The Destruction of Israel

9 I saw the Lord standing beside1 the altar, and he said:

e“Strike the capitals until ethe thresholds fshake,

gand shatter them on the heads of all the people;2

and those who are left of them I will kill with the sword;

hnot one of them shall flee away;

not one of them shall escape.

2  i“If they dig into Sheol,

from there shall my hand take them;

iif they climb up to heaven,

from there I will bring them down.

3  If they hide themselves on jthe top of Carmel,

from there I will search them out and take them;

kand if they hide from my sight at the bottom of the sea,

there I will command the serpent, and it shall bite them.

4  lAnd if they go into captivity before their enemies,

there I will command the sword, and it shall kill them;

mand I will fix my eyes upon them

for evil and not for good.”

5  The Lord God of hosts,

he who touches the earth and nit melts,

and all who dwell in it mourn,

oand all of it rises like the Nile,

oand sinks again, like the Nile of Egypt;

6  pwho builds his upper chambers in the heavens

and founds his vault upon the earth;

qwho calls for the waters of the sea

and pours them out upon the surface of the earth—

rthe Lord is his name.

7  “Are you not like sthe Cushites to me,

O people of Israel?” declares the Lord.

t“Did I not bring up Israel from the land of Egypt,

and uthe Philistines from vCaphtor and the Syrians from wKir?

8  Behold, xthe eyes of the Lord God are upon the sinful kingdom,

and I will destroy it from the surface of the ground,

yexcept that I will not utterly destroy the house of Jacob,”

declares the Lord.

9  “For behold, I will command,

zand shake the house of Israel among all the nations

as one shakes with a sieve,

but no pebble shall fall to the earth.

10  All the sinners of my people shall die by the sword,

who say, a‘Disaster shall not overtake or meet us.’