In the ninth year of Hoshea, the king of Assyria took Samaria, and carried Israel away into Assyria. And he placed them in Halah, and in Habor by the river Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes.
A harsh vision is revealed to me; the deceiver deceives, and the plunderer plunders. Go up, O Elam; besiege, O Media! I have caused all her sighing to cease.
I have raised up one from the north, and he shall come from the sunrise; he will call on My name. And he shall come on rulers as on mortar, and as the potter tramples clay.
For out of the north a nation comes up against her, which shall make her land a desert, and none shall dwell in it. They shall flee, they shall depart, both man and beast.
They lay hold on a bow and spear; they are cruel and will not show mercy. Their voice shall roar like the sea, and they shall ride on horses arrayed like a man for the battle against you, O daughter of Babylon.
For, lo, I am stirring up and bringing up against Babylon a company of great nations from a northern land. And they shall array themselves against her. She shall be captured there. Their arrows shall be as those of a skillful, mighty man; none shall return in vain.
Sharpen the arrows; gather the shields; Jehovah has raised up the spirit of the kings of the Medes. For His plan is against Babylon, to destroy it; because it is the vengeance of Jehovah, the vengeance of His temple.