1This is the word that the LORD spoke against Babylon and against the land of the Chaldeans through Jeremiah the prophet.
2"Tell it among the nations, and make it known. Lift up a flag. Make it known, and hide nothing. Say, 'Babylon is captured. Bel is put to shame. Merodach is smashed to pieces. Her idols are put to shame, and her images are smashed to pieces.'"
3For a nation is coming up against her out of the north. It will make her land a waste, and no one will live there. Both people and animals will move away and be gone.
4"In those days, and at that time, says the LORD, the children of Israel will come, they and the children of Judah together. They will come weeping as they go, and they will look for the LORD their God."
5They will ask the way to Zion, with their faces turned that way. They will say, 'Come, let us join ourselves to the LORD in a covenant that lasts for ever and will never be forgotten.'
6My people have been like lost sheep. Their shepherds led them astray and turned them loose on the mountains. They wandered from mountain to hill, and forgot the place where they could rest.
7All who found them ate them up. Their enemies said, 'We are not guilty, because they sinned against the LORD, the true home of justice, the LORD, the hope of their fathers.'
8"Get out from inside Babylon. Leave the land of the Chaldeans. Be like the he goats that walk in front of the flocks."
9For look, I will stir up a crowd of great nations from the land of the north and bring them against Babylon. They will line up for battle against her, and she will be captured from there. Their arrows will be like those of a skilled fighter; none of them will come back with nothing.
10Chaldea will be plundered. All who plunder her will have their fill, says the LORD.
11"You were glad, you rejoiced, you who destroyed my own people. You have grown fat like a young cow in the grass, and you bellow like bulls."
12So your mother will be deeply ashamed. She who gave you birth will be disgraced. Look, she will be the last of the nations: a wilderness, a dry land, a desert.
13Because of the anger of the LORD no one will live there; it will be completely empty. Everyone who passes by Babylon will be shocked and will hiss at all her wounds.
14Line up for battle against Babylon on every side. All you who bend the bow, shoot at her. Do not save your arrows, for she has sinned against the LORD.
15Shout against her on every side. She has surrendered. Her walls have fallen, her defences are pulled down. This is the LORD's payback. Pay her back; do to her as she has done.
16Cut off from Babylon the one who sows, and the one who swings the sickle at harvest time. Because of the cruel sword, each one will turn back to his own people; each one will run away to his own land.
17Israel is a scattered sheep, driven away by lions. First the king of Assyria ate him up, and last this Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon has broken his bones.
18So this is what the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, says: Look, I will punish the king of Babylon and his land, just as I punished the king of Assyria.
19I will bring Israel back to his own pasture. He will feed on Carmel and Bashan, and he will eat his fill on the hills of Ephraim and Gilead.
20In those days, and at that time, says the LORD, people will look for the guilt of Israel, and there will be none; and for the sins of Judah, and they will not be found. For I will forgive those whom I leave alive.
21"Go up against the land of Merathaim, against it and against the people of Pekod. Kill them and destroy them completely, says the LORD. Do everything I have commanded you."
22The sound of battle is in the land, and the sound of great destruction.
23How the hammer of the whole earth is cut in two and broken! How Babylon has become a horror among the nations!
24I set a trap for you, Babylon, and you were caught, and you did not know it. You were found and taken, because you fought against the LORD.
25The LORD has opened his store of weapons and brought out the weapons of his anger. For this is the work of the Lord GOD of hosts in the land of the Chaldeans.
26Come against her from the farthest border. Open her storehouses. Pile her up like heaps of grain and destroy her completely. Let nothing of her be left.
27Kill all her young bulls; let them go down to the slaughter. How terrible for them! For their day has come, the time for them to be punished.
28Listen to those who run and escape from the land of Babylon. They tell in Zion how the LORD our God has paid them back, paid them back for his temple.
29"Call the archers together against Babylon. All you who bend the bow, camp around her. Let no one escape from her. Pay her back for what she has done; do to her just as she has done. For she has been proud against the LORD, against the Holy One of Israel."
30So her young men will fall in the streets, and all her soldiers will be destroyed on that day, says the LORD.
31Look, I am against you, you proudest of all, says the Lord GOD of hosts. For your day has come, the time when I will punish you.
32The proudest one will stumble and fall, and no one will lift him up. I will light a fire in his cities, and it will burn up everything around him.
33This is what the LORD of hosts says: The children of Israel and the children of Judah were crushed together. All who took them captive held them tight and refused to let them go.
34Their Redeemer is strong. The LORD of hosts is his name. He will take up their case with all his strength, so that he may give rest to the land and trouble those who live in Babylon.
35A sword is against the Chaldeans, says the LORD, and against those who live in Babylon, and against her officials and her wise men.
36A sword is against the liars, and they will act like fools. A sword is against her strong men, and they will be filled with terror.
37A sword is against their horses and their chariots, and against all the mixed peoples among them, and they will become like women. A sword is against her treasures, and they will be stolen.
38A drought is against her waters, and they will dry up. For it is a land of carved images, and the people are mad about their idols.
39So the wild animals of the desert will live there with the wild animals of the islands, and the owls will live there. No one will ever live there again; it will not be lived in from one generation to the next.
40As God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah and the towns around them, says the LORD, so no one will stay there, and no human being will live in it.
41Look, a people is coming from the north. A great nation and many kings are stirred up from the far parts of the earth.
42They carry the bow and the spear. They are cruel and show no mercy. Their voice roars like the sea, and they ride on horses. They are lined up like men ready for battle against you, daughter of Babylon.
43The king of Babylon has heard the news of them, and his hands hang weak. Fear has gripped him, and pain like a woman giving birth.
44Look, he will come up like a lion from the thick woods of the Jordan to a strong pasture. But I will suddenly make them run away from her. Who is the chosen man I will put in charge of her? For who is like me? Who will set me a time? What shepherd can stand before me?
45So hear the plan the LORD has made against Babylon, and what he has decided against the land of the Chaldeans: Surely the smallest of the flock will drag them away. Surely he will make their pasture a horror over them.
46At the noise of Babylon's capture the earth shakes, and the cry is heard among the nations.