Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

⁽¹⁾ God, the pagans have entered your heritage.
They have defiled your holy temple
and turned Yerushalayim into rubble.
² They have given the corpses of your servants
as food for the birds in the air,
yes, the flesh of those faithful to you
for the wild animals of the earth.
³ All around Yerushalayim
they have shed their blood like water,
and no one is left to bury them.
⁴ We suffer the taunts of our neighbors,
we are mocked and scorned by those around us.

⁵ How long, Adonai?
Will you be angry forever?
How long will your jealousy burn like fire?

⁶ Pour out your wrath on the nations that don’t know you,
on the kingdoms that don’t call out your name;
⁷ for they have devoured Ya‘akov
and left his home a waste.

⁸ Don’t count past iniquities against us,
but let your compassion come quickly to meet us,
for we have been brought very low.
⁹ Help us, God of our salvation,
for the sake of the glory of your name.
Deliver us, forgive our sins,
for your name’s sake.
¹⁰ Why should the nations ask,
“Where is their God?”

Let the vengeance taken on your servants’ shed blood
be known among the nations before our eyes.
¹¹ Let the groaning of the captives come before you;
by your great strength save those condemned to death.

¹² Repay our neighbors sevenfold where they can feel it
for the insults they inflicted on you, Adonai.

¹³ Then we, your people and the flock in your pasture,
will give you thanks forever.
From generation to generation
we will proclaim your praise.

⁶ “When that day comes,” says Adonai,
“I will assemble the lame
and gather those who were dispersed,
along with those I afflicted.
⁷ I will make the lame a remnant
and those who were driven off a strong nation.”

Adonai will rule them on Mount Tziyon
from that time forth and forever.
⁸ You, tower of the flock,
hill of the daughter of Tziyon,
to you your former sovereignty will return,
the royal power of the daughter of Yerushalayim.
⁹ Why are you now crying out?
Don’t you have a king?
Has your counselor been destroyed,
that you are seized with pain like a woman in labor?
¹⁰ Be in pain! Work to give birth
like a woman in labor, daughter of Tziyon!
For now you will go out of the city
and live in the wilds till you reach Bavel.
There you will be rescued;
there Adonai will redeem you
from the power of your enemies.
¹¹ Now many nations have gathered against you;
they say, “Let her be defiled,
let’s gloat over Tziyon.”
¹² But they don’t know the thoughts of Adonai,
they don’t understand his plan;
for he has gathered them like sheaves
on the threshing-floor.
¹³ Get up! Start threshing, daughter of Tziyon!
“For I will make your horns like iron
and your hoofs like bronze.”
You will crush many peoples
and devote their plunder to Adonai,
their wealth to the Lord of all the earth.

“She has fallen! She has fallen!
Bavel the Great!^[a]
She has become a home for demons,
a prison for every unclean spirit,
a prison for every unclean, hated bird.

³ “For all the nations have drunk of the wine
of God’s fury caused by her whoring —
yes, the kings of the earth went whoring with her,
and from her unrestrained love of luxury
the world’s businessmen have grown rich.”

⁴ Then I heard another voice out of heaven say:

“My people, come out of her!
so that you will not share in her sins,
so that you will not be infected by her plagues,
⁵ for her sins are a sticky mass piled up to heaven,
and God has remembered her crimes.

⁶ “Render to her as she rendered to others!
Pay her back double for what she has done!
Use the cup in which she has brewed
to brew her a double-sized drink!

⁷ “Give her as much torment and sorrow
as the glory and luxury she gave herself!
For in her heart she says, ‘I sit a queen —
I am not a widow, I will never see sorrow.’
⁸ “Therefore, her plagues will come in a single day —
death, sorrow and famine;
and she will be burned with fire,
because Adonai, God, her Judge, is mighty”

“Oh no! The great city!
Bavel, the mighty city!
In a single hour
your judgment has come!”