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Therefore thus says Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel: Behold, I will punish the king of Babylon and his land, as I have punished the king of Assyria.

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I will bring Israel again to his pasture, and he shall feed on Carmel and Bashan, and his soul shall be satisfied on the hills of Ephraim and in Gilead.

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In those days, and in that time, says Yahweh, the iniquity of Israel shall be sought for, and there shall be none; and the sins of Judah, and they shall not be found: for I will pardon them whom I leave as a remnant.

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Go up against the land of Merathaim, even against it, and against the inhabitants of Pekod: kill and utterly destroy after them, says Yahweh, and do according to all that I have commanded you.

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A sound of battle is in the land, and of great destruction.

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How is the hammer of the whole earth cut apart and broken! how is Babylon become a desolation among the nations!

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I have laid a snare for you, and you are also taken, Babylon, and you weren’t aware: you are found, and also caught, because you have striven against Yahweh.

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Yahweh has opened his armory, and has brought forth the weapons of his indignation; for the Lord, Yahweh of Armies, has a work [to do] in the land of the Chaldeans.

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Come against her from the utmost border; open her storehouses; cast her up as heaps, and destroy her utterly; let nothing of her be left.

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Kill all her bulls; let them go down to the slaughter: woe to them! for their day is come, the time of their visitation.

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The voice of those who flee and escape out of the land of Babylon, to declare in Zion the vengeance of Yahweh our God, the vengeance of his temple.

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Call together the archers against Babylon, all those who bend the bow; encamp against her all around; let none of it escape: recompense her according to her work; according to all that she has done, do to her; for she has been proud against Yahweh, against the Holy One of Israel.

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Therefore her young men will fall in her streets, and all her men of war will be brought to silence in that day, says Yahweh.

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Behold, I am against you, you proud one, says the Lord, Yahweh of Armies; for your day has come, the time that I will visit you.

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The proud one shall stumble and fall, and none shall raise him up; and I will kindle a fire in his cities, and it shall devour all who are around him.

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Thus says Yahweh of Armies: The children of Israel and the children of Judah are oppressed together; and all who took them captive hold them fast; they refuse to let them go.

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Their Redeemer is strong; Yahweh of Armies is his name: he will thoroughly plead their cause, that he may give rest to the earth, and disquiet the inhabitants of Babylon.

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A sword is on the Chaldeans, says Yahweh, and on the inhabitants of Babylon, and on her princes, and on her wise men.

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A sword is on the boasters, and they shall become fools; a sword is on her mighty men, and they shall be dismayed.

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A sword is on their horses, and on their chariots, and on all the mixed people who are in the midst of her; and they shall become as women: a sword is on her treasures, and they shall be robbed.

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A drought is on her waters, and they shall be dried up; for it is a land of engraved images, and they are mad over idols.

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Therefore the wild animals of the desert with the wolves shall dwell there, and the ostriches shall dwell therein: and it shall be no more inhabited forever; neither shall it be lived in from generation to generation.

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As when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah and the neighbor cities of it, says Yahweh, so shall no man dwell there, neither shall any son of man live therein.

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Behold, a people comes from the north; and a great nation and many kings shall be stirred up from the uttermost parts of the earth.

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They lay hold on bow and spear; they are cruel, and have no mercy; their voice roars like the sea; and they ride on horses, everyone set in array, as a man to the battle, against you, daughter of Babylon.

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The king of Babylon has heard the news of them, and his hands wax feeble: anguish has taken hold of him, [and] pangs as of a woman in travail.

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Behold, [the enemy] shall come up like a lion from the pride of the Jordan against the strong habitation: for I will suddenly make them run away from it; and whoever is chosen, him will I appoint over it: for who is like me? and who will appoint me a time? and who is the shepherd who can stand before me?

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Therefore hear the counsel of Yahweh, that he has taken against Babylon; and his purposes, that he has purposed against the land of the Chaldeans: Surely they shall drag them away, [even] the little ones of the flock; surely he shall make their habitation desolate over them.

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At the noise of the taking of Babylon the earth trembles, and the cry is heard among the nations.

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Thus says Yahweh: Behold, I will raise up against Babylon, and against those who dwell in Lebkamai, a destroying wind.

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I will send to Babylon strangers, who shall winnow her; and they shall empty her land: for in the day of trouble they shall be against her around.

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Against [him who] bends let the archer bend his bow, and against [him who] lifts himself up in his coat of mail: and don’t spare her young men; utterly destroy all her army.

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They shall fall down slain in the land of the Chaldeans, and thrust through in her streets.

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For Israel is not forsaken, nor Judah, of his God, of Yahweh of Armies; though their land is full of guilt against the Holy One of Israel.

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Flee out of the midst of Babylon, and save every man his life; don’t be cut off in her iniquity: for it is the time of Yahweh’s vengeance; he will render to her a recompense.

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Babylon has been a golden cup in Yahweh’s hand, who made all the earth drunken: the nations have drunk of her wine; therefore the nations are mad.

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Babylon is suddenly fallen and destroyed: wail for her; take balm for her pain, if so be she may be healed.

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We would have healed Babylon, but she is not healed: forsake her, and let us go everyone into his own country; for her judgment reaches to heaven, and is lifted up even to the skies.

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Yahweh has brought forth our righteousness: come, and let us declare in Zion the work of Yahweh our God.

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Make sharp the arrows; hold firm the shields: Yahweh has stirred up the spirit of the kings of the Medes; because his purpose is against Babylon, to destroy it: for it is the vengeance of Yahweh, the vengeance of his temple.

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Set up a standard against the walls of Babylon, make the watch strong, set the watchmen, prepare the ambushes; for Yahweh has both purposed and done that which he spoke concerning the inhabitants of Babylon.

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You who dwell on many waters, abundant in treasures, your end has come, the measure of your covetousness.

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Yahweh of Armies has sworn by himself, [saying], Surely I will fill you with men, as with the canker worm; and they shall lift up a shout against you.

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He has made the earth by his power, he has established the world by his wisdom, and by his understanding has he stretched out the heavens:

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when he utters his voice, there is a tumult of waters in the heavens, and he causes the vapors to ascend from the ends of the earth; he makes lightning for the rain, and brings forth the wind out of his treasuries.

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Every man is become brutish [and is] without knowledge; every goldsmith is disappointed by his image; for his molten image is falsehood, and there is no breath in them.

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They are vanity, a work of delusion: in the time of their visitation they shall perish.

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The portion of Jacob is not like these; for he is the former of all things; and [Israel] is the tribe of his inheritance: Yahweh of Armies is his name.

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You are my battle axe and weapons of war: and with you will I break in pieces the nations; and with you will I destroy kingdoms;

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and with you will I break in pieces the horse and his rider;

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and with you will I break in pieces the chariot and him who rides therein; and with you will I break in pieces man and woman; and with you will I break in pieces the old man and the youth; and with you will I break in pieces the young man and the virgin;

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and with you will I break in pieces the shepherd and his flock; and with you will I break in pieces the farmer and his yoke [of oxen]; and with you will I break in pieces governors and deputies.

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I will render to Babylon and to all the inhabitants of Chaldea all their evil that they have done in Zion in your sight, says Yahweh.

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Behold, I am against you, destroying mountain, says Yahweh, which destroys all the earth; and I will stretch out my hand on you, and roll you down from the rocks, and will make you a burnt mountain.

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They shall not take of you a stone for a corner, nor a stone for foundations; but you shall be desolate for ever, says Yahweh.

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Set up a standard in the land, blow the trumpet among the nations, prepare the nations against her, call together against her the kingdoms of Ararat, Minni, and Ashkenaz: appoint a marshal against her; cause the horses to come up as the rough canker worm.

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Prepare against her the nations, the kings of the Medes, its governors, and all its deputies, and all the land of their dominion.

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The land trembles and is in pain; for the purposes of Yahweh against Babylon do stand, to make the land of Babylon a desolation, without inhabitant.

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The mighty men of Babylon have forborne to fight, they remain in their strongholds; their might has failed; they are become as women: her dwelling places are set on fire; her bars are broken.

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One runner will run to meet another, and one messenger to meet another, to show the king of Babylon that his city is taken on every quarter:

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and the passages are seized, and the reeds they have burned with fire, and the men of war are frightened.

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For thus says Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel: The daughter of Babylon is like a threshing floor at the time when it is trodden; yet a little while, and the time of harvest shall come for her.

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Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon has devoured me, he has crushed me, he has made me an empty vessel, he has, like a monster, swallowed me up, he has filled his maw with my delicacies; he has cast me out.

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The violence done to me and to my flesh be on Babylon, shall the inhabitant of Zion say; and, My blood be on the inhabitants of Chaldea, shall Jerusalem say.

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Therefore thus says Yahweh: Behold, I will plead your cause, and take vengeance for you; and I will dry up her sea, and make her fountain dry.

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Babylon shall become heaps, a dwelling place for jackals, an astonishment, and a hissing, without inhabitant.

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They shall roar together like young lions; they shall growl as lions’ cubs.

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When they are heated, I will make their feast, and I will make them drunken, that they may rejoice, and sleep a perpetual sleep, and not wake, says Yahweh.

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I will bring them down like lambs to the slaughter, like rams with male goats.

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How is Sheshach taken! and the praise of the whole earth seized! how is Babylon become a desolation among the nations!

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The sea is come up on Babylon; she is covered with the multitude of its waves.

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Her cities are become a desolation, a dry land, and a desert, a land in which no man dwells, neither does any son of man pass thereby.

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I will execute judgment on Bel in Babylon, and I will bring forth out of his mouth that which he has swallowed up; and the nations shall not flow any more to him: yes, the wall of Babylon shall fall.

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My people, go away from the midst of her, and save yourselves every man from the fierce anger of Yahweh.

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Don’t let your heart faint, neither fear for the news that shall be heard in the land; for news shall come one year, and after that in another year [shall come] news, and violence in the land, ruler against ruler.

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Therefore, behold, the days come, that I will execute judgment on the engraved images of Babylon; and her whole land shall be confounded; and all her slain shall fall in the midst of her.

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Then the heavens and the earth, and all that is therein, shall sing for joy over Babylon; for the destroyers shall come to her from the north, says Yahweh.

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As Babylon has caused the slain of Israel to fall, so at Babylon shall fall the slain of all the land.

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You who have escaped the sword, go, don’t stand still; remember Yahweh from afar, and let Jerusalem come into your mind.

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We are confounded, because we have heard reproach; confusion has covered our faces: for strangers are come into the sanctuaries of Yahweh’s house.

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Therefore, behold, the days come, says Yahweh, that I will execute judgment on her engraved images; and through all her land the wounded shall groan.

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Though Babylon should mount up to the sky, and though she should fortify the height of her strength, yet from me shall destroyers come to her, says Yahweh.

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The sound of a cry from Babylon, and of great destruction from the land of the Chaldeans!

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For Yahweh lays Babylon waste, and destroys out of her the great voice; and their waves roar like many waters; the noise of their voice is uttered:

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for the destroyer is come on her, even on Babylon, and her mighty men are taken, their bows are broken in pieces; for Yahweh is a God of recompenses, he will surely requite.

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I will make drunk her princes and her wise men, her governors and her deputies, and her mighty men; and they shall sleep a perpetual sleep, and not wake up, says the King, whose name is Yahweh of Armies.

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Thus says Yahweh of Armies: The broad walls of Babylon shall be utterly overthrown, and her high gates shall be burned with fire; and the peoples shall labor for vanity, and the nations for the fire; and they shall be weary.

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The word which Jeremiah the prophet commanded Seraiah the son of Neriah, the son of Mahseiah, when he went with Zedekiah the king of Judah to Babylon in the fourth year of his reign. Now Seraiah was chief quartermaster.

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Jeremiah wrote in a book all the evil that should come on Babylon, even all these words that are written concerning Babylon.

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Jeremiah said to Seraiah, When you come to Babylon, then see that you read all these words,

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and say, Yahweh, you have spoken concerning this place, to cut it off, that none shall dwell therein, neither man nor animal, but that it shall be desolate forever.

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It shall be, when you have made an end of reading this book, that you shall bind a stone to it, and cast it into the midst of the Euphrates:

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and you shall say, Thus shall Babylon sink, and shall not rise again because of the evil that I will bring on her; and they shall be weary. Thus far are the words of Jeremiah.

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Zedekiah was twenty-one years old when he began to reign; and he reigned eleven years in Jerusalem: and his mother’s name was Hamutal the daughter of Jeremiah of Libnah.

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He did that which was evil in the sight of Yahweh, according to all that Jehoiakim had done.

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For through the anger of Yahweh did it happen in Jerusalem and Judah, until he had cast them out from his presence. Zedekiah rebelled against the king of Babylon.

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It happened in the ninth year of his reign, in the tenth month, in the tenth day of the month, that Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came, he and all his army, against Jerusalem, and encamped against it; and they built forts against it round about.

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So the city was besieged to the eleventh year of king Zedekiah.

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In the fourth month, in the ninth day of the month, the famine was severe in the city, so that there was no bread for the people of the land.

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Then a breach was made in the city, and all the men of war fled, and went forth out of the city by night by the way of the gate between the two walls, which was by the king’s garden; (now the Chaldeans were against the city all around;) and they went toward the Arabah.