For the fortified city is solitary, a habitation deserted and forsaken, like the wilderness. The calf will feed there, and there he will lie down, and consume its branches.
I will lay it a wasteland. It won't be pruned nor hoed, but it will grow briers and thorns. I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain on it.*
Instead of the thorn shall come up the fir tree; and instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle tree: and it shall be to the LORD for a name, for an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off.
For thus says the LORD, the God of Yisra'el, concerning the houses of this city, and concerning the houses of the kings of Yehudah, which are broken down [to make a defense] against the mounds and against the sword;
The high places also of Aven, the sin of Yisra'el, will be destroyed. The thorn and the thistle will come up on their altars. They will tell the mountains, *Cover us!* and the hills, *Fall on us!*
Lest I strip her naked, and make her bare as in the day that she was born, and make her like a wilderness, and set her like a dry land, and kill her with thirst.
For, behold, they have gone away from destruction. Egypt will gather them up. Mof will bury them. Nettles will possess their pleasant things of silver. Thorns will be in their tents.