Kerioth is taken, and the strongholds are surprised, and the mighty men's hearts in Moab at that day shall be as the heart of a woman in birth pangs.

Woe be unto you, O Moab! the people of Chemosh perish: for your sons are taken captives, and your daughters captives.

Behold, I will bring a fear upon you, says the Lord GOD of hosts, from all those that are about you; and you shall be driven out every man straight before him; and none shall gather up the fugitives.

But I have made Esau bare, I have uncovered his secret places, and he shall not be able to hide himself: his descendants are plundered, and his brethren, and his neighbors, and he is not.

For thus says the LORD; Behold, they whose judgment was not to drink of the cup have assuredly drunk; and are you he that shall altogether go unpunished? you shall not go unpunished, but you shall surely drink of it.

Concerning Damascus. Hamath is confounded, and Arpad: for they have heard evil tidings: they are fainthearted; there is sorrow on the sea; it cannot be quiet.

And their camels shall be a booty, and the multitude of their cattle a plunder: and I will scatter into all winds them that are in the utmost corners; and I will bring their calamity from all its sides, says the LORD.

Declare you among the nations, and publish, and set up a standard; publish, and conceal not: say, Babylon is taken, Bel is confounded, Merodach is broken in pieces; her idols are confounded, her images are broken in pieces.

Shout against her round about: she has given her hand: her foundations have fallen, her walls are thrown down: for it is the vengeance of the LORD: take vengeance upon her; as she has done, do unto her.

I have laid a snare for you, and you are also taken, O Babylon, and you were not aware: you are found, and also caught, because you have contended against the LORD.

A sword is upon their horses, and upon their chariots, and upon all the mixed people that are in the midst of her; and they shall become as women: a sword is upon her treasures; and they shall be robbed.

A drought is upon her waters; and they shall be dried up: for it is the land of graven images, and they are mad over their idols.

They shall hold the bow and the lance: they are cruel, and will not show mercy: their voice shall roar like the sea, and they shall ride upon horses, everyone set in array, like a man for the battle, against you, O daughter of Babylon.

Thus the slain shall fall in the land of the Chaldeans, and they that are thrust through in her streets.

Babylon has been a golden cup in the LORD's hand, that made all the earth drunk: the nations have drunk of her wine; therefore the nations are mad.

They are vanity, the work of errors: in the time of their judgment they shall perish.

You are my battle-axe and weapons of war: for with you will I break in pieces the nations, and with you will I destroy kingdoms;

The mighty men of Babylon have ceased to fight, they have remained in their strongholds: their might has failed; they became as women: they have burned her dwelling places; her bars are broken.

And that the fords are seized, and the reeds they have burned with fire, and the men of war are terrified.

Her cities are a desolation, a dry land, and a wilderness, a land in which no man dwells, neither does any son of man pass by there.

We are ashamed, because we have heard reproach: shame has covered our faces: for strangers have come into the sanctuaries of the LORD's house.

Because the plunderer has come upon her, even upon Babylon, and her mighty men are taken, everyone of their bows is broken: for the LORD God of recompenses shall surely repay.

So Jeremiah wrote in a book all the evil that should come upon Babylon, even all these words that are written against Babylon.

And you shall say, Thus shall Babylon sink, and shall not rise from the evil that I will bring upon her: and they shall be weary. Thus far are the words of Jeremiah.

These are the people whom Nebuchadnezzar carried away captive: in the seventh year three thousand Jews and three and twenty:

She weeps bitterly in the night, and her tears are on her cheeks: among all her lovers she has none to comfort her: all her friends have dealt treacherously with her, they have become her enemies.

The roads to Zion do mourn, because none come to the solemn feasts: all her gates are desolate: her priests sigh, her virgins are afflicted, and she is in bitterness.

The yoke of my transgressions is bound by his hand: they are woven together, and come up upon my neck: he has made my strength to fall, the Lord has delivered me into their hands, from whom I am not able to rise up.

For these things I weep; my eye, my eye runs down with water, because the comforter that should relieve my soul is far from me: my children are desolate, because the enemy prevailed.

They have heard that I sigh: there is none to comfort me: all my enemies have heard of my trouble; they are glad that you have done it: you will bring the day that you have announced, and they shall be like unto me.

Let all their wickedness come before you; and do unto them, as you have done unto me for all my transgressions: for my sighs are many, and my heart is faint.

Her gates are sunk into the ground; he has destroyed and broken her bars: her king and her princes are among the nations: the law is no more; her prophets also find no vision from the LORD.

He has set me in dark places, like they that are long dead.

It is of the LORD'S mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not.

They are new every morning: great is your faithfulness.

How has the gold become dim! how has the most fine gold changed! the stones of the sanctuary are poured out at the head of every street.

The precious sons of Zion, comparable to fine gold, how are they esteemed as earthen pitchers, the work of the hands of the potter!

They that did eat delicacies are desolate in the streets: they that were brought up in scarlet embrace ash heaps.

Their appearance is now blacker than coal; they are not known in the streets: their skin cleaves to their bones; it is withered, it has become like a dry stick.

They that are slain with the sword are better than they that are slain with hunger: for these pine away, stricken through for lack of the fruits of the field.

They hunt our steps, so that we cannot go in our streets: our end is near, our days are fulfilled; for our end has come.

Our persecutors are swifter than the eagles of the heaven: they pursued us upon the mountains, they laid wait for us in the wilderness.

We are orphans and fatherless, our mothers are as widows.

Our necks are under persecution: we labor, and have no rest.

Our fathers have sinned, and are not; and we have borne their iniquities.

For this our heart is faint; for these things our eyes are dim.

But you have utterly rejected us; you are very angry against us.

For they are impudent children and stubborn. I do send you unto them; and you shall say unto them, Thus says the Lord GOD.

And they, whether they will hear, or whether they refuse, (for they are a rebellious house,) yet shall know that there has been a prophet among them.

And you, son of man, be not afraid of them, neither be afraid of their words, though briers and thorns are with you, and you do dwell among scorpions: be not afraid of their words, nor be dismayed at their looks, though they be a rebellious house.

And you shall speak my words unto them, whether they will hear, or whether they refuse: for they are most rebellious.

For you are not sent to a people of foreign speech and of a hard language, but to the house of Israel;

But the house of Israel will not hearken unto you; for they will not hearken unto me: for all the house of Israel are impudent and hard-hearted.

Like adamant harder than flint have I made your forehead: fear them not, neither be dismayed at their looks, though they are a rebellious house.

And I will make your tongue cleave to the roof of your mouth, that you shall be dumb, and shall not be to them one who reproves: for they are a rebellious house.

But when I speak with you, I will open your mouth, and you shall say unto them, Thus says the Lord GOD; He that hears, let him hear; and he that refuses, let him refuse: for they are a rebellious house.

You shall burn with fire a third part in the midst of the city, when the days of the siege are fulfilled: and you shall take a third part, and strike about it with a sword: and a third part you shall scatter in the wind; and I will draw out a sword after them.

Thus says the Lord GOD; This is Jerusalem: I have set it in the midst of the nations and countries that are round about her.

And she has changed my ordinances into wickedness more than the nations, and my statutes more than the countries that are round about her: for they have refused my ordinances and my statutes, they have not walked in them.

Therefore thus says the Lord GOD; Because you multiplied more than the nations that are round about you, and have not walked in my statutes, neither have kept my ordinances, neither have done according to the ordinances of the nations that are round about you;

Moreover I will make you a waste, and a reproach among the nations that are round about you, in the sight of all that pass by.

So it shall be a reproach and a taunt, a warning and an astonishment unto the nations that are round about you, when I shall execute judgments on you in anger and in fury and in furious rebukes. I the LORD have spoken it.

And my eye shall not spare, neither will I have pity: I will recompense you according to your ways and your abominations that are in the midst of you; and you shall know that I am the LORD that strikes.

And the LORD said unto him, Go through the midst of the city, through the midst of Jerusalem, and set a mark upon the foreheads of the men that sigh and that cry for all the abominations that are done in its midst.

Then said he unto me, Son of man, these are the men that devise iniquity, and give wicked counsel in this city:

Who say, It is not near for us to build houses: this city is the caldron, and we are the flesh.

Therefore thus says the Lord GOD; Your slain whom you have laid in the midst of it, they are the flesh, and this city is the caldron: but I will bring you forth out of the midst of it.

And you shall know that I am the LORD: for you have not walked in my statutes, neither executed my judgments, but have done after the manners of the nations that are round about you.

Son of man, your brethren, even your brethren, the men of your kindred, and all the house of Israel entirely, are they unto whom the inhabitants of Jerusalem have said, Get you far from the LORD: unto us is this land given in possession.

Son of man, you dwell in the midst of a rebellious house, who have eyes to see, and see not; they have ears to hear, and hear not: for they are a rebellious house.

Therefore, you son of man, prepare you belongings for moving, and move by day in their sight; and you shall move from your place to another place in their sight: it may be they will consider, though they are a rebellious house.

Say you unto them, Thus says the Lord GOD; This burden concerns the prince in Jerusalem, and all the house of Israel that are among them.

And I will scatter toward every wind all that are about him to help him, and all his troops; and I will draw out the sword after them.

And say unto the people of the land, Thus says the Lord GOD of the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and of the land of Israel; They shall eat their bread with anxiety, and drink their water with dismay, that their land may be emptied from all who are in it, because of the violence of all them that dwell in it.

And the cities that are inhabited shall be laid waste, and the land shall be desolate; and you shall know that I am the LORD.

Son of man, what is that proverb that you have in the land of Israel, saying, The days are prolonged, and every vision fails?

Tell them therefore, Thus says the Lord GOD; I will make this proverb to cease, and they shall no more use it as a proverb in Israel; but say unto them, The days are at hand, and the fulfillment of every vision.

Son of man, behold, they of the house of Israel say, The vision that he sees is for many days from now, and he prophesies of the times that are far off.

O Israel, your prophets are like the foxes in the deserts.

That I may seize the house of Israel in their own heart, because they are all estranged from me through their idols.

And say, Thus says the Lord GOD unto Jerusalem; Your birth and your nativity are from the land of Canaan; your father was an Amorite, and your mother a Hittite.

I have caused you to multiply as the bud of the field, and you have increased and become great, and you are come to excellent beauty: your breasts were formed, and your hair had grown, yet you were naked and bare.

Behold, therefore I have stretched out my hand over you, and have diminished your allowance of food, and delivered you unto the will of them that hate you, the daughters of the Philistines, who are ashamed of your lewd way.

And you are different from other women in your harlotries, therefore none follows you to commit harlotries: and in that you give a reward, and no reward is given unto you, therefore you are different.

And I will judge you, as women that break wedlock and shed blood are judged; and I will bring blood upon you in fury and jealousy.

You are your mother's daughter, that loathes her husband and her children; and you are the sister of your sisters, who loathed their husbands and their children: your mother was an Hittite, and your father an Amorite.

You also, who have judged your sisters, bear your own shame for your sins that you have committed more abominable than they: they are more righteous than you: yea, be disgraced also, and bear your shame, in that you have justified your sisters.

That you may bear your own shame, and may be disgraced in all that you have done, in that you are a comfort unto them.

Before your wickedness was discovered, as at the time of your reproach of the daughters of Syria, and all that are round about her, the daughters of the Philistines, which despise you round about.

What mean you, that you use this proverb concerning the land of Israel, saying, The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children's teeth are set on edge?

Behold, all souls are mine; as the soul of the father, so also the soul of the son is mine: the soul that sins, it shall die.

Yet you say, The way of the Lord is not equal. Hear now, O house of Israel; Is not my way equal? are not your ways unequal?

Yet says the house of Israel, The way of the Lord is not equal. O house of Israel, are not my ways equal? are not your ways unequal?

Therefore say unto the house of Israel, Thus says the Lord GOD; Are you defiled after the manner of your fathers? and commit you harlotry after their abominations?

And I will bring you out from the people, and will gather you out of the countries in which you are scattered, with a mighty hand, and with an outstretched arm, and with fury poured out.

You therefore, son of man, prophesy, and strike your hands together, and let the sword strike twice, even the third time, the sword of the slain: it is the sword of the great men that are slain, which enters into their private chambers.

Therefore thus says the Lord GOD; Because you have made your iniquity to be remembered, in that your transgressions are uncovered, so that in all your doings your sins do appear; because, I say, that you are come to remembrance, you shall be taken with the hand.

While they see false visions for you, while they divine a lie unto you, to bring you upon the necks of them that are slain, of the wicked, whose day has come, when their iniquity shall have an end.

Those that are near, and those that are far from you, shall mock you, who are infamous and full of tumult.

In you are men that slander to shed blood: and in you they eat upon the mountains: in the midst of you they commit lewdness.