Isaiah 22-24

New International Version - UK

What troubles you now,
    that you have all gone up on the roofs,
² you town so full of commotion,
    you city of tumult and revelry?
Your slain were not killed by the sword,
    nor did they die in battle.
³ All your leaders have fled together;
    they have been captured without using the bow.
All you who were caught were taken prisoner together,
    having fled while the enemy was still far away.
⁴ Therefore I said, ‘Turn away from me;
    let me weep bitterly.
Do not try to console me
    over the destruction of my people.’

⁵ The Lord, the Lord Almighty, has a day
    of tumult and trampling and terror
    in the Valley of Vision,
a day of battering down walls
    and of crying out to the mountains.
⁶ Elam takes up the quiver,
    with her charioteers and horses;
    Kir uncovers the shield.
⁷ Your choicest valleys are full of chariots,
    and horsemen are posted at the city gates.

⁸ The Lord stripped away the defences of Judah,
    and you looked in that day
    to the weapons in the Palace of the Forest.
⁹ You saw that the walls of the City of David
    were broken through in many places;
you stored up water
    in the Lower Pool.
¹⁰ You counted the buildings in Jerusalem
    and tore down houses to strengthen the wall.
¹¹ You built a reservoir between the two walls
    for the water of the Old Pool,
but you did not look to the One who made it,
    or have regard for the One who planned it long ago.

¹² The Lord, the Lord Almighty,
    called you on that day
to weep and to wail,
    to tear out your hair and put on sackcloth.
¹³ But see, there is joy and revelry,
    slaughtering of cattle and killing of sheep,
    eating of meat and drinking of wine!
‘Let us eat and drink,’ you say,
    ‘for tomorrow we die!’

‘Go, say to this steward,
    to Shebna the palace administrator:
¹⁶ what are you doing here and who gave you permission
    to cut out a grave for yourself here,
hewing your grave on the height
    and chiselling your resting-place in the rock?

¹⁷ ‘Beware, the Lord is about to take firm hold of you
    and hurl you away, you mighty man.
¹⁸ He will roll you up tightly like a ball
    and throw you into a large country.
There you will die
    and there the chariots you were so proud of
    will become a disgrace to your master’s house.
¹⁹ I will depose you from your office,
    and you will be ousted from your position.

Wail, you ships of Tarshish!
    For Tyre is destroyed
    and left without house or harbour.
From the land of Cyprus
    word has come to them.

² Be silent, you people of the island
    and you merchants of Sidon,
    whom the seafarers have enriched.
³ On the great waters
    came the grain of the Shihor;
the harvest of the Nile^[b] was the revenue of Tyre,
    and she became the market-place of the nations.

⁴ Be ashamed, Sidon, and you fortress of the sea,
    for the sea has spoken:
‘I have neither been in labour nor given birth;
    I have neither reared sons nor brought up daughters.’
⁵ When word comes to Egypt,
    they will be in anguish at the report from Tyre.

⁶ Cross over to Tarshish;
    wail, you people of the island.
⁷ Is this your city of revelry,
    the old, old city,
whose feet have taken her
    to settle in far-off lands?
⁸ Who planned this against Tyre,
    the bestower of crowns,
whose merchants are princes,
    whose traders are renowned in the earth?
⁹ The Lord Almighty planned it,
    to bring down her pride in all her splendour
    and to humble all who are renowned on the earth.

¹⁰ Till^[c] your land as they do along the Nile,
    Daughter Tarshish,
    for you no longer have a harbour.
¹¹ The Lord has stretched out his hand over the sea
    and made its kingdoms tremble.
He has given an order concerning Phoenicia
    that her fortresses be destroyed.
¹² He said, ‘No more of your revelling,
    Virgin Daughter Sidon, now crushed!

‘Up, cross over to Cyprus;
    even there you will find no rest.’
¹³ Look at the land of the Babylonians,^[d]
    this people that is now of no account!
The Assyrians have made it
    a place for desert creatures;
they raised up their siege towers,
    they stripped its fortresses bare
    and turned it into a ruin.

¹⁴ Wail, you ships of Tarshish;
    your fortress is destroyed!

¹⁶ ‘Take up a harp, walk through the city,
    you forgotten prostitute;
play the harp well, sing many a song,
    so that you will be remembered.’

⁴ The earth dries up and withers,
    the world languishes and withers,
    the heavens languish with the earth.
⁵ The earth is defiled by its people;
    they have disobeyed the laws,
violated the statutes
    and broken the everlasting covenant.
⁶ Therefore a curse consumes the earth;
    its people must bear their guilt.
Therefore earth’s inhabitants are burned up,
    and very few are left.
⁷ The new wine dries up and the vine withers;
    all the merrymakers groan.
⁸ The joyful tambourines are stilled,
    the noise of the revellers has stopped,
    the joyful harp is silent.
⁹ No longer do they drink wine with a song;
    the beer is bitter to its drinkers.
¹⁰ The ruined city lies desolate;
    the entrance to every house is barred.
¹¹ In the streets they cry out for wine;
    all joy turns to gloom,
    all joyful sounds are banished from the earth.
¹² The city is left in ruins,
    its gate is battered to pieces.
¹³ So will it be on the earth
    and among the nations,
as when an olive tree is beaten,
    or as when gleanings are left after the grape harvest.

¹⁴ They raise their voices, they shout for joy;
    from the west they acclaim the Lord’s majesty.
¹⁵ Therefore in the east give glory to the Lord;
    exalt the name of the Lord, the God of Israel,
    in the islands of the sea.
¹⁶ From the ends of the earth we hear singing:
    ‘Glory to the Righteous One.’

But I said, ‘I waste away, I waste away!
    Woe to me!
The treacherous betray!
    With treachery the treacherous betray!’
¹⁷ Terror and pit and snare await you,
    people of the earth.
¹⁸ Whoever flees at the sound of terror
    will fall into a pit;
whoever climbs out of the pit
    will be caught in a snare.

The floodgates of the heavens are opened,
    the foundations of the earth shake.
¹⁹ The earth is broken up,
    the earth is split asunder,
    the earth is violently shaken.
²⁰ The earth reels like a drunkard,
    it sways like a hut in the wind;
so heavy upon it is the guilt of its rebellion
    that it falls – never to rise again.

²¹ In that day the Lord will punish
    the powers in the heavens above
    and the kings on the earth below.
²² They will be herded together
    like prisoners bound in a dungeon;
they will be shut up in prison
    and be punished^[e] after many days.
²³ The moon will be dismayed,
    the sun ashamed;
for the Lord Almighty will reign
    on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem,
    and before its elders – with great glory.