Isaiah 10:5–21

Doom to Assyria!

^5–11“Doom to Assyria, weapon of my anger.

My wrath is a cudgel in his hands!

I send him against a godless nation,

against the people I’m angry with.

I command him to strip them clean, rob them blind,

and then push their faces in the mud and leave them.

But Assyria has another agenda;

he has something else in mind.

He’s out to destroy utterly,

to stamp out as many nations as he can.

Assyria says, ‘Aren’t my commanders all kings?

Can’t they do whatever they like?

Didn’t I destroy Calno as well as Carchemish?

Hamath as well as Arpad? Level Samaria as I did Damascus?

I’ve eliminated kingdoms full of gods

far more impressive than anything in Jerusalem and Samaria.

So what’s to keep me from destroying Jerusalem

in the same way I destroyed Samaria and all her god-idols?’ ”

^12–13When the Master has finished dealing with Mount Zion and Jerusalem, he’ll say, “Now it’s Assyria’s turn. I’ll punish the bragging arrogance of the king of Assyria, his high and mighty posturing, the way he goes around saying,

^13–14“ ‘I’ve done all this by myself.

I know more than anyone.

I’ve wiped out the boundaries of whole countries.

I’ve walked in and taken anything I wanted.

I charged in like a bull

and toppled their kings from their thrones.

I reached out my hand and took all that they treasured

as easily as a boy taking a bird’s eggs from a nest.

Like a farmer gathering eggs from the henhouse,

I gathered the world in my basket,

And no one so much as fluttered a wing

or squawked or even chirped.’ ”

^15–19Does an ax take over from the one who swings it?

Does a saw act more important than the sawyer?

As if a shovel did its shoveling by using a ditch digger!

As if a hammer used the carpenter to pound nails!

Therefore the Master, God-of-the-Angel-Armies,

will send a debilitating disease on his robust Assyrian fighters.

Under the canopy of God’s bright glory

a fierce fire will break out.

Israel’s Light will burst into a conflagration.

The Holy will explode into a firestorm,

And in one day burn to cinders

every last Assyrian thornbush.

God will destroy the splendid trees and lush gardens.

The Assyrian body and soul will waste away to nothing

like a disease-ridden invalid.

A child could count what’s left of the trees

on the fingers of his two hands.

^20–23And on that Day also, what’s left of Israel, the ragtag survivors of Jacob, will no longer be fascinated by abusive, battering Assyria. They’ll lean on God, The Holy—yes, truly. The ragtag remnant—what’s left of Jacob—will come back to the Strong God.