Isaiah 14

¹The Lord will have compassion on Jacob and will again choose Israel, and will set them in their own land, and aliens will join them and will cleave to the house of Jacob. ²And the peoples will take them and bring them to their place, and the house of Israel will possess them in the Lord’s land as male and female slaves; they will take captive those who were their captors, and rule over those who oppressed them.

³When the Lord has given you rest from your pain and turmoil and the hard service with which you were made to serve, ⁴you will take up this taunt against the king of Babylon:

“How the oppressor has ceased,

the insolent fury ceased!

⁵The Lord has broken the staff of the wicked,

the scepter of rulers,

⁶that smote the peoples in wrath

with unceasing blows,

that ruled the nations in anger

with unrelenting persecution.

⁷The whole earth is at rest and quiet;

they break forth into singing.

⁸The cypresses rejoice at you,

the cedars of Lebanon, saying,

‘Since you were laid low,

no hewer comes up against us.’

⁹Sheol beneath is stirred up

to meet you when you come,

it rouses the shades to greet you,

all who were leaders of the earth;

it raises from their thrones

all who were kings of the nations.

¹⁰All of them will speak

and say to you:

‘You too have become as weak as we!

You have become like us!’

¹¹Your pomp is brought down to Sheol,

the sound of your harps;

maggots are the bed beneath you,

and worms are your covering.

¹²“How you are fallen from heaven,

O Day Star, son of Dawn!

How you are cut down to the ground,

you who laid the nations low!

¹³You said in your heart,

‘I will ascend to heaven;

above the stars of God

I will set my throne on high;

I will sit on the mount of assembly

in the far north;

¹⁴I will ascend above the heights of the clouds,

I will make myself like the Most High.’

¹⁵But you are brought down to Sheol,

to the depths of the Pit.

¹⁶Those who see you will stare at you,

and ponder over you:

‘Is this the man who made the earth tremble,

who shook kingdoms,

¹⁷who made the world like a desert

and overthrew its cities,

who did not let his prisoners go home?’

¹⁸All the kings of the nations lie in glory,

each in his own tomb;

¹⁹but you are cast out, away from your sepulchre,

like a loathed untimely birth,

clothed with the slain, those pierced by the sword,

who go down to the stones of the Pit,

like a dead body trodden under foot.

²⁰You will not be joined with them in burial,

because you have destroyed your land,

you have slain your people.

“May the descendants of evildoers

nevermore be named!

²¹Prepare slaughter for his sons

because of the guilt of their fathers,

lest they rise and possess the earth,

and fill the face of the world with cities.”

²²“I will rise up against them,” says the Lord of hosts, “and will cut off from Babylon name and remnant, offspring and posterity, says the Lord. ²³And I will make it a possession of the hedgehog, and pools of water, and I will sweep it with the broom of destruction, says the Lord of hosts.”

²⁴The Lord of hosts has sworn:

“As I have planned,

so shall it be,

and as I have purposed,

so shall it stand,

²⁵that I will break the Assyrian in my land,

and upon my mountains trample him under foot;

and his yoke shall depart from them,

and his burden from their shoulder.”

²⁶This is the purpose that is purposed

concerning the whole earth;

and this is the hand that is stretched out

over all the nations.

²⁷For the Lord of hosts has purposed,

and who will annul it?

His hand is stretched out,

and who will turn it back?

²⁸In the year that King Ahaz died came this oracle:

²⁹“Rejoice not, O Philistia, all of you,

that the rod which smote you is broken,

for from the serpent’s root will come forth an adder,

and its fruit will be a flying serpent.

³⁰And the first-born of the poor will feed,

and the needy lie down in safety;

but I will kill your root with famine,

and your remnant I will slay.

³¹Wail, O gate; cry, O city;

melt in fear, O Philistia, all of you!

For smoke comes out of the north,

and there is no straggler in his ranks.”

³²What will one answer the messengers of the nation?

“The Lord has founded Zion,

and in her the afflicted of his people find refuge.”