Chapter 31

Pharaoh Warned of Assyria’s Fate

1 In the aeleventh year, in the third month, on the first of the month, the word of the Lord came to me saying,

2 “Son of man, say to Pharaoh king of Egypt and to his ahordes,

‘Whom are you like in your greatness?

3 ‘Behold, Assyria was a acedar in Lebanon

With beautiful branches and forest shade,

And 1bvery high,

And its top was among the 2clouds.

4 ‘The awaters made it grow, the 1deep made it high.

With its rivers it continually 2extended all around its planting place,

And sent out its channels to all the trees of the field.

5 ‘Therefore aits height was loftier than all the trees of the field

And its boughs became many and its branches long

Because of bmany waters 1as it spread them out.

6 ‘All the abirds of the heavens nested in its boughs,

And under its branches all the beasts of the field gave birth,

And all great nations lived under its shade.

7 ‘So it was beautiful in its greatness, in the length of its branches;

For its 1roots extended to many waters.

8 ‘The acedars in bGod’s garden 1could not match it;

The 2cypresses 1could not compare with its boughs,

And the plane trees 3could not match its branches.

No tree in bGod’s garden 1could compare with it in its beauty.

9 ‘I made it beautiful with the multitude of its branches,

And all the trees of aEden, which were in the agarden of God, were jealous of it.

10 ‘Therefore thus says the Lord 1God, “Because 2it is high in stature and has set its top among the 3clouds, and its aheart is haughty in its loftiness,

11 therefore I will give it into the hand of a 1adespot of the nations; he will thoroughly deal with it. According to its wickedness I have bdriven it away.

12 “aAlien btyrants of the nations have cut it down and left it; on the cmountains and in all the valleys its branches have fallen and its boughs have been broken in all the ravines of the land. And all the peoples of the earth have dgone down from its shade and left it.

13 “On its ruin all the abirds of the heavens will dwell, and all the beasts of the field will be on its fallen branches

14 so that all the trees by the waters may not be exalted in their stature, nor set their top among the 1clouds, nor their 2well-watered mighty ones stand erect in their height. For they have all been given over to death, to the aearth beneath, among the sons of men, with those who go down to the pit.”

15 ‘Thus says the Lord God, “On the day when it went down to Sheol I acaused lamentations; I closed the 1deep over it and held back its rivers. And its many waters were stopped up, and I made Lebanon 2mourn for it, and all the trees of the field wilted away on account of it.

16 “I made the nations aquake at the sound of its fall when I made it bgo down to Sheol with those who go down to the pit; and all the 1well-watered trees of Eden, the choicest and best of cLebanon, were dcomforted in the earth beneath.

17 “They also awent down with it to Sheol to those who were bslain by the sword; and those who were its 1strength lived cunder its shade among the nations.

18 “To which among the trees of Eden are you thus 1equal in glory and greatness? Yet you will be brought down with the trees of Eden to the earth beneath; you will lie in the midst of the auncircumcised, with those who were slain by the sword. bSo is Pharaoh and all his hordes!” ’ declares the Lord God.”