Isaiah 13:1

¹“Come down and sit in the dust, virgin daughter of Babylon. Sit on the ground without a throne, daughter of the Chaldeans. For you will no longer be called tender and delicate. ²Take the millstones and grind flour. Remove your veil, lift up your skirt, uncover your legs, and wade through the rivers. ³Your nakedness will be uncovered. Yes, your shame will be seen. I will take vengeance, and will spare no one.” ⁴Our Redeemer, the LORD of Armies is his name, is the Holy One of Israel. ⁵“Sit in silence, and go into darkness, daughter of the Chaldeans. For you shall no longer be called the mistress of kingdoms. ⁶I was angry with my people. I profaned my inheritance and gave them into your hand. You showed them no mercy. You laid a very heavy yoke on the aged. ⁷You said, ‘I will be a princess forever,’ so that you didn’t lay these things to your heart, nor did you remember the results. ⁸“Now therefore hear this, you who are given to pleasures, who sit securely, who say in your heart, ‘I am, and there is no one else besides me. I won’t sit as a widow, neither will I know the loss of children.’ ⁹But these two things will come to you in a moment in one day: the loss of children and widowhood. They will come on you in their full measure, in the multitude of your sorceries, and the great abundance of your enchantments. ¹⁰For you have trusted in your wickedness. You have said, ‘No one sees me.’ Your wisdom and your knowledge has perverted you. You have said in your heart, ‘I am, and there is no one else besides me.’ ¹¹Therefore disaster will come on you. You won’t know when it dawns. Mischief will fall on you. You won’t be able to put it away. Desolation will come on you suddenly, which you don’t understand. ¹²“Stand now with your enchantments and with the multitude of your sorceries, in which you have labored from your youth, as if you might profit, as if you might prevail. ¹³You are wearied in the multitude of your counsels. Now let the astrologers, the stargazers, and the monthly prognosticators stand up and save you from the things that will happen to you. ¹⁴Behold, they are like stubble. The fire will burn them. They won’t deliver themselves from the power of the flame. It won’t be a coal to warm at or a fire to sit by. ¹⁵The things that you labored in will be like this: those who have trafficked with you from your youth will each wander in his own way. There will be no one to save you.

¹The word that the LORD spoke concerning Babylon, concerning the land of the Chaldeans, by Jeremiah the prophet. ²“Declare among the nations and publish, and set up a standard; publish, and don’t conceal; say, ‘Babylon has been taken, Bel is disappointed, Merodach is dismayed! Her images are disappointed. Her idols are dismayed.’ ³For a nation comes up out of the north against her, which will make her land desolate, and no one will dwell in it. They have fled. They are gone, both man and animal. ⁴“In those days, and in that time,” says the LORD, “the children of Israel will come, they and the children of Judah together; they will go on their way weeping, and will seek the LORD their God. ⁵They will inquire concerning Zion with their faces turned toward it, saying, ‘Come, and join yourselves to the LORD in an everlasting covenant that will not be forgotten.’ ⁶My people have been lost sheep. Their shepherds have caused them to go astray. They have turned them away on the mountains. They have gone from mountain to hill. They have forgotten their resting place. ⁷All who found them have devoured them. Their adversaries said, ‘We are not guilty, because they have sinned against the LORD, the habitation of righteousness, even the LORD, the hope of their fathers.’ ⁸“Flee out of the middle of Babylon! Go out of the land of the Chaldeans, and be as the male goats before the flocks. ⁹For, behold, I will stir up and cause to come up against Babylon a company of great nations from the north country; and they will set themselves in array against her. She will be taken from there. Their arrows will be as of an expert mighty man. None of them will return in vain. ¹⁰Chaldea will be a prey. All who prey on her will be satisfied,” says the LORD. ¹¹“Because you are glad, because you rejoice, O you who plunder my heritage, because you are wanton as a heifer that treads out the grain, and neigh as strong horses, ¹²your mother will be utterly disappointed. She who bore you will be confounded. Behold, she will be the least of the nations, a wilderness, a dry land, and a desert. ¹³Because of the LORD’s wrath she won’t be inhabited, but she will be wholly desolate. Everyone who goes by Babylon will be astonished, and hiss at all her plagues. ¹⁴Set yourselves in array against Babylon all around, all you who bend the bow; shoot at her. Spare no arrows, for she has sinned against the LORD. ¹⁵Shout against her all around. She has submitted herself. Her bulwarks have fallen. Her walls have been thrown down, for it is the vengeance of the LORD. Take vengeance on her. As she has done, do to her. ¹⁶Cut off the sower from Babylon, and him who handles the sickle in the time of harvest. For fear of the oppressing sword, they will each return to their own people, and they will each flee to their own land. ¹⁷“Israel is a hunted sheep. The lions have driven him away. First, the king of Assyria devoured him, and now at last Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon has broken his bones.”

¹⁸Therefore the LORD of Armies, the God of Israel, says: “Behold, I will punish the king of Babylon and his land, as I have punished the king of Assyria. ¹⁹I will bring Israel again to his pasture, and he will feed on Carmel and Bashan. His soul will be satisfied on the hills of Ephraim and in Gilead. ²⁰In those days, and in that time,” says the LORD, “the iniquity of Israel will be sought for, and there will be none, also the sins of Judah, and they won’t be found; for I will pardon them whom I leave as a remnant. ²¹“Go up against the land of Merathaim, even against it, and against the inhabitants of Pekod. Kill and utterly destroy after them,” says the LORD, “and do according to all that I have commanded you. ²²A sound of battle is in the land, and of great destruction. ²³How the hammer of the whole earth is cut apart and broken! How Babylon has become a desolation among the nations! ²⁴I have laid a snare for you, and you are also taken, Babylon, and you weren’t aware. You are found, and also caught, because you have fought against the LORD. ²⁵The LORD has opened his armory, and has brought out the weapons of his indignation; for the Lord, GOD ^[+] of Armies, has a work to do in the land of the Chaldeans. ²⁶Come against her from the farthest border. Open her storehouses. Cast her up as heaps. Destroy her utterly. Let nothing of her be left. ²⁷Kill all her bulls. Let them go down to the slaughter. Woe to them! For their day has come, the time of their visitation. ²⁸Listen to those who flee and escape out of the land of Babylon, to declare in Zion the vengeance of the LORD our God, the vengeance of his temple. ²⁹“Call together the archers against Babylon, all those who bend the bow. Encamp against her all around. Let none of it escape. Pay her back according to her work. According to all that she has done, do to her; for she has been proud against the LORD, against the Holy One of Israel. ³⁰Therefore her young men will fall in her streets. All her men of war will be brought to silence in that day,” says the LORD. ³¹“Behold, I am against you, you proud one,” says the Lord, GOD of Armies; “for your day has come, the time that I will visit you. ³²The proud one will stumble and fall, and no one will raise him up. I will kindle a fire in his cities, and it will devour all who are around him.” ³³The LORD of Armies says: “The children of Israel and the children of Judah are oppressed together. All who took them captive hold them fast. They refuse to let them go. ³⁴Their Redeemer is strong. The LORD of Armies is his name. He will thoroughly plead their cause, that he may give rest to the earth, and disquiet the inhabitants of Babylon. ³⁵“A sword is on the Chaldeans,” says the LORD, “and on the inhabitants of Babylon, on her princes, and on her wise men. ³⁶A sword is on the boasters, and they will become fools. A sword is on her mighty men, and they will be dismayed. ³⁷A sword is on their horses, on their chariots, and on all the mixed people who are in the middle of her; and they will become as women. A sword is on her treasures, and they will be robbed. ³⁸A drought is on her waters, and they will be dried up; for it is a land of engraved images, and they are mad over idols. ³⁹Therefore the wild animals of the desert with the wolves will dwell there. The ostriches will dwell therein. It will be inhabited no more forever, neither will it be lived in from generation to generation. ⁴⁰As when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah and its neighbor cities,” says the LORD, “so no man will dwell there, neither will any son of man live therein. ⁴¹“Behold, a people comes from the north. A great nation and many kings will be stirred up from the uttermost parts of the earth. ⁴²They take up bow and spear. They are cruel, and have no mercy. Their voice roars like the sea. They ride on horses, everyone set in array, as a man to the battle, against you, daughter of Babylon. ⁴³The king of Babylon has heard the news of them, and his hands become feeble. Anguish has taken hold of him, pains as of a woman in labor. ⁴⁴Behold, the enemy will come up like a lion from the thickets of the Jordan against the strong habitation; for I will suddenly make them run away from it. Whoever is chosen, I will appoint him over it, for who is like me? Who will appoint me a time? Who is the shepherd who can stand before me?” ⁴⁵Therefore hear the counsel of the LORD that he has taken against Babylon; and his purposes that he has purposed against the land of the Chaldeans: Surely they will drag them away, even the little ones of the flock. Surely he will make their habitation desolate over them. ⁴⁶The earth trembles at the noise of the taking of Babylon. The cry is heard among the nations.

¹The vision of Isaiah the son of Amoz, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem, in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah.

¹One of the seven angels who had the seven bowls came and spoke with me, saying, “Come here. I will show you the judgment of the great prostitute who sits on many waters, ²with whom the kings of the earth committed sexual immorality. Those who dwell in the earth were made drunken with the wine of her sexual immorality.” ³He carried me away in the Spirit into a wilderness. I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet-colored beast, full of blasphemous names, having seven heads and ten horns. ⁴The woman was dressed in purple and scarlet, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having in her hand a golden cup full of abominations and the impurities of the sexual immorality of the earth. ⁵And on her forehead a name was written, “MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF THE PROSTITUTES AND OF THE ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.” ⁶I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus. When I saw her, I wondered with great amazement.

⁷The angel said to me, “Why do you wonder? I will tell you the mystery of the woman and of the beast that carries her, which has the seven heads and the ten horns. ⁸The beast that you saw was, and is not; and is about to come up out of the abyss and to go into destruction. Those who dwell on the earth and whose names have not been written in the book of life from the foundation of the world will marvel when they see that the beast was, and is not, and shall be present.

^9[+] Here is the mind that has wisdom. The seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman sits. ¹⁰They are seven kings. Five have fallen, the one is, and the other has not yet come. When he comes, he must continue a little while. ¹¹The beast that was, and is not, is himself also an eighth, and is of the seven; and he goes to destruction. ¹²The ten horns that you saw are ten kings who have received no kingdom as yet, but they receive authority as kings with the beast for one hour. ¹³These have one mind, and they give their power and authority to the beast. ¹⁴These will war against the Lamb, and the Lamb will overcome them, for he is Lord of lords and King of kings; and those who are with him are called, chosen, and faithful.” ¹⁵He said to me, “The waters which you saw, where the prostitute sits, are peoples, multitudes, nations, and languages. ¹⁶The ten horns which you saw, they and the beast will hate the prostitute, will make her desolate, will strip her naked, will eat her flesh, and will burn her utterly with fire. ¹⁷For God has put in their hearts to do what he has in mind, to be of one mind, and to give their kingdom to the beast, until the words of God should be accomplished. ¹⁸The woman whom you saw is the great city which reigns over the kings of the earth.”

²⁸PERES: your kingdom is divided, and given to the Medes and Persians.”

⁶Then the king’s face was changed in him, and his thoughts troubled him; and the joints of his thighs were loosened, and his knees struck one against another.

⁴that you will take up this parable against the king of Babylon, and say, “How the oppressor has ceased! The golden city has ceased!” ⁵The LORD has broken the staff of the wicked, the scepter of the rulers, ⁶who struck the peoples in wrath with a continual stroke, who ruled the nations in anger, with a persecution that no one restrained. ⁷The whole earth is at rest, and is quiet. They break out in song. ⁸Yes, the cypress trees rejoice with you, with the cedars of Lebanon, saying, “Since you are humbled, no lumberjack has come up against us.” ⁹Sheol^[+] from beneath has moved for you to meet you at your coming. It stirs up the departed spirits for you, even all the rulers of the earth. It has raised up from their thrones all the kings of the nations. ¹⁰They all will answer and ask you, “Have you also become as weak as we are? Have you become like us?” ¹¹Your pomp is brought down to Sheol,^[+] with the sound of your stringed instruments. Maggots are spread out under you, and worms cover you.

¹²How you have fallen from heaven, shining one, son of the dawn! How you are cut down to the ground, who laid the nations low! ¹³You said in your heart, “I will ascend into heaven! I will exalt my throne above the stars of God! I will sit on the mountain of assembly, in the far north! ¹⁴I will ascend above the heights of the clouds! I will make myself like the Most High!” ¹⁵Yet you shall be brought down to Sheol,^[+] to the depths of the pit. ¹⁶Those who see you will stare at you. They will ponder you, saying, “Is this the man who made the earth to tremble, who shook kingdoms, ¹⁷who made the world like a wilderness, and overthrew its cities, who didn’t release his prisoners to their home?”

¹⁸All the kings of the nations sleep in glory, everyone in his own house. ¹⁹But you are cast away from your tomb like an abominable branch, clothed with the slain who are thrust through with the sword, who go down to the stones of the pit; like a dead body trodden under foot. ²⁰You will not join them in burial, because you have destroyed your land. You have killed your people. The offspring of evildoers will not be named forever.

²¹Prepare for slaughter of his children because of the iniquity of their fathers, that they not rise up and possess the earth, and fill the surface of the world with cities. ²²“I will rise up against them,” says the LORD of Armies, “and cut off from Babylon name and remnant, and son and son’s son,” says the LORD. ²³“I will also make it a possession for the porcupine, and pools of water. I will sweep it with the broom of destruction,” says the LORD of Armies.

¹²“It will happen, when seventy years are accomplished, that I will punish the king of Babylon and that nation,” says the LORD, “for their iniquity. I will make the land of the Chaldeans desolate forever. ¹³I will bring on that land all my words which I have pronounced against it, even all that is written in this book, which Jeremiah has prophesied against all the nations. ¹⁴For many nations and great kings will make bondservants of them, even of them. I will recompense them according to their deeds, and according to the work of their hands.”

¹⁵For the LORD, the God of Israel, says to me: “Take this cup of the wine of wrath from my hand, and cause all the nations to whom I send you to drink it. ¹⁶They will drink, and reel back and forth, and be insane, because of the sword that I will send among them.”

¹⁷Then I took the cup at the LORD’s hand, and made all the nations to drink, to whom the LORD had sent me: ¹⁸Jerusalem, and the cities of Judah, with its kings and its princes, to make them a desolation, an astonishment, a hissing, and a curse, as it is today; ¹⁹Pharaoh king of Egypt, with his servants, his princes, and all his people; ²⁰and all the mixed people, and all the kings of the land of Uz, all the kings of the Philistines, Ashkelon, Gaza, Ekron, and the remnant of Ashdod; ²¹Edom, Moab, and the children of Ammon; ²²and all the kings of Tyre, all the kings of Sidon, and the kings of the isle which is beyond the sea; ²³Dedan, Tema, Buz, and all who have the corners of their beard cut off; ²⁴and all the kings of Arabia, all the kings of the mixed people who dwell in the wilderness; ²⁵and all the kings of Zimri, all the kings of Elam, and all the kings of the Medes; ²⁶and all the kings of the north, far and near, one with another; and all the kingdoms of the world, which are on the surface of the earth. The king of Sheshach will drink after them.

¹⁹Babylon, the glory of kingdoms, the beauty of the Chaldeans’ pride, will be like when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah.

¹The burden of the wilderness of the sea. As whirlwinds in the South sweep through, it comes from the wilderness, from an awesome land.

²A grievous vision is declared to me. The treacherous man deals treacherously, and the destroyer destroys. Go up, Elam; attack! I have stopped all of Media’s sighing. ³Therefore my thighs are filled with anguish. Pains have seized me, like the pains of a woman in labor. I am in so much pain that I can’t hear. I am so dismayed that I can’t see. ⁴My heart flutters. Horror has frightened me. The twilight that I desired has been turned into trembling for me. ⁵They prepare the table. They set the watch. They eat. They drink. Rise up, you princes, oil the shield! ⁶For the Lord said to me, “Go, set a watchman. Let him declare what he sees. ⁷When he sees a troop, horsemen in pairs, a troop of donkeys, a troop of camels, he shall listen diligently with great attentiveness.” ⁸He cried like a lion: “Lord, I stand continually on the watchtower in the daytime, and every night I stay at my post. ⁹Behold, here comes a troop of men, horsemen in pairs.” He answered, “Fallen, fallen is Babylon; and all the engraved images of her gods are broken to the ground.

¹⁰You are my threshing, and the grain of my floor!” That which I have heard from the LORD of Armies, the God of Israel, I have declared to you.

¹¹The burden of Dumah. One calls to me out of Seir, “Watchman, what of the night? Watchman, what of the night?”