¹ This is the burden against Babylon that Isaiah son of Amoz received:

² Raise a banner on a barren hilltop; call aloud to them. Wave your hand, that they may enter the gates of the nobles.

³ I have commanded My sanctified ones; I have even summoned My warriors to execute My wrath and exult in My triumph.

⁴ Listen, a tumult on the mountains, like that of a great multitude! Listen, an uproar among the kingdoms, like nations gathered together! The LORD of Hosts is mobilizing an army for war.

⁵ They are coming from faraway lands, from the ends of the heavens— the LORD and the weapons of His wrath— to destroy the whole country.

⁶ Wail, for the Day of the LORD is near; it will come as destruction from the Almighty.¹

1. Hebrew Shaddai

⁷ Therefore all hands will fall limp, and every man’s heart will melt.

⁸ Terror, pain, and anguish will seize them; they will writhe like a woman in labor. They will look at one another, their faces flushed with fear.

⁹ Behold, the Day of the LORD is coming— cruel, with fury and burning anger— to make the earth a desolation and to destroy the sinners within it.

¹⁰ For the stars of heaven and their constellations will not give their light. The rising sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light.

¹¹ I will punish the world for its evil and the wicked for their iniquity. I will end the haughtiness of the arrogant and lay low the pride of the ruthless.

¹² I will make man scarcer than pure gold, and mankind rarer than the gold of Ophir.

¹³ Therefore I will make the heavens tremble, and the earth will be shaken from its place at the wrath of the LORD of Hosts on the day of His burning anger.

¹⁴ Like a hunted gazelle, like a sheep without a shepherd, each will return to his own people, each will flee to his native land.

¹⁵ Whoever is caught will be stabbed, and whoever is captured will die by the sword.

¹⁶ Their infants will be dashed to pieces before their eyes, their houses will be looted, and their wives will be ravished.

¹⁷ Behold, I will stir up against them the Medes, who have no regard for silver and no desire for gold.

¹⁸ Their bows will dash young men to pieces; they will have no mercy on the fruit of the womb; they will not look with pity on the children.

¹⁹ And Babylon, the jewel of the kingdoms, the glory of the pride of the Chaldeans, will be overthrown by God like Sodom and Gomorrah.

²⁰ She will never be inhabited or settled from generation to generation; no nomad will pitch his tent there, no shepherd will rest his flock there.

²¹ But desert creatures will lie down there, and howling creatures will fill her houses. Ostriches¹ will dwell there, and wild goats will leap about.

1. Literally Daughters of an ostrich or Daughters of an owl

²² Hyenas will howl in her fortresses and jackals¹ in her luxurious palaces. Babylon’s time is at hand, and her days will not be prolonged.

1. Or serpents or dragons