Isaiah 19:1–17

Anarchy and Chaos and Killing!

¹19A Message concerning Egypt:

Watch this! God riding on a fast-moving cloud,

moving in on Egypt!

The god-idols of Egypt shudder and shake,

Egyptians paralyzed by panic.

^2–4God says, “I’ll make Egyptian fight Egyptian,

brother fight brother, neighbor fight neighbor,

City fight city, kingdom fight kingdom—

anarchy and chaos and killing!

I’ll knock the wind out of the Egyptians.

They won’t know coming from going.

They’ll go to their god-idols for answers;

they’ll conjure ghosts and hold séances, desperate for answers.

But I’ll turn the Egyptians

over to a tyrant most cruel.

I’ll put them under the rule of a mean, merciless king.”

Decree of the Master, God-of-the-Angel-Armies.

^5–10The River Nile will dry up,

the riverbed baked dry in the sun.

The canals will become stagnant and stink,

every stream touching the Nile dry up.

River vegetation will rot away

the banks of the Nile-baked clay,

The riverbed hard and smooth,

river grasses dried up and gone with the wind.

Fishermen will complain

that the fishing’s been ruined.

Textile workers will be out of work, all weavers

and workers in linen and cotton and wool

Dispirited, depressed in their forced idleness—

everyone who works for a living, jobless.

^11–15The princes of Zoan are fools,

the advisors of Pharaoh stupid.

How could any of you dare tell Pharaoh,

“Trust me: I’m wise. I know what’s going on.

Why, I’m descended from the old wisdom of Egypt”?

There’s not a wise man or woman left in the country.

If there were, one of them would tell you

what God-of-the-Angel-Armies has in mind for Egypt.

As it is, the princes of Zoan are all fools

and the princes of Memphis, dunces.

The honored pillars of your society

have led Egypt into detours and dead ends.

God has scrambled their brains,

Egypt’s become a falling-down-in-his-own-vomit drunk.

Egypt’s hopeless, past helping,

a senile, doddering old fool.

^16–17On that Day, Egyptians will be like hysterical schoolgirls, screaming at the first hint of action from God-of-the-Angel-Armies. Little Judah will strike terror in Egyptians! Say “Judah” to an Egyptian and see panic. The word triggers fear of the God-of-the-Angel-Armies’ plan against Egypt.