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36 Therefore this is what the Lord says:
Watch! I will defend your cause
and take revenge for you.
I will dry up her sea
and make her springs dry.
37 Babylon will become a heap of ruins,
a haunt for jackals,
a horror and a target of contempt,[a]
and no one will live there.
38 They will all roar together like young lions.
They will growl like lion cubs.
39 When they are ravenous, I will spread a feast.
I will make them drunk,
so that they will celebrate,[b]
and then they will go to sleep forever
and never wake up, declares the Lord.
40 I will bring them down like lambs to the slaughter,
like rams and goats.

41 How Sheshak[c] is captured!
The pride of the whole earth is seized!
Babylon has become an object of horror among the nations.
42 The sea has come all the way up to Babylon,
and she is covered with its rolling waves.
43 Her cities have become desolate,
a desert and a wasteland,
a land in which no one lives,
a land through which no man passes.
44 I will punish Bel in Babylon
and make his mouth spit out what he has swallowed.
The nations will no longer stream to him.
The wall of Babylon will fall.

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Footnotes

  1. Jeremiah 51:37 Literally hissing
  2. Jeremiah 51:39 The translation follows the Hebrew. The Greek and Latin read pass out.
  3. Jeremiah 51:41 Sheshak is a cypher or cryptogram for Babylon. It is written in reverse alphabet: A=Z, B=Y, etc. In the Hebrew alphabet, bbl reversed is shshk.

36 Therefore this is what the Lord says:

“See, I will defend your cause(A)
    and avenge(B) you;
I will dry up(C) her sea
    and make her springs dry.
37 Babylon will be a heap of ruins,
    a haunt(D) of jackals,
an object of horror and scorn,(E)
    a place where no one lives.(F)
38 Her people all roar like young lions,(G)
    they growl like lion cubs.
39 But while they are aroused,
    I will set out a feast for them
    and make them drunk,(H)
so that they shout with laughter—
    then sleep forever(I) and not awake,”
declares the Lord.(J)
40 “I will bring them down
    like lambs to the slaughter,
    like rams and goats.(K)

41 “How Sheshak[a](L) will be captured,(M)
    the boast of the whole earth seized!
How desolate(N) Babylon will be
    among the nations!
42 The sea will rise over Babylon;
    its roaring waves(O) will cover her.
43 Her towns will be desolate,
    a dry and desert(P) land,
a land where no one lives,
    through which no one travels.(Q)
44 I will punish Bel(R) in Babylon
    and make him spew out(S) what he has swallowed.
The nations will no longer stream to him.
    And the wall(T) of Babylon will fall.

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Footnotes

  1. Jeremiah 51:41 Sheshak is a cryptogram for Babylon.

36 Therefore thus saith the Lord; Behold, I will plead thy cause, and take vengeance for thee; and I will dry up her sea, and make her springs dry.

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

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

39 In 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, saith the Lord.

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

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

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

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

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

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