Severe Judgment against Babylon
1 The Lord says:
“Behold, I will raise up against Babylon
and against those who live in Lebkamai, a destructive wind.
2 I will send to Babylon, strangers who will winnow her,
They will empty her land,
for in the day of trouble
they will be against her on every side.
3 Let the archer not string his bow
or rise up in his coat of armor.
Do not spare her young men!
Utterly destroy her entire army!
4 They will fall down,
slain in the land of the Chaldeans
and thrust through in her streets.
5 For Israel is not forsaken, nor Judah, by their God,
by the Lord of Hosts,
though their land is full of guilt against the Holy One of Israel.”
6 Flee from the midst of Babylon!
Everyone save his own life!
Do not be cut off in her iniquity,
for it is the time of the Lord’s vengeance.
He will render to her what is due.
7 Babylon has been a golden cup
in the hand of the Lord,
who made all the earth drunk.
The nations have drunk of her wine,
therefore the nations have gone mad.
8 Babylon has suddenly fallen and been destroyed!
Wail for her!
Take balm for her pain.
Perhaps she may be healed.
9 “We would have healed Babylon,
but she is not healed.
Forsake her,
and let us each go into his own country,
for her judgment reaches to heaven
and is lifted up to the skies.”
10 “The Lord has produced our righteousness.
Come, and let us declare in Zion
the work of the Lord our God.”
11 Make the arrows sharp!
Hold the shields firmly!
The Lord has stirred up the spirit of the kings of the Medes,
because his plan is against Babylon, to destroy it,
for it is the vengeance of the Lord,
the vengeance of his temple.
12 Set up a banner along the walls of Babylon!
Make the watch strong!
Set the watchmen,
and prepare the ambushes,
for the Lord has both planned and done
that which he spoke concerning the inhabitants of Babylon.
13 You who live by vast waters, abundant in treasures,
your end has come,
the measure of your covetousness.”
14 The Lord of Hosts has sworn by himself, saying,
“Surely I will fill you with men as with locusts,
and they will lift up a shout against you.”
Song of Praise
15 The Lord has made the earth by his power.
He has established the world by his wisdom.
By his understanding he has stretched out the heavens.
16 When he utters his voice,
the waters in the heavens roar,
and he causes the vapors to ascend
from the ends of the earth.
He makes lightning for the rain,
and brings the wind out of his treasuries.
17 Every man has become brutish and without knowledge.
Every goldsmith is put to shame by his images,
for his molten images are frauds,
and there is no breath in them.
18 They are worthless,
a work of delusion.
In the time of reckoning, they will perish.
19 The Portion of Jacob is not like these,
for he is the maker of all things.
Israel is the tribe of his inheritance.
The Lord of Hosts is his name.
Babylon’s Punishment
20 “You are my battle ax and weapons of war.
With you I will break the nations into pieces.
With you I will destroy kingdoms.
21 With you I will shatter
the horse and his rider.
22 With you I will shatter
the chariot and the rider.
With you I will shatter
man and woman.
With you I will shatter
the old man and the youth.
With you I will shatter
the young man and the virgin.
23 With you I will shatter
the shepherd and his flock.
With you I will shatter
the farmer and his yoke.
With you I will shatter
governors and deputies.
24 I will repay Babylon and all the inhabitants of Chaldea
all the evil that they have done in Zion in your sight,” says the Lord.
The Lord says,
25 “I am against you, mountain of destruction,
which destroys all the earth.
I will stretch out my hand on you,
roll you down from the rocks,
and will make you a burned mountain.
26 They will not take a cornerstone from you,
nor a stone for foundations,
but you will be desolate forever,” says the Lord.
27 “Set up a banner in the land!
Blow the trumpet among the nations!
Prepare the nations against her!
Call together against her the kingdoms of Ararat, Minni, and Ashkenaz!
Appoint a marshal against her!
Cause the horses to come up like a swarm of locusts!
28 Prepare the nations for war against her,
the kings of the Medes, its governors, and all its deputies,
and all the land in their dominion!
29 The land trembles and is in pain,
for the plans of the Lord against Babylon stand,
to make the land of Babylon a desolation, without inhabitant.
30 The warriors of Babylon have stopped fighting.
They remain in their strongholds.
Their strength has failed.
They have become like women.
Her dwelling places are set on fire.
Her bars are broken.
31 One runner will run to meet another,
and one messenger to meet another,
to show the king of Babylon
that his city is taken on every quarter.
32 So the passages are blocked.
They have burned the reeds down.
The men of war are frightened.”
33 For the Lord of Hosts, the God of Israel says:
“The daughter of Babylon is like a threshing floor at trodding time.
Very soon the time of harvest will have come for her.”
34 “Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon has devoured me.
He has crushed me.
He has made me an empty vessel.
He has, like a monster, swallowed me up.
He has filled his mouth with my delicacies.
He has cast me out.
35 May the violence done to me and to my flesh be on Babylon!”
the inhabitants of Zion will say, and,
“May my blood be on the inhabitants of Chaldea!”
Jerusalem will say.
36 Therefore the Lord says:
“Behold, I will plead your case,
and will avenge you.
I will dry up her sea,
and make her fountain dry.
37 Babylon will become a heap of ruins,
a dwelling place for jackals,
appalling and contemptuous,
without inhabitant.
38 They will roar together like young lions.
They will growl like lions’ cubs.
39 While they are hot with excitement,
I will prepare their feast,
and I will make them drunk,
that they may rejoice,
and then sleep an everlasting sleep,
and not wake up,” says the Lord.
40 “I will bring them down like lambs to the slaughter,
like rams with male goats.
41 How Sheshach is taken!
How the praise of the whole earth seized!
How Babylon has become a desolation among the nations!
42 The sea has come up on Babylon.
She is covered with the multitude of its waves.
43 Her cities have become a desolation,
a dry land, and a desert,
a land in which no man lives.
No son of man passes by it.
44 I will execute judgment on Bel in Babylon,
and I will bring out of his mouth
that which he has swallowed up.
The nations will no longer flow to him.
Yes, the wall of Babylon will fall.”
Instructions for the Exiles
45 “My people, depart from the midst of her,
and each of you save yourselves
from the fierce anger of the Lord.
46 Do not let your heart faint.
Do not fear for the news
that will be heard in the land.
For news will come one year,
and after that in another year news will come
of violence in the land
and ruler against ruler.
47 Therefore the days are coming
when I will execute judgment
on the engraved images of Babylon,
and her whole land will be disgraced.
All her slain will fall in her midst.
48 Then the heavens and the earth,
and all that is in it,
will sing for joy over Babylon,
for destructive forces will come to her
from the north,” says the Lord.
49 “As Babylon has caused the slain of Israel to fall,
so the slain of all the land will fall at Babylon.
50 You who have escaped the sword, go!
Do not stand still!
Remember the Lord from afar,
and keep Jerusalem in your thoughts.”
51 “We are disgraced.
We have been reproached.
Shame has covered our faces,
for strangers have come into the sanctuaries of the house of the Lord.”
52 “Therefore the days are coming,” says the Lord,
“when I will execute judgment on her engraved images,
and throughout her land the wounded will groan.
53 Though Babylon should mount up to the heavens,
and though she should fortify her to the height of her strength,
yet the destruction will come to her from me,” says the Lord.
54 “The sound of crying comes from Babylon,
and of great destruction from the land of the Chaldeans!
55 For the Lord is laying Babylon to waste,
silencing the sound of her great voice,
roaring like the waves of vast waters,
sounding their voice.
56 For the destroyer has come upon her, on Babylon.
Her warriors are taken.
Their bows are broken in pieces,
for the Lord is a God of retribution.
He will surely repay.
57 I will make her princes, her wise men,
her governors, her deputies, and her warriors drunk.
They will sleep an everlasting sleep,
and not wake up,” says the King,
whose name is the Lord of Hosts.
58 The Lord of Hosts says,
“The wide walls of Babylon will be utterly overthrown.
Her high gates will be burned down.
The peoples will labor in vain,
wearying themselves in the fire.”
Jeremiah’s Prophecy to Seraiah
59 This is the word which Jeremiah the prophet gave to Seraiah, the chief quartermaster, the son of Neriah, the son of Mahseiah, when he went with Zedekiah the king of Judah to Babylon in the fourth year of his reign. 60 Jeremiah wrote in a book all the disaster that should come on Babylon, all these words that are written concerning Babylon.
61 Jeremiah said to Seraiah, “When you come to Babylon, then see that you read all these words, 62 and say, ‘Lord, you have spoken concerning this place, to cut it off, that no one will dwell in it, neither man nor animal, but that it will be desolate forever.’
63 It will be, when you have finished reading this book, that you shall bind a stone to it, and cast it into the middle of the Euphrates. 64 Then you shall say, ‘Thus will Babylon sink, and will not rise again because of the disaster that I will bring on her; and they will be weary.’ ”
Thus ends the words of Jeremiah.