Chapter Text
21:1 The oracle concerning the wilderness of the sea. As whirlwinds in the Negev sweep on, It comes from the wilderness, from a fearsome land.
21:2 A harsh vision has been declared to me; The treacherous one still deals treacherously, and the destroyer still destroys. Go up, Elam, lay siege, Media; I have made an end of all the groaning she has caused.
21:3 For this reason my loins are full of anguish; Pains have seized me like the pains of a woman in labor. I am so bewildered I cannot hear, so terrified I cannot see.
21:4 My heart reels; horror terrorizes me; The twilight I longed for has been turned for me into trembling.
21:5 They set the table, they spread out the cloth, they eat, they drink; “Rise up, commanders, oil the shields,”
21:6 For thus the Lord says to me, “Go, station the lookout, let him declare what he sees.
21:7 Indeed, he shall see riders, horsemen in pairs, Riders of donkeys, riders of camels, So let him pay close attention, very close attention.”
21:8 Then the lookout called, “O Lord, I stand continually by day on the watchtower, And I am stationed every night at my guard post.
21:9 Now behold, here comes a troop of riders, horsemen in pairs.” And one answered and said, “Fallen, fallen is Babylon; And all the graven images of her gods are shattered on the ground.”
21:10 O my trampled people and my afflicted of the threshing floor! What I have heard from Yahweh of hosts, The God of Israel, I have declared to you.
21:11 The oracle concerning Dumah. One keeps calling to me from Seir, “Watchman, how far gone is the night? Watchman, how far gone is the night?”
21:12 The watchman says, “Morning comes but also night. If you would inquire, inquire; Come back again.”
21:13 The oracle about Arabia. In the thickets of Arabia you must spend the night, O caravans of Dedanites.
21:14 Bring water to meet the thirsty, O inhabitants of the land of Tema, Meet with bread the one who has fled.
21:15 For they have fled from the swords, From the drawn sword, and from the bent bow And from the heaviness of battle.
21:16 For thus the Lord said to me, “In a year, as a hired man would count it, all the glory of Kedar will end;
21:17 and the remainder of the number of bowmen, the mighty men of the sons of Kedar, will be few; for Yahweh, the God of Israel, has spoken.”