Woe to the obstinate nation

1‘Woe to the obstinate children,’

declares the Lord,

‘to those who carry out plans that are not mine,

forming an alliance, but not by my Spirit,

heaping sin upon sin;

2who go down to Egypt

without consulting me;

who look for help to Pharaoh’s protection,

to Egypt’s shade for refuge.

3But Pharaoh’s protection will be to your shame,

Egypt’s shade will bring you disgrace.

4Though they have officials in Zoan

and their envoys have arrived in Hanes,

5everyone will be put to shame

because of a people useless to them,

who bring neither help nor advantage,

but only shame and disgrace.’

6A prophecy concerning the animals of the Negev:

Through a land of hardship and distress,

of lions and lionesses,

of adders and darting snakes,

the envoys carry their riches on donkeys’ backs,

their treasures on the humps of camels,

to that unprofitable nation,

7to Egypt, whose help is utterly useless.

Therefore I call her

Rahab the Do-Nothing.

8Go now, write it on a tablet for them,

inscribe it on a scroll,

that for the days to come

it may be an everlasting witness.

9For these are rebellious people, deceitful children,

children unwilling to listen to the Lord’s instruction.

10They say to the seers,

‘See no more visions!’

and to the prophets,

‘Give us no more visions of what is right!

Tell us pleasant things,

prophesy illusions.

11Leave this way,

get off this path,

and stop confronting us

with the Holy One of Israel!’

12Therefore this is what the Holy One of Israel says:

‘Because you have rejected this message,

relied on oppression

and depended on deceit,

13this sin will become for you

like a high wall, cracked and bulging,

that collapses suddenly, in an instant.

14It will break in pieces like pottery,

shattered so mercilessly

that among its pieces not a fragment will be found

for taking coals from a hearth

or scooping water out of a cistern.’

15This is what the Sovereign Lord, the Holy One of Israel, says:

‘In repentance and rest is your salvation,

in quietness and trust is your strength,

but you would have none of it.

16You said, “No, we will flee on horses.”

Therefore you will flee!

You said, “We will ride off on swift horses.”

Therefore your pursuers will be swift!

17A thousand will flee

at the threat of one;

at the threat of five

you will all flee away,

till you are left

like a flagstaff on a mountaintop,

like a banner on a hill.’

18Yet the Lord longs to be gracious to you;

therefore he will rise up to show you compassion.

For the Lord is a God of justice.

Blessed are all who wait for him!

19People of Zion, who live in Jerusalem, you will weep no more. How gracious he will be when you cry for help! As soon as he hears, he will answer you. 20Although the Lord gives you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, your teachers will be hidden no more; with your own eyes you will see them. 21Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, ‘This is the way; walk in it.’ 22Then you will desecrate your idols overlaid with silver and your images covered with gold; you will throw them away like a menstrual cloth and say to them, ‘Away with you!’

23He will also send you rain for the seed you sow in the ground, and the food that comes from the land will be rich and plentiful. In that day your cattle will graze in broad meadows. 24The oxen and donkeys that work the soil will eat fodder and mash, spread out with fork and shovel. 25In the day of great slaughter, when the towers fall, streams of water will flow on every high mountain and every lofty hill. 26The moon will shine like the sun, and the sunlight will be seven times brighter, like the light of seven full days, when the Lord binds up the bruises of his people and heals the wounds he inflicted.

27See, the Name of the Lord comes from afar,

with burning anger and dense clouds of smoke;

his lips are full of wrath,

and his tongue is a consuming fire.

28His breath is like a rushing torrent,

rising up to the neck.

He shakes the nations in the sieve of destruction;

he places in the jaws of the peoples

a bit that leads them astray.

29And you will sing

as on the night you celebrate a holy festival;

your hearts will rejoice

as when people playing pipes go up

to the mountain of the Lord,

to the Rock of Israel.

30The Lord will cause people to hear his majestic voice

and will make them see his arm coming down

with raging anger and consuming fire,

with cloudburst, thunderstorm and hail.

31The voice of the Lord will shatter Assyria;

with his rod he will strike them down.

32Every stroke the Lord lays on them

with his punishing club

will be to the music of tambourines and harps,

as he fights them in battle with the blows of his arm.

33Topheth has long been prepared;

it has been made ready for the king.

Its fire pit has been made deep and wide,

with an abundance of fire and wood;

the breath of the Lord,

like a stream of burning sulphur,

sets it ablaze.