² And as they journeyed eastward, they found a plain (valley) in the land of Shinar, and they settled and dwelt there.

³ And they said one to another, Come, let us make bricks and burn them thoroughly. So they had brick for stone, and slime (bitumen) for mortar.

⁴ And they said, Come, let us build us a city and a tower whose top reaches into the sky, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered over the whole earth.

⁵ And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower which the sons of men had built.

¹¹ And in that day the Lord shall again lift up His hand a second time to recover (acquire and deliver) the remnant of His people which is left, from Assyria, from Lower Egypt, from Pathros, from Ethiopia, from Elam [in Persia], from Shinar [Babylonia], from Hamath [in Upper Syria], and from the countries bordering on the [Mediterranean] Sea.^(A)

¹² And He will raise up a signal for the nations and will assemble the outcasts of Israel and will gather together the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth.

¹³ The envy and jealousy of Ephraim also shall depart, and they who vex and harass Judah from outside or inside shall be cut off; Ephraim shall not envy Judah, and Judah shall not vex and harass Ephraim.

¹⁴ But [with united forces Ephraim and Judah] will swoop down upon the shoulders of the Philistines’ [land sloping] toward the west; together they will strip the people on the east [the Arabs]. They will lay their hands upon Edom and Moab, and the Ammonites will obey them.

³ The land and the earth shall be utterly laid waste and utterly pillaged; for the Lord has said this.

⁴ The land and the earth mourn and wither, the world languishes and withers, the high ones of the people [and the heavens with the earth] languish.

⁵ The land and the earth also are defiled by their inhabitants, because they have transgressed the laws, disregarded the statutes, and broken the everlasting covenant.^(A)

⁶ Therefore a curse devours the land and the earth, and they who dwell in it suffer the punishment of their guilt. Therefore the inhabitants of the land and the earth are scorched and parched [under the curse of God’s wrath], and few people are left.^(B)