Severe Judgment against Babylon

1Thus said the LORD; Behold, I will raise up against Babylon, and against them that dwell in the middle of them that rise up against me, a destroying wind;

2And will send to Babylon fanners, that shall fan her, and shall empty her land: for in the day of trouble they shall be against her round about.

3Against him that bends let the archer bend his bow, and against him that lifts himself up in his brigandine: and spare you not her young men; destroy you utterly all her host.

4Thus the slain shall fall in the land of the Chaldeans, and they that are thrust through in her streets.

5For Israel has not been forsaken, nor Judah of his God, of the LORD of hosts; though their land was filled with sin against the Holy One of Israel.

6Flee out of the middle of Babylon, and deliver every man his soul: be not cut off in her iniquity; for this is the time of the LORD's vengeance; he will render to her a recompense.

7Babylon has been a golden cup in the LORD's hand, that made all the earth drunken: the nations have drunken of her wine; therefore the nations are mad.

8Babylon is suddenly fallen and destroyed: howl for her; take balm for her pain, if so be she may be healed.

9We would have healed Babylon, but she is not healed: forsake her, and let us go every one into his own country: for her judgment reaches to heaven, and is lifted up even to the skies.

10The LORD has brought forth our righteousness: come, and let us declare in Zion the work of the LORD our God.

11Make bright the arrows; gather the shields: the LORD has raised up the spirit of the kings of the Medes: for his device is against Babylon, to destroy it; because it is the vengeance of the LORD, the vengeance of his temple.

12Set up the standard on the walls of Babylon, make the watch strong, set up the watchmen, prepare the ambushes: for the LORD has both devised and done that which he spoke against the inhabitants of Babylon.

13O you that dwell on many waters, abundant in treasures, your end is come, and the measure of your covetousness.

14The LORD of hosts has sworn by himself, saying, Surely I will fill you with men, as with caterpillars; and they shall lift up a shout against you.

Song of Praise

15He has made the earth by his power, he has established the world by his wisdom, and has stretched out the heaven by his understanding.

16When he utters his voice, there is a multitude of waters in the heavens; and he causes the vapors to ascend from the ends of the earth: he makes lightning with rain, and brings forth the wind out of his treasures.

17Every man is brutish by his knowledge; every founder is confounded by the graven image: for his molten image is falsehood, and there is no breath in them.

18They are vanity, the work of errors: in the time of their visitation they shall perish.

19The portion of Jacob is not like them; for he is the former of all things: and Israel is the rod of his inheritance: the LORD of hosts is his name.

Babylon's Punishment

20You are my battle ax and weapons of war: for with you will I break in pieces the nations, and with you will I destroy kingdoms;

21And with you will I break in pieces the horse and his rider; and with you will I break in pieces the chariot and his rider;

22With you also will I break in pieces man and woman; and with you will I break in pieces old and young; and with you will I break in pieces the young man and the maid;

23I will also break in pieces with you the shepherd and his flock; and with you will I break in pieces the farmer and his yoke of oxen; and with you will I break in pieces captains and rulers.

24And I will render to Babylon and to all the inhabitants of Chaldea all their evil that they have done in Zion in your sight, said the LORD.

25Behold, I am against you, O destroying mountain, said the LORD, which destroy all the earth: and I will stretch out my hand on you, and roll you down from the rocks, and will make you a burnt mountain.

26And they shall not take of you a stone for a corner, nor a stone for foundations; but you shall be desolate for ever, said the LORD.

27Set you up a standard in the land, blow the trumpet among the nations, prepare the nations against her, call together against her the kingdoms of Ararat, Minni, and Ashchenaz; appoint a captain against her; cause the horses to come up as the rough caterpillars.

28Prepare against her the nations with the kings of the Medes, the captains thereof, and all the rulers thereof, and all the land of his dominion.

29And the land shall tremble and sorrow: for every purpose of the LORD shall be performed against Babylon, to make the land of Babylon a desolation without an inhabitant.

30The mighty men of Babylon have declined to fight, they have remained in their holds: their might has failed; they became as women: they have burned her dwelling places; her bars are broken.

31One post shall run to meet another, and one messenger to meet another, to show the king of Babylon that his city is taken at one end,

32And that the passages are stopped, and the reeds they have burned with fire, and the men of war are affrighted.

33For thus said the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel; The daughter of Babylon is like a threshing floor, it is time to thresh her: yet a little while, and the time of her harvest shall come.

34Nebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon has devoured me, he has crushed me, he has made me an empty vessel, he has swallowed me up like a dragon, he has filled his belly with my delicates, he has cast me out.

35The violence done to me and to my flesh be on Babylon, shall the inhabitant of Zion say; and my blood on the inhabitants of Chaldea, shall Jerusalem say.

36Therefore thus said the LORD; Behold, I will plead your cause, and take vengeance for you; and I will dry up her sea, and make her springs dry.

37And Babylon shall become heaps, a dwelling place for dragons, an astonishment, and an hissing, without an inhabitant.

38They shall roar together like lions: they shall yell as lions' whelps.

39In their heat I will make their feasts, and I will make them drunken, that they may rejoice, and sleep a perpetual sleep, and not wake, said the LORD.

40I will bring them down like lambs to the slaughter, like rams with he goats.

41How is Sheshach taken! and how is the praise of the whole earth surprised! how is Babylon become an astonishment among the nations!

42The sea is come up on Babylon: she is covered with the multitude of the waves thereof.

43Her cities are a desolation, a dry land, and a wilderness, a land wherein no man dwells, neither does any son of man pass thereby.

44And I will punish Bel in Babylon, and I will bring forth out of his mouth that which he has swallowed up: and the nations shall not flow together any more to him: yes, the wall of Babylon shall fall.

Instructions for the Exiles

45My people, go you out of the middle of her, and deliver you every man his soul from the fierce anger of the LORD.

46And lest your heart faint, and you fear for the rumor that shall be heard in the land; a rumor shall both come one year, and after that in another year shall come a rumor, and violence in the land, ruler against ruler.

47Therefore, behold, the days come, that I will do judgment on the graven images of Babylon: and her whole land shall be confounded, and all her slain shall fall in the middle of her.

48Then the heaven and the earth, and all that is therein, shall sing for Babylon: for the spoilers shall come to her from the north, said the LORD.

49As Babylon has caused the slain of Israel to fall, so at Babylon shall fall the slain of all the earth.

50You that have escaped the sword, go away, stand not still: remember the LORD afar off, and let Jerusalem come into your mind.

51We are confounded, because we have heard reproach: shame has covered our faces: for strangers are come into the sanctuaries of the LORD's house.

52Why, behold, the days come, said the LORD, that I will do judgment on her graven images: and through all her land the wounded shall groan.

53Though Babylon should mount up to heaven, and though she should fortify the height of her strength, yet from me shall spoilers come to her, said the LORD.

54A sound of a cry comes from Babylon, and great destruction from the land of the Chaldeans:

55Because the LORD has spoiled Babylon, and destroyed out of her the great voice; when her waves do roar like great waters, a noise of their voice is uttered:

56Because the spoiler is come on her, even on Babylon, and her mighty men are taken, every one of their bows is broken: for the LORD God of recompenses shall surely requite.

57And I will make drunk her princes, and her wise men, her captains, and her rulers, and her mighty men: and they shall sleep a perpetual sleep, and not wake, said the King, whose name is the LORD of hosts.

58Thus said the LORD of hosts; The broad walls of Babylon shall be utterly broken, and her high gates shall be burned with fire; and the people shall labor in vain, and the folk in the fire, and they shall be weary.

Jeremiah's Prophecy to Seraiah

59The word which Jeremiah the prophet commanded Seraiah the son of Neriah, the son of Maaseiah, when he went with Zedekiah the king of Judah into Babylon in the fourth year of his reign. And this Seraiah was a quiet prince. 60So Jeremiah wrote in a book all the evil that should come on Babylon, even all these words that are written against Babylon. 61And Jeremiah said to Seraiah, When you come to Babylon, and shall see, and shall read all these words; 62Then shall you say, O LORD, you have spoken against this place, to cut it off, that none shall remain in it, neither man nor beast, but that it shall be desolate for ever. 63And it shall be, when you have made an end of reading this book, that you shall bind a stone to it, and cast it into the middle of Euphrates: 64And you shall say, Thus shall Babylon sink, and shall not rise from the evil that I will bring on her: and they shall be weary. Thus far are the words of Jeremiah.