Look, the sovereign master, the Lord who commands armies, is ready to cut off the branches with terrifying power. The tallest trees will be cut down, the loftiest ones will be brought low.

There will be some left behind, like when an olive tree is beaten -- two or three ripe olives remain toward the very top, four or five on its fruitful branches," says the Lord God of Israel.

The time is coming when Jacob will take root; Israel will blossom and grow branches. The produce will fill the surface of the world.

For the fortified city is left alone; it is a deserted settlement and abandoned like the desert. Calves graze there; they lie down there and eat its branches bare.

When its branches get brittle, they break; women come and use them for kindling. For these people lack understanding, therefore the one who made them has no compassion on them; the one who formed them has no mercy on them.

I commission you as my spokesman; I cover you with the palm of my hand, to establish the sky and to found the earth, to say to Zion, 'You are my people.'"