10
📚✭Woe to those who enact unjust laws,
and who write oppressive
decisions which they have
prescribed
2 📚To deprive the needy of justice,
and take away the rights of
the poor of my people,
so that widows may be their prey,
and that they may rob
the fatherless!
3 📚✭And what will you do in the day
of punishment,
and in the desolation which
will come from afar?
To whom will you flee for help?
And where will you leave your glory?
4 📚Without me they will bow down
among the prisoners,
and they will fall under the slain.
Yet for all this his anger is not
turned away, but his hand is
stretched out still.
God’s punishment of Assyria
5 📚✭✭“Woe to the Assyrian,
the rod of my anger,
and the staff in whose hand is
my indignation!
6 📚I will send him against an
ungodly nation,
and I will give him a charge against
the people of my wrath,
to take the plunder,
and to take the prey,
and to trample them down like
the mire of the streets.
7 📚✭But he does not intend this,
nor does his heart think so;
but it is in his heart to destroy
and cut off many nations.
8 📚For he says,
‘Are not my princes all kings?’
9 📚✭Is not Calno like Carchemish?
Is not Hamath like Arpad?
Is not Samaria like Damascus?
10 📚✭As my hand has reached
the kingdoms of the idols,
whose carved images exceeded
those of Jerusalem and of Samaria,
11 📚Shall I not do to Jerusalem and her
idols as I have done to Samaria
and her idols?’ ”
12 📚✭Therefore it will come about,
when the Lord has completed
his whole work on mount Zion
and on Jerusalem,
that he will say,
“I will punish the fruit of the arrogant
heart of the king of Assyria,
and the glory of his high looks”.
13 📚For he says, “I have done it
by the strength of my hand
and by my wisdom;
for I have understanding.
And I have removed the boundaries
of the people,
and have robbed their treasures,
and like a mighty man
I have put down their inhabitants:
14 📚And like finding a nest
my hand has reached the riches
of the people.
I have gathered the whole earth
like one gathers eggs
that are left,
and there was none
that moved the wing,
or opened the mouth, or peeped”.
15 📚✭Should the axe boast itself
against the one who cuts with it?
Or should the saw exalt itself
against the one who handles it?
As if the rod could wield
those who lift it up,
or as if the staff could lift up
what is not wood.
16 📚✭Therefore the Lord,
the LORD of hosts,
will send leanness among his
fat ones,
and under his glory he shall kindle
a fire like a burning flame.
17 📚And the light of Israel will become
a fire,
and his Holy One a flame,
and it will burn and devour
his thorns and his briars in one day,
18 📚And will consume the glory
of his forest,
and of his fruitful field,
both soul and body;
and they will be as when
a sick man wastes away.
19 📚And the rest of the trees
of his forest will be so few
that a child may write them down.
20 📚✭And it shall come to pass
in that day,
that the remnant of Israel,
and those of the house
of Jacob who escape,
will not again depend on him
who defeated them,
but will in fact depend on the LORD,
the Holy One of Israel.
21 📚The remnant,
the remnant of Jacob,
will return to the mighty God.
22 📚For though your people Israel be
like the sand of the sea,
yet only a remnant of them
will return.
Destruction has been decreed;
it will overflow with righteousness.
23 📚For the Lord God of hosts will carry
out the decreed destruction throughout
the whole land.
24 📚✭Therefore thus says
the Lord God of hosts:
“O my people who live in Zion,
do not be afraid of the Assyrian
who will strike you with a rod,
and lift up his staff against you,
like Egypt did,
25 📚For yet a very little while,
and the indignation I have against you
will cease,
and my anger will be directed
to their destruction”.
26 📚And the LORD of hosts will stir up
a scourge for him.
It will be like the slaughter
of Midian at the rock of Oreb.
And his rod will be over the sea;
he will lift it up like he did in Egypt.
27 📚And it will happen in that day,
that his burden will be taken
from your shoulders,
and his yoke from your neck,
and the yoke will be destroyed
because of the anointing.
28 📚✭He has come to Aiath,
he has passed on to Migron;
at Michmash he has stored his
baggage carriages.
29 📚They have gone over the pass;
they make a lodging place at Geba.
Ramah is afraid;
Gibeah of Saul has fled.
30 📚Raise your voice,
O daughter of Gallim.
Cause it to be heard at Laish.
O poor Anathoth!
31 📚Madmenah has run away.
The inhabitants of Gebim flee
for cover.
32 📚This day he will still stop at Nob.
He will shake his fist at
the mount of the daughter of Zion✭,
the hill of Jerusalem.
33 📚✭See, the Lord,
the LORD of hosts,
will lop off the bough producing
terror;
and the lofty ones will be
cut down,
and the haughty will be brought low.
34 📚And he will cut down the forest thickets
with an iron tool;
Lebanon will fall before a mighty one.