²¹This is the word that the Lord hath spoken of him: The virgin, the daughter of Sion, hath despised thee, and laughed thee to scorn: the daughter of Jerusalem hath wagged her head behind thy back.

²²Whom hast thou reproached, and whom hast thou blasphemed? against whom hast thou exalted thy voice, and lifted up thy eyes on high? against the holy one of Israel.

²³By the hand of thy servants thou hast reproached the Lord, and hast said: With the multitude of my chariots I have gone up to the height of the mountains, to the top of Libanus, and have cut down its tall cedars, and its choice fir trees. And I have entered into the furthest parts thereof, and the forest of its Carmel.

²⁴I have cut down, and I have drunk strange waters, and have dried up with the soles of my feet all the shut up waters.

²⁵Hast thou not heard what I have done from the beginning? from the days of old I have formed it, and now I have brought it to effect: that fenced cities of fighting men should be turned to heaps of ruins:

²⁶And the inhabitants of them were weak of hand, they trembled and were confounded, they became like the grass of the field, and the green herb on the tops of houses, which withered before it came to maturity.

²⁷Thy dwelling, and thy going out, and thy coming in, and thy way I knew before, and thy rage against me.

²⁸Thou hast been mad against me, and thy pride hath come up to my ears: therefore I will put a ring in thy nose, and a bit between thy lips, and I will turn thee back by the way by which thou camest.

²⁹And to thee, O Ezechias, this shall be a sign: Eat this year what thou shalt find: and in the second year, such things as spring of themselves: but in the third year sow and reap: plant vineyards, and eat the fruit of them.

³⁰And whatsoever shall be left of the house of Juda, shall take root downward, and bear fruit upward.

³¹For out of Jerusalem shall go forth a remnant, and that which shall be saved out of mount Sion: the zeal of the Lord of hosts shall do this.

³²Wherefore thus saith the Lord concerning the king of the Assyrians: He shall not come into this city, nor shoot an arrow into it, nor come before it with shield, nor cast a trench about it.

³³By the way that he came he shall return: and into this city he shall not come, saith the Lord.

³⁴And I will protect this city, and will save it for my own sake, and for David, my servant’s sake.

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