And I went in to my wife, and she became with child, and gave birth to a son. Then the Lord said to me, Give him the name Maher-shalal-hash-baz,

What answer, then, will my people give to the representatives of the nation? That the Lord is the builder of Zion, and she will be a safe place for the poor of his people.

And it will be after the end of seventy years, that the Lord will have mercy on Tyre, and she will go back to her trade, acting as a loose woman with all the kingdoms of the world on the face of the earth.

For the strong town is without men, an unpeopled living-place; and she has become a waste land: there the young ox will take his rest, and its branches will be food for him.

And I will send trouble on Ariel, and there will be weeping and cries of grief; and she will be to me as Ariel.

The word about the Beasts of the South. Through the land of trouble and grief, the land of the she-lion and the voice of the lion, of the snake and the burning winged snake, they take their wealth on the backs of young asses, and their stores on camels, to a people in whom is no profit.

For there is no use or purpose in the help of Egypt: so I have said about her, She is Rahab, who has come to an end.

And she will have no more fear of change, being full of salvation, wisdom, and knowledge: the fear of the Lord is her wealth.

Say kind words to the heart of Jerusalem, crying out to her that her time of trouble is ended, that her punishment is complete; that she has been rewarded by the Lord's hand twice over for all her sins.

Will a woman give up the child at her breast, will she be without pity for the fruit of her body? yes, these may, but I will not let you go out of my memory.

She has no one among all her children to be her guide; not one of the sons she has taken care of takes her by the hand.

You will not now be named, She who is given up; and your land will no longer be named, The waste land: but you will have the name, My pleasure is in her, and your land will be named, Married: for the Lord has pleasure in you, and your land will be married.

Before her pains came, she gave birth; before her pains, she gave birth to a man-child.

When has such a story come to men's ears? who has seen such things? will a land come to birth in one day? will a nation be given birth in a minute? For when Zion's pains came on her, she gave birth to her children straight away.

For the Lord says, See, I will make her peace like a river, and the glory of the nations like an overflowing stream, and she will take her children in her arms, gently caring for them on her knees.

They say, If a man puts away his wife and she goes from him and becomes another man's, will he go back to her again? will not that land have been made unclean? but though you have been acting like a loose woman with a number of lovers, will you now come back to me? says the Lord.

And the Lord said to me in the days of Josiah the king, Have you seen what Israel, turning away from me, has done? She has gone up on every high mountain and under every branching tree, acting like a loose woman there.

And I said, After she has done all these things she will come back to me; but she did not. And her false sister Judah saw it.

And though she saw that, because Israel, turning away from me, had been untrue to me, I had put her away and given her a statement in writing ending the relation between us, still Judah, her false sister, had no fear, but went and did the same.

So that through all her loose behaviour the land became unclean, and she was untrue, giving herself to stones and trees.

Like keepers of a field they are against her on every side; because she has been fighting against me, says the Lord.

Go quickly through the streets of Jerusalem, and see now, and get knowledge, and make a search in her wide places if there is a man, if there is one in her who is upright, who keeps faith; and she will have my forgiveness.

As the spring keeps its waters cold, so she keeps her evil in her: the sound of cruel and violent behaviour is in her; before me at all times are disease and wounds.

The mother of seven is without strength; her spirit is gone from her, her sun has gone down while it is still day: she has been shamed and overcome: and the rest of them I will give up to the sword before their haters, says the Lord.

Because he did not put me to death before my birth took place: so my mother's body would have been my last resting-place, and she would have been with child for ever.

So has the Lord said: In Ramah there is a sound of crying, weeping and bitter sorrow; Rachel weeping for her children; she will not be comforted for their loss.

She makes a sound like the hiss of a snake when they come on with strength; they go against her with axes, like wood-cutters.

The daughter of Egypt will be put to shame; she will be given up into the hands of the people of the north.

Put up a pillar for Moab, for she will come to a complete end: and her towns will become a waste, without anyone living in them.

Moab has been put to shame, she is broken: make loud sounds of grief, crying out for help; give the news in Arnon, that Moab has been made waste.

Damascus has become feeble, she is turned to flight, fear has taken her in its grip: pain and sorrows have come on her, as on a woman in birth-pains.

For see, I am moving and sending up against Babylon a band of great nations from the north country: and they will put their armies in position against her; and from there she will be taken: their arrows will be like those of an expert man of war; not one will come back without getting its mark.

Your mother will be put to shame; she who gave you birth will be looked down on: see, she will be the last of the nations, a waste place, a dry and unwatered land.

Put your armies in position against Babylon on every side, all you bowmen; let loose your arrows at her, not keeping any back: for she has done evil against the Lord.

Give a loud cry against her on every side; she has given herself up, her supports are overturned, her walls are broken down: for it is the payment taken by the Lord; give her payment; as she has done, so do to her.

Send for the archers to come together against Babylon, all the bowmen; put up your tents against her on every side; let no one get away: give her the reward of her work; as she has done, so do to her: for she has been uplifted in pride against the Lord, against the Holy One of Israel.

We would have made Babylon well, but she is not made well: give her up, and let us go everyone to his country: for her punishment is stretching up to heaven, and lifted up even to the skies.

The sea has come up over Babylon; she is covered with the mass of its waves.

Even if Babylon was lifted up to heaven, even if she had the high places of her strength shut in with walls, still I would send against her those who will make her waste, says the Lord.

See her seated by herself, the town which was full of people! She who was great among the nations has become like a widow! She who was a princess among the countries has come under the yoke of forced work!

She is sorrowing bitterly in the night, and her face is wet with weeping; among all her lovers she has no comforter: all her friends have been false to her, they have become her haters.

Jerusalem keeps in mind, in the days of her sorrow and of her wanderings, all the desired things which were hers in days gone by; when her people came into the power of her hater and she had no helper, her attackers saw their desire effected on her and made sport of her destruction.

Great is the sin of Jerusalem; for this cause she has become an unclean thing: all those who gave her honour are looking down on her, because they have seen her shame: now truly, breathing out grief, she is turned back.

In her skirts were her unclean ways; she gave no thought to her end; and her fall has been a wonder; she has no comforter: see her sorrow, O Lord; for the attacker is lifted up.

The hand of her hater is stretched out over all her desired things; for she has seen that the nations have come into her holy place, about whom you gave orders that they were not to come into the meeting of your people.

Breathing out grief all her people are looking for bread; they have given their desired things for food to give them life: see, O Lord, and take note; for she has become a thing of shame.

Zion's hands are outstretched; she has no comforter; the Lord has given orders to the attackers of Jacob round about him: Jerusalem has become like an unclean thing among them.

And she has gone against my orders by doing evil more than the nations, and against my rules more than the countries round her: for they have given up my orders, and as for my rules, they have not gone in the way of them.

Your older sister is Samaria, living at your left hand, she and her daughters: and your younger sister, living at your right hand, is Sodom and her daughters.

By my life, says the Lord, Sodom your sister never did, she or her daughters, what you and your daughters have done.

Truly, this was the sin of your sister Sodom: pride, a full measure of food, and the comforts of wealth in peace, were seen in her and her daughters, and she gave no help to the poor or to those in need.

And has not taken flesh with the blood for food, or given worship to the images of the children of Israel; if he has not had connection with his neighbour's wife, or come near to a woman at the time when she is unclean;

What was your mother? Like a she-lion among lions, stretched out among the young lions she gave food to her little ones.

Now when she saw that her hope was made foolish and gone, she took another of her little ones and made him into a young lion.

Your mother was in comparison like a vine, planted by the waters: she was fertile and full of branches because of the great waters.

And she had a strong rod for a rod of authority for the rulers, and it became tall among the clouds and it was seen lifted up among the number of its branches.

But she was uprooted in burning wrath, and made low on the earth; the east wind came, drying her up, and her branches were broken off; her strong rod became dry, the fire made a meal of it.

And now she is planted in the waste land, in a dry and unwatered country.

In you they have let the shame of their fathers be seen; in you they have done wrong to a woman at the time when she was unclean.

And Oholah was untrue to me when she was mine; she was full of desire for her lovers, even for the Assyrians, her neighbours,

And she gave her unclean love to them, all of them the noblest men of Assyria: and she made herself unclean with the images of all who were desired by her.

And she has not given up her loose ways from the time when she was in Egypt; for when she was young they were her lovers, and by them her young breasts were crushed, and they let loose on her their unclean desire.

By these her shame was uncovered: they took her sons and daughters and put her to death with the sword: and she became a cause of wonder to women; for they gave her the punishment which was right.

She was full of desire for the Assyrians, captains and rulers, her neighbours, clothed in blue, horsemen going on horses, all of them young men to be desired.

And I saw that she had become unclean; the two of them went the same way.

And her loose behaviour became worse; for she saw men pictured on a wall, pictures of the Chaldaeans painted in bright red

And when she saw them she was full of desire for them, and sent servants to them in Chaldaea.

And the Babylonians came to her, into the bed of love, and made her unclean with their loose desire, and she became unclean with them, and her soul was turned from them.

But still she went on the more with her loose behaviour, keeping in mind the early days when she had been a loose woman in the land of Egypt

And she was full of desire for her lovers, whose flesh is like the flesh of asses and whose seed is like the seed of horses.

And she made the memory of the loose ways of her early years come back to mind, when her young breasts were crushed by the Egyptians

Then the Lord said to me: Son of man, will you be the judge of Oholibah? then make clear to her the disgusting things she has done

For she has been false to me, and blood is on her hands, and with her images she has been untrue; and more than this, she made her sons, whom she had by me, go through the fire to them to be burned up.

Further, this is what she has done to me: she has made my holy place unclean and has made my Sabbaths unclean

For when she had made an offering of her children to her images, she came into my holy place to make it unclean; see, this is what she has done inside my house.

And she even sent for men to come from far away, to whom a servant was sent, and they came: for whom she was washing her body and painting her eyes and making herself fair with ornaments.

And she took her seat on a great bed, with a table put ready before it on which she put my perfume and my oil.

Then I said ... now she will go on with her loose ways.

And upright men will be her judges, judging her as false wives and women who take lives are judged; because she has been untrue to me and blood is on her hands.

For her blood is in her; she has put it on the open rock not draining it on to the earth so that it might be covered with dust;

In order that it might make wrath come up to give punishment, she has put her blood on the open rock, so that it may not be covered.

And I will put her on the coals so that she may be heated and her brass burned, so that what is unclean in her may become soft and her waste be completely taken away.

Son of man, because Tyre has said against Jerusalem, Aha, she who was the doorway of the peoples is broken; she is turned over to them; she who was full is made waste;

She will be a place for the stretching out of nets in the middle of the sea; for I have said it, says the Lord: and her goods will be given over to the nations.

And they will send up a song of grief for you, and say to you, What destruction has come on you, how are you cut off from the sea, the noted town, which was strong in the sea, she and her people, causing the fear of them to come on all the dry land!

And she will be made waste among the countries which have been made waste, and her towns will be among the towns which are unpeopled.

And at Tehaphnehes the day will become dark, when the yoke of Egypt is broken there, and the pride of her power comes to an end: as for her, she will be covered with a cloud, and her daughters will be taken away prisoners.

Son of man, when the children of Israel were living in their land, they made it unclean by their way and their acts: their way before me was as when a woman is unclean at the time when she is kept separate.

And at the end of years they will be joined together; and the daughter of the king of the south will come to the king of the north to make an agreement: but she will not keep the strength of her arm; and his offspring will not keep their place; but she will be uprooted, with those who were the cause of her coming, and her son, and he who took her in those times.

So he took as his wife Gomer, the daughter of Diblaim, and she gave birth to a son.

And after that she gave birth to a daughter. And the Lord said, Give her the name Lo-ruhamah; for I will not again have mercy on Israel, to give them forgiveness.

Take up the cause against your mother, take it up, for she is not my wife, and I am not her husband; let her put away her loose ways from her face, and her false ways from between her breasts;

For their mother has been untrue; she who gave them birth has done things of shame, for she said, I will go after my lovers, who give me my bread and my water, my wool and my linen, my oil and my wine.

For this cause I will put thorns in her road, building up a wall round her so that she may not go on her way.

And if she goes after her lovers she will not overtake them; if she makes search for them she will not see them; then will she say, I will go back to my first husband, for then it was better for me than now.

For she had no knowledge that it was I who gave her the grain and the wine and the oil, increasing her silver and gold which they gave to the Baal.

And I will make waste her vines and her fig-trees, of which she has said, These are the payments which my lovers have made to me; and I will make them a waste of trees, and the beasts of the field will take them for food.

And I will give her punishment for the days of the Baals, to whom she has been burning perfumes, when she made herself fair with her nose-rings and her jewels, and went after her lovers, giving no thought to me, says the Lord.

And I will give her vine-gardens from there, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope; and she will give her answer there as in the days when she was young, and as in the time when she came up out of the land of Egypt.

For I will take away the names of the Baals out of her mouth, and never again will she say their names.