Raise a standard toward Zion, flee for safety, stay not, for I bring disaster from the north, and great destruction.

Impending Disaster for Jerusalem

Flee for safety, O people of Benjamin, from the midst of Jerusalem! Blow the trumpet in Tekoa, and raise a signal on Beth-haccherem, for disaster looms out of the north, and great destruction.

As a well keeps its water fresh, so she keeps fresh her evil; violence and destruction are heard within her; sickness and wounds are ever before me.

Let those be put to shame who persecute me, but let me not be put to shame; let them be dismayed, but let me not be dismayed; bring upon them the day of disaster; destroy them with double destruction!

For whenever I speak, I cry out, I shout, “Violence and destruction!” For the word of the Lord has become for me a reproach and derision all day long.

behold, I will send for all the tribes of the north, declares the Lord, and for Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, my servant, and I will bring them against this land and its inhabitants, and against all these surrounding nations. I will devote them to destruction, and make them a horror, a hissing, and an everlasting desolation.

“A voice! A cry from Horonaim, ‘Desolation and great destruction!’

For at the ascent of Luhith they go up weeping; for at the descent of Horonaim they have heard the distressed cry of destruction.

“Go up against the land of Merathaim, and against the inhabitants of Pekod. Kill, and devote them to destruction, declares the Lord, and do all that I have commanded you.

The noise of battle is in the land, and great destruction!

Come against her from every quarter; open her granaries; pile her up like heaps of grain, and devote her to destruction; let nothing be left of her.

The Utter Destruction of Babylon

Thus says the Lord: “Behold, I will stir up the spirit of a destroyer against Babylon, against the inhabitants of Leb-kamai,

Let not the archer bend his bow, and let him not stand up in his armor. Spare not her young men; devote to destruction all her army.

“A voice! A cry from Babylon! The noise of great destruction from the land of the Chaldeans!