against Pharaoh king of Egypt, and will break his arms, both the strong arm and the one that was broken; and I will make the sword fall from his hand. ²³I will scatter the Egyptians among the nations, and disperse them throughout the lands. ²⁴I will strengthen the arms of the king of Babylon, and put my sword in his hand; but I will break the arms of Pharaoh, and he will groan before him with the groans of one mortally wounded. ²⁵I will strengthen the arms of the king of Babylon, but the arms of Pharaoh shall fall. And they shall know that I am the Lord, when I put my sword into the hand of the king of Babylon. He shall stretch it out against the land of Egypt, ²⁶and I will scatter the Egyptians among the nations and disperse them throughout the countries. Then they shall know that I am the Lord.

The Lofty Cedar

31In the eleventh year, in the third month, on the first day of the month, the word of the Lord came to me: ²Mortal, say to Pharaoh king of Egypt and to his hordes:
Whom are you like in your greatness?
³   Consider Assyria, a cedar of Lebanon,
with fair branches and forest shade,
   and of great height,
   its top among the clouds.^*
4 The waters nourished it,
   the deep made it grow tall,
making its rivers flow^*
   around the place where it was planted,
sending forth its streams
   to all the trees of the field.
⁵ So it towered high
   above all the trees of the field;
its boughs grew large
   and its branches long,
   from abundant water in its shoots.
⁶ All the birds of the air
   made their nests in its boughs;
under its branches all the animals of the field
   gave birth to their young;
and in its shade
   all great nations lived.
⁷ It was beautiful in its greatness,
   in the length of its branches;
for its roots went down
   to abundant water.
⁸ The cedars in the garden of God could not rival it,
   nor the fir trees equal its boughs;
the plane trees were as nothing
   compared with its branches;
no tree in the garden of God
   was like it in beauty.
⁹ I made it beautiful
   with its mass of branches,
the envy of all the trees of Eden
   that were in the garden of God.

10 Therefore, thus says the Lord God: Because it^* towered high and set its top among the clouds,^* and its heart was proud of its height, ¹¹I gave it into the hand of the prince of the nations; he has dealt with it as its wickedness deserves. I have cast it out. ¹²Foreigners from the most terrible of the nations have cut it down and left it. On the mountains and in all the valleys its branches have fallen, and its boughs lie broken in all the watercourses of the land; and all the peoples of the earth went away from its shade and left it.
¹³ On its fallen trunk settle
   all the birds of the air,
and among its boughs lodge
   all the wild animals.
¹⁴All this is in order that no trees by the waters may grow to lofty height or set their tops among the clouds,^* and that no trees that drink water may reach up to them in height.
For all of them are handed over to death,
   to the world below;
along with all mortals,
   with those who go down to the Pit.

15 Thus says the Lord God: On the day it went down to Sheol I closed the deep over it and covered it; I restrained its rivers, and its mighty waters were checked. I clothed Lebanon in gloom for it, and all the trees of the field fainted because of it. ¹⁶I made the nations quake at the sound of its fall, when I cast it down to Sheol with those who go down to the Pit; and all the trees of Eden, the choice and best of Lebanon, all that were well watered, were consoled in the world below. ¹⁷They also went down to Sheol with it, to those killed by the sword, along with its allies,^* those who lived in its shade among the nations.

18 Which among the trees of Eden was like you in glory and in greatness? Now you shall be brought down with the trees of Eden to the world below; you shall lie among the uncircumcised, with those who are killed by the sword. This is Pharaoh and all his horde, says the Lord God.