⁶ “Since this people has rejected
the gently flowing waters from Shilo’ach
and takes joy in Retzin and the son of Remalyah;
⁷ now Adonai will bring upon them
the mighty floodwaters of the [Euphrates] River —
that is, the king of Ashur and his power.
It will rise above all its channels
and overflow all its banks.
⁸ It will sweep through Y’hudah,
flooding everything and passing on.
It will reach even up to the neck,
and its outspread wings
will fill the whole expanse of the land.”

God is with us! ^[a]
9 You may make an uproar, peoples;
but you will be shattered.
Listen, all of you from distant lands:
arm yourselves, but you will be shattered;
yes, arm yourselves,
but you will be shattered;
¹⁰ devise a plan, but it will come to nothing;
say anything you like, but it won’t happen;
because God is with us ^[b].

¹¹ For this is what Adonai said to me, speaking with a strong hand, warning me not to live the way this people does:

¹² “Don’t regard as alliance what this people calls alliance,
and don’t fear what they fear or be awestruck by it;
¹³ but Adonai-Tzva’ot — consecrate him!
Let him be the object of your fear and awe!
¹⁴ He is there to be a sanctuary.
But for both the houses of Isra’el
he will be a stone to stumble over,
a rock obstructing their way;
a trap and a snare
for the inhabitants of Yerushalayim.
¹⁵ Many of them will stumble and fall,
be broken and trapped and captured.

¹⁶ Wrap up this document, and confine its teaching to those I have instructed.”

¹⁷ I will wait for Adonai,
who is hiding his face
from the house of Ya‘akov;
yes, I will look for him.
¹⁸ Meanwhile, I and the children
whom Adonai has given me
will become for Isra’el
signs and wonders
from Adonai-Tzva’ot
living on Mount Tziyon.
¹⁹ So when they tell you to consult
those squeaking, squawking mediums and fortune-tellers;
[you are to answer],
“Shouldn’t a people seek their God?
Must the living ask the dead
²⁰ for teaching and instruction?”
For they will indeed give you
this unenlightened suggestion.

²¹ Distressed and hungry
they will pass through the land;
and because of their hunger they will grow angry
and curse by their king and by their God.
But whether they look up [to God]
²² or [down] at the earth,
they will see only trouble and darkness,
anguished gloom and pervasive darkness.

^23 (9:1) But there will be no more gloom
for those who are now in anguish.
In the past the land of Z’vulun
and the land of Naftali were regarded lightly;
but in the future he will honor the way to the lake,
beyond the Yarden, Galil-of-the-Goyim.
9 ⁽²⁾ The people living in darkness
have seen a great light;
upon those living in the land that lies
in the shadow of death, light has dawned.
^2 (3) You have enlarged the nation
and increased their joy;
they rejoice in your presence
as if rejoicing at harvest time,
the way men rejoice
when dividing up the spoil.
^3 (4) For the yoke that weighed them down,
the bar across their shoulders,
and their driver’s goad
you have broken as on the day of Midyan[’s defeat].
^4 (5) For all the boots of soldiers marching
and every cloak rolled in blood
is destined for burning,
fuel for the fire.

^5 (6) For a child is born to us,
a son is given to us;
dominion will rest on his shoulders,
and he will be given the name
Pele-Yo‘etz El Gibbor
Avi-‘Ad Sar-Shalom
[Wonder of a Counselor, Mighty God,
Father of Eternity, Prince of Peace],
^6 (7) in order to extend the dominion
and perpetuate the peace
of the throne and kingdom of David,
to secure it and sustain it
through justice and righteousness
henceforth and forever.
The zeal of Adonai-Tzva’ot
will accomplish this.

^7 (8) Adonai sent a word to Ya‘akov,
and it has fallen on Isra’el.
^8 (9) All the people know it,
Efrayim and the inhabitants of Shomron.
But they say in pride,
in the arrogance of their hearts,
^9 (10) “The bricks have fallen,
but we will rebuild with cut stone;
the sycamore-fig trees have been chopped down,
but we will replace them with cedars.”
^10 (11) So Adonai has raised up Retzin’s foes against him
and spurred on his enemies —
^11 (12) Aram from the east, P’lishtim from the west;
and they devour Isra’el with an open mouth.

Even after all this, his anger remains,
his upraised hand still threatens.

^12 (13) Yet the people do not turn to the one striking them,
they don’t seek Adonai-Tzva’ot.
^13 (14) Therefore Adonai will cut off
Isra’el’s head and tail,
[tall] palm frond and [lowly] reed in a single day.
^14 (15) The old and the honored are the head,
while prophets teaching lies are the tail.
^15 (16) For those leading this people lead them astray,
and those led by them are destroyed.
^16 (17) Therefore Adonai takes no joy in their young men
and has no compassion on their orphans and widows;
for everyone is ungodly and does evil,
every mouth speaks foolishly.

Even after all this, his anger remains,
his upraised hand still threatens.
^17 (18) For wickedness burns like fire,
it devours briars and thorns;
it sets the forest underbrush ablaze,
with clouds of smoke whirling upward.
^18 (19) The anger of Adonai-Tzva’ot
is burning up the land;
the people, too, are fuel for the fire —
no one spares even his brother.
^19 (20) The one on the right grabs but stays hungry,
the one on the left eats but is unfilled.
Everyone devours his own arm’s flesh —
^20 (21) M’nasheh devours Efrayim;
and Efrayim, M’nasheh;
while together they oppose Y’hudah.

Even after all this, his anger remains,
his upraised hand still threatens.

10 Woe to those who enact unjust decrees
and draft oppressive legislation
² to deprive the impoverished of justice
and rob my people’s poor of their rights,
looting widows and preying on orphans!
³ What will you do on the day of punishment,
when calamity comes from afar?
To whom will you flee for help?
Where will you leave your wealth,
⁴ so as not to squat among the prisoners
or fall among the slain?

Even after all this, his anger remains,
his upraised hand still threatens.

⁵ “Oh Ashur, the rod expressing my anger!
The club in their hands is my fury!
⁶ I am sending him against a hypocritical nation,
ordering him to march against a people who enrage me,
to take the spoil and the plunder
and trample them down like mud in the street.
⁷ That is not what Ashur intends,
that is not what they think;
rather, they mean to destroy,
to cut down nation after nation.
⁸ For [their king] says,
‘Aren’t all my commanders kings?
⁹ Hasn’t Kalno [suffered] like Kark’mish,
Hamat like Arpad, Shomron like Dammesek?
¹⁰ Just as my hand reached the kingdoms of non-gods,
with more images than in Yerushalayim and Shomron;
¹¹ so won’t I do to Yerushalayim and her non-gods
what I did to Shomron and her idols?’”

¹² Therefore when Adonai has done everything he intends to do to Mount Tziyon and Yerushalayim, “I will punish the king of Ashur for the boasting that comes from his proud heart and from reveling in his arrogant looks. ¹³ For he says,

“‘With my own strong arm I have done this,
and with my wisdom, because I’m so clever!
I erased the boundaries between peoples,
I plundered their stores for the future;
as a mighty man, I subjugated the inhabitants.
¹⁴ My hand found the riches of the peoples like a nest;
and as one gathers abandoned eggs,
I gathered the whole earth!
Not one wing fluttered,
not one beak opened or let out a chirp!’”

¹⁵ Should the axe glorify itself
over the one who chops with it?
Should the saw magnify itself
over the one who moves it?
It’s as if a stick could wave
the hand that raises it up,
or as if a wooden staff could lift
[a person, who is] not made of wood.
¹⁶ Therefore the Lord, Adonai-Tzva’ot,
will send leanness to his well-fed ones;
and in place of his glory,
a fire will be kindled that will burn and burn.
¹⁷ The light of Isra’el will become a fire
and his Holy One a flame,
burning and devouring
his thorns and briars in a single day.
¹⁸ The glory of his forest
and of his fertile land
he will consume body and soul,
like an invalid wasting away.
¹⁹ So few forest trees will remain
that a child could list them.

²⁰ On that day the remnant of Isra’el,
those of the house of Ya‘akov who escaped,
will no longer rely
on the man who struck them down,
but will truly rely on Adonai,
the Holy One of Isra’el.
²¹ A remnant will return,
the remnant of Ya‘akov,
to the mighty God.
²² For, although your people, Isra’el,
are like the sand of the sea,
only a remnant of them will return.
Destruction is decreed, overflowing with justice.
²³ Adonai Elohim-Tzva’ot
will bring about this decreed destruction
throughout all the land.

²⁴ Therefore Adonai Elohim-Tzva’ot says:

“My people living in Tziyon,
don’t be afraid of Ashur,
even when he strikes you with a stick
and raises his staff against you,
the way it was in Egypt.
²⁵ For in but a little while, my fury will end;
and my anger will have destroyed them.”

²⁶ Adonai-Tzva’ot will wield a whip against them, as he did when striking Midyan at the Rock of ‘Orev; as his staff was over the sea, he will raise it, the way it was in Egypt.

²⁷ On that day his burden will fall from your shoulders
and his yoke from your neck;
the yoke will be destroyed
by your prosperity.

²⁸ He has come to ‘Ayat
and passed through Migron.
He has stored his equipment at Mikhmas.
²⁹ They have crossed the pass,
then lodged at Geva.
Ramah is shaking,
Giv‘at-Sha’ul has fled.
³⁰ Cry, shriek, Bat-Gallim!
Listen, Layish! Poor ‘Anatot!
³¹ Madmenah is in flight,
The people of Gevim take cover.
³² This very day he will stop at Nov;
and he will shake his fist
at the mountain of the daughter of Tziyon,
at the hill of Yerushalayim.
³³ See how Adonai Elohim-Tzva’ot
lops off the branches with terrible violence!
The ones standing highest are chopped down,
the lofty are laid low.
³⁴ He will hack down the forest underbrush with an axe,
and the L’vanon in its splendor falls.

“‘See! The days are coming,’ says Adonai,
‘when I will establish
over the house of Isra’el and over the house of Y’hudah
a new covenant.

⁹ “‘It will not be like the covenant
which I made with their fathers
on the day when I took them by their hand
and led them forth out of the land of Egypt;
because they, for their part,
did not remain faithful to my covenant;
so I, for my part,
stopped concerning myself with them,’
says Adonai.

¹⁰ “‘For this is the covenant which I will make
with the house of Isra’el after those days,’
says Adonai:

‘I will put my Torah in their minds
and write it on their hearts;
I will be their God,
and they will be my people.

¹¹ “‘None of them will teach his fellow-citizen
or his brother, saying, “Know Adonai!”
For all will know me,
from the least of them to the greatest,
¹² because I will be merciful toward their wickednesses
and remember their sins no more.’”^[c]