Then I said, ‘Until when, Lord? ’ And he replied: Until cities lie in ruins without inhabitants, houses are without people, the land is ruined and desolate,
therefore, mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord God. This is what the Lord God says to the mountains and hills, to the ravines and valleys, to the desolate ruins and abandoned cities, which have become plunder and a mockery to the rest of the nations all around.
On that day’ #– #the declaration of the Lord of Armies #– #‘the peg that was driven into a firm place will give way, be cut off, and fall, and the load on it will be destroyed.’ Indeed, the Lord has spoken.
This fulfilled the word of the Lord through Jeremiah, and the land enjoyed its Sabbath rest all the days of the desolation until seventy years were fulfilled.
All its soil will be a burning waste of sulphur and salt, unsown, producing nothing, with no plant growing on it, just like the fall of Sodom and Gomorrah, Admah and Zeboiim, which the Lord demolished in his fierce anger.
I will make it a wasteland. It will not be pruned or weeded; thorns and briars will grow up. I will also give orders to the clouds that rain should not fall on it.
In that day one will take up a taunt against you and lament mournfully, saying, ‘We are totally ruined! He measures out the allotted land of my people. How he removes it from me! He allots our fields to traitors.’
But this is a people plundered and looted, all of them trapped in holes or imprisoned in dungeons. They have become plunder with no one to rescue them and loot, with no one saying, ‘Give it back! ’