36
Therefore, this is what the Lord says: I am about to plead your case and take vengeance on your behalf; I will dry up her sea and make her fountain run dry.
37
Babylon will become a heap of rubble, a jackals' den, a desolation and an object of scorn, without inhabitant.
38
They will roar together like young lions; they will growl like lion cubs.
39
While they are flushed with heat, I will serve them a feast, and I will make them drunk so that they revel. Then they will fall asleep forever and never wake up. [This is]*The bracketed text has been added for clarity. the Lord's declaration.
40
I will bring them down like lambs to the slaughter, like rams together with male goats.
41
How Sheshach has been captured, the praise of the whole earth seized. What a horror Babylon has become among the nations!
42
The sea has risen over Babylon; she is covered with its turbulent waves.
43
Her cities have become a desolation, a dry and arid land, a land where no one lives, where no human being passes through.
44
I will punish Bel in Babylon. I will make him vomit what he swallowed. The nations will no longer stream to him; even Babylon's wall will fall.
45
Come out from among her, My people! Save your lives, each of you, from the Lord's burning anger.
46
May you not become faint-hearted and fearful when the report is proclaimed in the land, for the report will come one year, and then another the next year. There will be violence in the land with ruler against ruler.