Yahweh Will Empty the Earth
Behold, Yahweh aempties the earth to destruction, eviscerates it, distorts its surface, and scatters its inhabitants. 2 And the people will be like the priest, the male slave like his master, the female slave like her mistress, the buyer like the seller, the lender like the borrower, the acreditor like the debtor. 3 The earth will be completely emptied to destruction and completely plundered, for Yahweh has spoken this word. 4 The aearth mourns and withers; the world languishes and withers; the bexalted of the people of the earth languish. 5 The earth is also apolluted by its inhabitants, for they trespassed laws, violated statutes, bbroke the everlasting covenant. 6 Therefore, a acurse devours the earth, and those who inhabit it are held guilty. Therefore, the binhabitants of the earth are burned, and few men remain.
7 The anew wine mourns;
The vine languishes;
All the glad of heart sigh.
8 The ajoy of tambourines ceases;
The rumbling of those exulting stops;
The joy of the harp ceases.
9 They do not drink wine with song;
aStrong drink is bbitter to those who drink it.
10 The acity of chaos is broken down;
bEvery house is shut up so that none may enter.
11 There is an aoutcry in the streets concerning the wine;
bAll gladness turns to gloom.
The joy of the earth is taken away into exile.
12 Desolation remains in the city,
And the agate is struck down to ruins.
13 For athus it will be in the midst of the earth among the peoples,
As the shaking of an olive tree,
As the gleanings when the grape harvest is over.
14 aThey lift up their voices, they shout for joy;
They cry out from the west concerning the majesty of Yahweh.
15 Therefore aglorify Yahweh in the east,
The bname of Yahweh, the God of Israel,
In the ccoastlands of the sea.
16 From the aends of the earth we hear songs, “bGlory to the Righteous One,”
But I say, “cI waste away! I waste away! Woe is me!
The dtreacherous deal treacherously,
And the treacherous deal very treacherously.”
17 aPanic and pit and pitfall
Are upon you, O inhabitant of the earth.
18 Then it will be that he who flees the sound of panic will fall into the pit,
And he who climbs out of the pit will be caught in the pitfall;
For the awindows above are opened, and the bfoundations of the earth quake.
19 aThe earth is broken asunder;
The earth is bsplit through;
The earth is shaken violently.
20 The earth areels to and fro like a drunkard
And it totters like a shack,
For its btransgression is heavy upon it,
And it will fall, cnever to rise again.
21 So it will be in that day,
That Yahweh will apunish the host of heights on high,
And the bkings of the earth on earth.
22 They will be gathered together
Like aprisoners in the pit,
And will be confined in prison;
And after many days they will bbe punished.
23 Then the amoon will be humiliated and the sun ashamed,
For bYahweh of hosts will reign on cMount Zion and in Jerusalem,
And His glory will be before His elders.
Yahweh Will Swallow Up Death
O Yahweh, You are amy God;
I will exalt You, I will give thanks to Your name;
For You have bworked wonders,
cCounsels formed long ago, with perfect faithfulness.
2 For You have made a city into a aheap,
A bfortified town into a ruin;
A cpalace of strangers is a city no more,
It will never be rebuilt.
3 Therefore a strong people will aglorify You;
bTowns of ruthless nations will fear You.
4 For You have been a astrong defense for the poor,
A strong defense for the needy in his distress,
A brefuge from the storm, a shade from the heat;
For the breath of the cruthless
Is like a rain storm against a wall.
5 Like heat in a dry land, You subdue the arumbling of strangers;
Like heat by the shadow of a cloud, the song of the ruthless is silenced.
6 aAnd Yahweh of hosts will prepare a lavish banquet for ball peoples on this mountain;
A banquet of aged wine, choice pieces with marrow,
And refined, aged wine.
7 And on this mountain He will swallow up the acovering which is over all peoples,
Even the veil which is stretched over all nations.
8 He will aswallow up death for all time,
And Lord Yahweh will bwipe tears away from all faces,
And He will remove the creproach of His people from all the earth;
For Yahweh has spoken.
9 And it will be said in that day,
“Behold, athis is our God in whom we have bhoped that cHe would save us.
This is Yahweh in whom we have hoped;
dLet us rejoice and be glad in His salvation.”
10 For the hand of Yahweh will rest on this mountain,
And aMoab will be trodden down in his place
As straw is trodden down in the water of a manure pile.
11 And he will aspread out his hands in the middle of it
As a swimmer spreads out his hands to swim,
But Yahweh will blay low his lofty pride together with the trickery of his hands.
12 The aunassailable fortifications of your walls He will bring down,
Lay low, and cast to the ground, even to the dust.
Yahweh Will Establish Peace
aIn that day this song will be sung in the land of Judah:
“We have a bstrong city;
He sets up walls and ramparts for csalvation.
2 Open the agates, that the brighteous nation may enter,
The one that keeps faithfulness.
3 The steadfast of mind You will keep in perfect apeace
Because he trusts in You.
4 aTrust in Yahweh forever,
For in Yah—Yahweh Himself—we have an everlasting bRock.
5 For He has laid low those who settle on high, the aexalted city;
bHe brings it low, He brings it low to the ground, He casts it to the dust.
6 aThe foot will trample it,
The feet of the bafflicted, the steps of the poor.”
7 The away of the righteous is upright;
O Upright One, bmake the path of the righteous level.
8 Indeed, while following the way of aYour judgments, O Yahweh,
We have hoped for You eagerly;
bYour name—the cmemory of You—is the desire of our souls.
9 aAt night my soul longs for You,
Indeed, my spirit within me bseeks You earnestly;
For when the earth experiences Your judgments,
The inhabitants of the world clearn righteousness.
10 Though the wicked is shown favor,
He does not alearn righteousness;
He bdeals unjustly in the land of uprightness,
And does not perceive the majesty of Yahweh.
11 O Yahweh, Your hand is raised up high, yet they ado not behold it.
They behold bYour zeal for the people and are put to shame;
Indeed, cfire will devour Your adversaries.
12 Yahweh, You will establish apeace for us,
Since You have also performed for us all our works.
13 O Yahweh our God, aother masters besides You have ruled us;
But through You alone we bbring Your name to remembrance.
14 aThe dead will not live; the departed spirits will not rise;
Therefore You have bvisited and destroyed them,
And You have made all remembrance of them perish.
15 aYou have increased the nation, O Yahweh;
You have increased the nation, You are glorified;
You have bextended all the borders of the land.
16 O Yahweh, they visited You ain distress;
They could only whisper a prayer;
Your chastening was upon them.
17 aAs the woman with child draws near to the time to give birth,
She writhes and cries out in her pangs of labor,
Thus were we before You, O Yahweh.
18 We were with child, we writhed in labor;
We agave birth, as it seems, only to wind.
We could not accomplish salvation for the earth,
And the binhabitants of the world were not born.
19 Your adead will live;
Their corpses will rise.
You who dwell in the dust, bawake and shout for joy,
For your dew is as the dew of the dawn,
And the earth will give birth to the departed spirits.
20 Come, my people, aenter into your rooms
And close your doors behind you;
Hide for a little bwhile
Until cindignation passes by.
21 For behold, Yahweh is about to acome out from His place
To bvisit the iniquity of the inhabitants of the earth;
And the earth will creveal her bloodshed
And will no longer cover those of hers who were killed.
Yahweh Will Deliver Israel
In that day aYahweh will punish bLeviathan the fleeing serpent,
With His fierce and great and mighty sword,
Even Leviathan the twisted serpent;
And cHe will kill the dragon who lives in the sea.
2 In that day,
“A avineyard of delight, sing of it!
3 I, Yahweh, am its keeper;
aI water it every moment.
Lest anyone damage it,
I bkeep it night and day.
4 I have no wrath.
Who would ever give Me abriars and thorns in the battle?
I would step on them, bI would burn them completely.
5 Or let him arely on My strong defense,
Let him make peace with Me,
Let him bmake peace with Me.”
6 In the days to come Jacob awill take root,
Israel will bblossom and bud,
And they will fill the whole world with cproduce.
7 Like the striking of Him who has struck them, has aHe struck them?
Or like the slaughter of those of His who were killed, have they been killed?
8 You contended with them by driving them away, by amaking them forlorn.
With His fierce wind He has expelled them on the day of the beast wind.
9 Therefore through this, Jacob’s iniquity will be aatoned for;
And this will be the whole fruit of the bturning away of his sin:
When he makes all the caltar stones like pulverized chalk stones,
When Asherim and incense altars will not stand.
10 For the fortified city is aisolated,
A haunt forlorn and forsaken like the desert;
bThere the calf will graze,
And there it will lie down and feed on its twigs.
11 When its alimbs are dry, they are broken off;
Women come and light a fire with them,
For they are not a people of bdiscernment,
Therefore ctheir Maker dwill not have compassion on them.
And their Creator will not be gracious to them.
12 And it will be in that day, that Yahweh awill start His threshing from the flowing stream of the bRiver to the brook of Egypt, and you will be cgathered up one by one, O sons of Israel. 13 And it will be in that day, that a great atrumpet will be blown, and those who were perishing in the land of bAssyria and who were banished in the land of Egypt will come and cworship Yahweh in the holy mountain at Jerusalem.