1Yahweh says, "Look, I am raising up a destructive wind against Babylon and against those who live in Lebkamai."
2I will send foreigners to Babylon who will winnow her, and they will empty her land. For in the day of trouble, they will surround her.
3Let the archer bend his bow against the one who string his bow, and let him rise against the one who puts on his armor. Don't spare her young men! Completely destroy her entire army!
4They will fall, slain in the land of the Chaldeans, and run through in her streets.
5For Israel and Judah have not been abandoned by their God, by Yahweh of Armies, even though their land is full of guilt against the Holy One of Israel.
6"Flee from the middle of Babylon! Let everyone save his own life! Don't be destroyed because of her sin; for it is the time of Yahweh's vengeance. He will repay her for what she has done."
7Babylon has been a gold cup in Yahweh's hand, making the whole world drunk. The nations have drunk her wine; therefore, the nations have gone mad.
8Babylon has suddenly fallen and is destroyed! Weep for her! Get balm for her pain. Perhaps she can be healed.
9“We tried to heal Babylon, but she could not be healed. Leave her, and let each of us go back to our own country, because the judgment against her reaches to the sky, even to the clouds.
10‘Yahweh has shown us what is right: come, let's announce in Zion what Yahweh our God has done.’
11“Sharpen the arrows! Hold the shields tightly! Yahweh has stirred up the kings of the Medes because he plans to destroy Babylon. This is Yahweh's revenge, the revenge for his temple.
12Raise a flag against the walls of Babylon! Strengthen the watch! Station the guards, and prepare the ambushes, because Yahweh has planned and carried out what he said he would do to the people of Babylon.
13You who live by many waters, rich in treasures, your end has come, the limit of your greed.
14Yahweh of Armies has sworn by himself, saying, ‘I will surely fill you with people, like a swarm of locusts; and they will shout in victory against you.’
15“He made the earth by his power. He set the world in place with his wisdom. By his understanding, he stretched out the heavens.
16When he speaks, there is a rumble of waters in the heavens, and he makes the clouds rise from the ends of the earth. He sends lightning with the rain and brings the wind out of his storage places.
17“Everyone has become stupid and ignorant. Every jeweler is ashamed of the idol he made, because his melted idol is a lie, and there's no life in them.
18They are worthless, a deceptive creation. When they are judged, they will be destroyed.
19The God of Jacob is not like these idols, for he is the one who created everything, including the people he chose as his inheritance. His name is Yahweh of Armies.
20“You are my battle-ax and my weapons of war. With you, I will smash nations to pieces. With you, I will destroy kingdoms.
21With you, I will smash the horse and its rider.
22With you, I will smash the chariot and its driver. With you, I will smash men and women. With you, I will smash old men and young people. With you, I will smash young men and young women.
23With you, I will smash the shepherd and his flock. With you, I will smash the farmer and his ox. With you, I will smash governors and officials.
24“I will repay Babylon and all the people of Chaldea for all the evil they did in Zion, right before your eyes,” says Yahweh.
25“Look, I am against you, you destructive mountain,” says Yahweh, “you who destroy the whole world. I will reach out my hand against you, roll you down from the cliffs, and turn you into a burnt mountain.
26No one will take a cornerstone from you, nor a stone for foundations; instead, you will be desolate forever,” says Yahweh.
27“Raise a flag in the land! Blow the trumpet among the nations! Prepare the nations to attack her! Gather the kingdoms of Ararat, Minni, and Ashkenaz against her! Appoint a commander against her! Make the horses charge like aggressive locusts!
28Prepare the nations against her, the kings of the Medes, their governors, all their officials, and all the land under their rule!
29The land shakes and is in pain, because Yahweh's plans against Babylon are firm: to make the land of Babylon a desolate place, with no one living in it.
30Babylon’s brave soldiers have stopped fighting; they stay in their strongholds. Their strength has failed. They have become like women. Her houses are set on fire. Her gates are broken.
31One messenger will run to meet another, and one courier to meet another, to inform the king of Babylon that his city has been captured from all sides.
32So the escape routes are blocked. They have burned the reedy marshes. The soldiers are terrified.”
33Because Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel, says: “The daughter of Babylon is like a threshing floor when it's being trampled. Soon the time for her harvest will come.”
34“King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon has eaten me up. He has crushed me. He has made me an empty jar. Like a monster, he has swallowed me. He has filled his mouth with my delights. He has thrown me out.
35“May the violence done to me and to my body be on Babylon!” the people of Zion will say; and “May my blood be on the people of Chaldea!” Jerusalem will say.
36Therefore Yahweh says: “Look, I will argue your case and get revenge for you. I will dry up Babylon's sea and make her springs dry.
37Babylon will become piles of rubble, a home for jackals, a shock, and an object of scorn, with no one living there.
38They will roar together like young lions. They will growl like lion cubs.
39“When they are eager, I will prepare their feast, and I will make them drunk so they can celebrate and then fall into an unending sleep from which they will not wake,” says Yahweh.
40“I will bring them down like lambs to be slaughtered, like rams along with male goats.
41“How Sheshach has been captured! And how the pride of the whole earth has been seized! How Babylon has become a desolate place among the nations!
42The sea has risen over Babylon. She is covered by its many waves.
43Her cities have become a desolate wasteland, a dry and barren desert, a land where no one lives, and no human travels through it.
44I will punish the idol Bel in Babylon, and I will make him spit out what he has swallowed. The nations will no longer flock to him. Indeed, the wall of Babylon will fall.
45“My people, get away from her, and each of you save yourselves from Yahweh’s fierce anger.
46Don't lose heart. Don't be afraid of the news that will be heard in the land. For news will come one year, and then in another year news will come, and there will be violence in the land, ruler against ruler.
47Therefore, look, the days are coming when I will punish the carved images of Babylon; and her whole land will be put to shame. All her slain will fall within her.
48Then the heavens and the earth, and everything in them, will shout for joy over Babylon, because destroyers will come to her from the north,” says Yahweh.
49Just as Babylon caused many in Israel to die, so people from all over the land will die in Babylon.
50You who have escaped the sword, go! Don’t stay here! Remember Yahweh from a distance, and think about Jerusalem.
51“We are ashamed, because we have heard insults. Disgrace covers our faces, because foreigners have entered the holy places of Yahweh’s house.”
52“Therefore, watch out, the time is coming,” says Yahweh, “when I will punish her idols; and throughout her land, the wounded will cry out.”
53Even if Babylon were to reach the sky, and even if she were to make her strongholds incredibly secure, destroyers will still come to her from me,” says Yahweh.
54“The sound of a cry comes from Babylon, a sound of great destruction from the land of the Chaldeans!
55For Yahweh is destroying Babylon, silencing its great noise! Their waves roar like many waters. The sound of their voices is heard.
56For a destroyer has come against her, against Babylon. Her strong warriors are captured. Their bows are broken, because Yahweh is a God who repays. He will certainly get revenge.
57I will make her princes, her wise men, her governors, her officials, and her mighty warriors drunk. They will sleep forever and never wake up,” says the King, whose name is Yahweh of Armies.
58Yahweh of Armies says: “The wide walls of Babylon will be completely torn down. Her tall gates will be burned with fire. The people will work for nothing, and the nations will toil for what will be consumed by fire; and they will become exhausted.”
59This is the message that Jeremiah the prophet gave to Seraiah son of Neriah, son of Mahseiah, when Seraiah went with King Zedekiah of Judah to Babylon in the fourth year of Zedekiah's reign. Seraiah was the chief quartermaster.
60Jeremiah wrote in a book all the disaster that would come upon Babylon—all these words written about Babylon.
61Jeremiah told Seraiah, “When you arrive in Babylon, make sure you read all these words aloud.
62Then say, ‘Yahweh, you have spoken about this place, saying you will destroy it so that no one, neither people nor animals, will live in it, but it will be empty forever.’
63It will happen that when you have finished reading this book, you are to tie a stone to it and throw it into the middle of the Euphrates River.”
64Then you will say, ‘In this way, Babylon will sink and never rise again because of the disaster I will bring on her; and they will be exhausted.’” These are the last words of Jeremiah.