Egypt Will Be Brought Down to Sheol
Now it happened in the aeleventh year, in the third month, on the first of the month, that the word of Yahweh came to me saying, 2 “Son of man, say to Pharaoh king of Egypt and to his amultitude,
‘To whom do you liken yourself in your greatness?
3 Behold, Assyria was a acedar in Lebanon
With beautiful branches and forest shade
And blofty in height,
And its top was among the clouds.
4 The awaters made it grow; the deep made it high.
With its rivers it was going all around its planting place
And sent out its conduits to all the trees of the field.
5 Therefore aits height was loftier than all the trees of the field,
And its boughs became many and its branches long
Because of bmany waters as it spread them out.
6 All the abirds of the sky nested in its boughs,
And under its branches all the beasts of the field gave birth,
And all great nations lived under its shade.
7 So it was beautiful in its greatness, in the length of its foliage;
For its roots extended to many waters.
8 The acedars in bGod’s garden could not match it;
The cypresses could not liken themselves with its boughs,
And the plane trees were not like its branches.
No tree in bGod’s garden could liken itself with it in its beauty.
9 I made it beautiful with the multitude of its foliage,
And all the trees of aEden, which were in the agarden of God, were jealous of it.
10 ‘Therefore thus says Lord Yahweh, “Because it is lofty in height and has put its top among the clouds, and its aheart is high up in its loftiness, 11 therefore I will give it into the hand of a adominant one of the nations; he will thoroughly deal with it. According to its wickedness I have bdriven it away. 12 aStrangers—bruthless ones of the nations have cut it down and abandoned it; on the cmountains and in all the valleys its foliage has fallen, and its boughs have been broken in all the ravines of the land. And all the peoples of the earth have dgone down from its shade and abandoned it. 13 On its downfall all the abirds of the sky will dwell, and all the beasts of the field will be on its fallen branches 14 so that all the trees by the waters may not be lofty in their height, nor put their top among the clouds, nor their dominant ones—all the well-watered ones—stand in their loftiness. For they have all been given over to death, to the aearth beneath, among the sons of men, with those who go down to the pit.”
15 ‘Thus says Lord Yahweh, “On the day when it went down to Sheol I acaused mourning; I covered it with the deep over it and held back its rivers. And its many waters were stopped up, and I made Lebanon mourn for it, and all the trees of the field wilted away on account of it. 16 I made the nations aquake at the sound of its downfall when I made it bgo down to Sheol with those who go down to the pit; and all the trees of Eden, the choicest and best of cLebanon, all the well-watered ones, were dcomforted in the earth beneath. 17 They also awent down with it to Sheol to those who were bslain by the sword; and those who were its strength lived cunder its shade among the nations.
18 “To which among the trees of Eden do you thus liken yourself in glory and greatness? Yet you will be brought down with the trees of Eden to the earth beneath; you will lie in the midst of the auncircumcised, with those who were slain by the sword. bSo is Pharaoh and all his multitude!”’ declares Lord Yahweh.”