Isaiah 21:1-10

God Commands That Babylon Be Taken

¹The pronouncement concerning the wilderness of the sea:

As windstorms in the Negev come in turns,

It comes from the wilderness, from a terrifying land.

2A harsh vision has been shown to me;

The treacherous one still deals treacherously, and the destroyer still destroys.

Go up, Elam, lay siege, Media;

I have put an end to all the groaning she has caused.

3For 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.

4My mind reels, horror overwhelms me;

The twilight I longed for has been turned into trembling for me.

5They set the table, they spread out the cloth, they eat, they drink;

“Rise up, captains, oil the shields!”

⁶For this is what the Lord says to me:

“Go, station the lookout, have him report what he sees.

7“When he sees a column of chariots, horsemen in pairs,

A train of donkeys, a train of camels,

He is to pay close attention, very close attention.”

⁸Then the lookout called,

“Lord, I stand continually by day on the watchtower,

And I am stationed every night at my guard post.

9“Now behold, here comes a troop of riders, horsemen in pairs.”

And one said, “Fallen, fallen is Babylon;

And all the images of her gods are shattered on the ground.”

10My downtrodden people, and my afflicted of the threshing floor!

What I have heard from the Lord of armies,

The God of Israel, I make known to you.

Pronouncements about Edom and Arabia