Jeremiah 51

Chapter 51

Babylon Judged for Sins against Israel

¹Thus says the Lord:

“Behold, I am going to arouse against Babylon

And against the inhabitants of ¹Leb-kamai

²The ^aspirit of a destroyer.

²“I will dispatch ¹foreigners to Babylon that they may ^awinnow her

And may devastate her land;

For on every side they will be opposed to her

In the day of her calamity.

³“¹Let not ²him who ^3abends his bow bend it,

Nor let him rise up in his ^bscale-armor;

So do not spare her young men;

Devote all her army to destruction.

⁴“They will fall down ¹slain in the land of the Chaldeans,

And ^apierced through in their streets.”

⁵For ^aneither Israel nor Judah has been ¹forsaken

By his God, the Lord of hosts,

Although their land is ^bfull of guilt

²Before the Holy One of Israel.

^6aFlee from the midst of Babylon,

And each of you save his life!

Do not be ^1bdestroyed in her ²punishment,

For this is the ^cLord’s time of vengeance;

He is going to ^drender recompense to her.

⁷Babylon has been a golden ^acup in the hand of the Lord,

Intoxicating all the earth.

The ^bnations have drunk of her wine;

Therefore the nations are ^cgoing mad.

⁸Suddenly ^aBabylon has fallen and been broken;

^bWail over her!

^cBring ¹balm for her pain;

Perhaps she may be healed.

⁹We applied healing to Babylon, but she was not healed;

Forsake her and ^alet us each go to his own country,

For her judgment has ^breached to heaven

And ¹towers up to the very skies.

¹⁰The Lord has ^abrought ¹about our vindication;

Come and let us ^brecount in Zion

The work of the Lord our God!

^11aSharpen the arrows, fill the quivers!

The Lord has aroused the spirit of the kings of the Medes,

Because His purpose is against Babylon to destroy it;

For it is the ^bvengeance of the Lord, vengeance for His temple.

^12aLift up a ¹signal against the walls of Babylon;

Post a strong guard,

Station ²sentries,

Place men in ambush!

For the Lord has both ^bpurposed and performed

What He spoke concerning the inhabitants of Babylon.

¹³O you who ^adwell by many waters,

Abundant in ^btreasures,

Your end has come,

The ¹measure of your ^2cend.

¹⁴The ^aLord of hosts has sworn by Himself:

“Surely I will fill you with a ¹population like ^blocusts,

And they will cry out with ²shouts of victory over you.”

¹⁵It is ^aHe who made the earth by His power,

Who established the world by His wisdom,

And by His understanding He ^bstretched out the heavens.

¹⁶When He utters His ^avoice, there is a tumult of waters in the heavens,

And He causes the ^bclouds to ascend from the end of the earth;

He makes lightning for the rain

And brings forth the ^cwind from His storehouses.

^17aAll mankind is stupid, devoid of knowledge;

Every goldsmith is put to shame by his ¹idols,

For his molten images are ^bdeceitful,

And there is no breath in them.

¹⁸They are ^aworthless, a work of mockery;

In the time of their punishment they will perish.

¹⁹The ^aportion of Jacob is not like these;

For the ¹Maker of all is He,

And of the ²tribe of His inheritance;

The ^bLord of hosts is His name.

²⁰He says, “You are My ^1awar-club, My weapon of war;

And with you I ^bshatter nations,

And with you I destroy kingdoms.

²¹“With you I ^ashatter the horse and his rider,

And with you I shatter the ^bchariot and its rider,

²²And with you I shatter ^aman and woman,

And with you I shatter old man and ^byouth,

And with you I shatter young man and virgin,

²³And with you I shatter the shepherd and his flock,

And with you I shatter the farmer and his team,

And with you I shatter governors and prefects.

²⁴“But I will repay Babylon and all the inhabitants of ^aChaldea for ^ball their evil that they have done in Zion before your eyes,” declares the Lord.

²⁵“Behold, ^aI am against you, ^bO destroying mountain,

Who destroys the whole earth,” declares the Lord,

“And I will stretch out My hand against you,

And roll you down from the crags,

And I will make you a ^cburnt out mountain.

²⁶“They will not take from you even a stone for a corner

Nor a stone for foundations,

But you will be ^adesolate forever,” declares the Lord.

^27aLift up a ¹signal in the land,

Blow a trumpet among the nations!

Consecrate the nations against her,

Summon against her the ^bkingdoms of ^cArarat, Minni and ^dAshkenaz;

Appoint a marshal against her,

Bring up the ^ehorses like bristly locusts.

²⁸Consecrate the nations against her,

The kings of the Medes,

¹Their governors and all their ²prefects,

And every land of ³their dominion.

²⁹So the ^aland quakes and writhes,

For the purposes of the Lord against Babylon stand,

To make the land of Babylon

¹A ^bdesolation without inhabitants.

³⁰The ^amighty men of Babylon have ceased fighting,

They stay in the strongholds;

^bTheir strength is ¹exhausted,

They are becoming like women;

Their dwelling places are set on fire,

The ^cbars of her gates are broken.

³¹One ^1acourier runs to meet another,

And one ^2bmessenger to meet another,

To tell the king of Babylon

That his city has been captured from end to end;

³²The fords also have been seized,

And they have burned the marshes with fire,

And the men of war are terrified.

³³For thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel:

“The daughter of Babylon is like a ^athreshing floor

At the time ¹it is stamped firm;

Yet in a little while the time of ^bharvest will come for her.”

³⁴“Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon has ^adevoured me and crushed me,

He has set me down like an ^bempty vessel;

He has ^cswallowed me like a monster,

He has filled his stomach with my delicacies;

He has washed me away.

³⁵“May the ^aviolence done to me and to my flesh be upon Babylon,”

The ¹inhabitant of Zion will say;

And, “May my blood be upon the inhabitants of Chaldea,”

Jerusalem will say.

³⁶Therefore thus says the Lord,

“Behold, I am going to ^aplead your case

And ^bexact full vengeance for you;

And ^cI will dry up her ¹sea

And make her fountain dry.

³⁷“^aBabylon will become a heap of ruins, a haunt of jackals,

An ^bobject of horror and hissing, without inhabitants.

³⁸“They will roar together like ^ayoung lions,

They will growl like lions’ cubs.

³⁹“When they become heated up, I will serve them their banquet

And ^amake them drunk, that they may become jubilant

And may ^bsleep a perpetual sleep

And not wake up,” declares the Lord.

⁴⁰“I will bring them down like ¹lambs ^ato the slaughter,

Like rams together with male goats.

⁴¹“How ^1aSheshak has been captured,

And ^bthe praise of the whole earth been seized!

How Babylon has become an object of horror among the nations!

⁴²“The ^1asea has come up over Babylon;

She has been engulfed with its tumultuous waves.

⁴³“Her cities have become an ^aobject of horror,

A parched land and a desert,

A land in which ^bno man lives

And through which no son of man passes.

⁴⁴“^aI will punish Bel in Babylon,

And I will make what he has swallowed ^bcome out of his mouth;

And the nations will no longer ^cstream to him.

Even the ^dwall of Babylon has fallen down!

⁴⁵“^aCome forth from her midst, My people,

And each of you ^bsave yourselves

From the fierce anger of the Lord.

⁴⁶“Now ^aso that your heart does not grow faint,

And you are not afraid at the ^breport that will be heard in the land—

For the report will come ¹one year,

And after that ²another report in another year,

And violence will be in the land

With ^cruler against ruler—

⁴⁷Therefore behold, days are coming

When I will punish the ^aidols of Babylon;

And her whole land will be ^bput to shame

And all her slain will fall in her midst.

⁴⁸“Then ^aheaven and earth and all that is in them

Will shout for joy over Babylon,

For ^bthe destroyers will come to her from the north,”

Declares the Lord.

^49aIndeed Babylon is to fall for the slain of Israel,

As also for Babylon ^bthe slain of all the earth have fallen.

⁵⁰You ^awho have escaped the sword,

Depart! Do not stay!

^bRemember the Lord from afar,

And let Jerusalem ¹come to your mind.

^51aWe are ashamed because we have heard reproach;

Disgrace has covered our faces,

For ^baliens have entered

The holy places of the Lord’s house.

⁵²“Therefore behold, the days are coming,” declares the Lord,

“When I will punish her ^aidols,

And the mortally wounded will groan throughout her land.

⁵³“Though Babylon should ^aascend to the heavens,

And though she should fortify ¹her lofty stronghold,

From ^bMe destroyers will come to her,” declares the Lord.

⁵⁴The ^asound of an outcry from Babylon,

And of great destruction from the land of the Chaldeans!

⁵⁵For the Lord is going to destroy Babylon,

And He will make her loud ¹noise vanish from her.

And their ^awaves will roar like many waters;

The tumult of their voices ²sounds forth.

⁵⁶For the ^adestroyer is coming against her, against Babylon,

And her mighty men will be captured,

Their ^bbows are shattered;

For the Lord is a God of ^crecompense,

He will fully repay.

⁵⁷“I will ^amake her princes and her wise men drunk,

Her governors, her prefects and her mighty men,

That they may sleep a ^bperpetual sleep and not wake up,”

^cDeclares the King, whose name is the Lord of hosts.

⁵⁸Thus says the Lord of hosts,

“The broad ^awall of Babylon will be completely razed

And her high ^bgates will be set on fire;

So the peoples will ^ctoil for nothing,

And the nations become ^dexhausted only for fire.”

⁵⁹The ¹message which Jeremiah the prophet commanded Seraiah the son of ^aNeriah, the grandson of Mahseiah, when he went with ^bZedekiah the king of Judah to Babylon in the fourth year of his reign. (Now Seraiah was quartermaster.)

⁶⁰So Jeremiah ^awrote in a single ¹scroll all the calamity which would come upon Babylon, that is, all these words which have been written concerning Babylon.

⁶¹Then Jeremiah said to Seraiah, “As soon as you come to Babylon, then see that you read all these words aloud,

⁶²and say, ‘You, O Lord, have ¹promised concerning this place to ^acut it off, so that there will be ^bnothing dwelling in it, ²whether man or beast, but it will be a perpetual desolation.’

⁶³“And as soon as you finish reading this ¹scroll, you will tie a stone to it and ^athrow it into the middle of the Euphrates,

⁶⁴and say, ‘Just so shall Babylon sink down and ^anot rise again because of the calamity that I am going to bring upon her;…