Wail, you shepherds, and cry! Wallow in the dust, you leaders of the flock! For the days of your slaughter and your dispersions are full. You will fall like a precious vase.
At the turn of the year, King Nebuchadnezzar sent and had him brought to Babylon along with the precious articles from the House of Adonai and made his brother Zedekiah king over Judah and Jerusalem.
Therefore it will come to pass, when Adonai finishes all His work on Mount Zion and on Jerusalem, “I will punish the fruit of the arrogant heart of the king of Assyria, and the glorying of his haughty eyes.”
Its collapse is like smashing a clay jar, so ruthlessly shattered that a shard will not be found among the pieces to take fire from the hearth or scoop water from the cistern.”
Oy , you destroyer, never destroyed, you traitor, never betrayed! When you have stopped destroying, you will be destroyed; and when you finish betraying, they will betray you.
The sword of Adonai is filled with blood, gorged with fat— the blood of lambs and goats, the fat of kidneys of rams. For Adonai has a sacrifice in Bozrah, a great slaughter in the land of Edom.
Then it will come to pass, when 70 years are completed, that I will punish the king of Babylon and that nation,” declares Adonai, “the land of the Chaldeans, for their iniquity, and I will make it ruins forever.
All the nations will serve him—and his son, and his grandson—until the time of his own land comes, and then many nations and great kings will make him their slave.’
“Then I Myself said: ‘How gladly would I make you sons and give you a pleasant land— the most beautiful inheritance of the nations!’ I thought you would call Me—Avi!— and would not turn from following Me.
On all the housetops of Moab and in its squares— lamentation everywhere! For I have broken Moab like a jar In which no one delights” —it is a declaration of Adonai—
“Daughter of My people, put on sackcloth and roll in ashes. Mourn as for an only son with bitter lamentation.” “For suddenly the destroyer will come on us!”
He will also carry off their gods into captivity to Egypt, along with their metal images and their precious articles of silver and gold. For a few years he will stay away from the king of the north.
Therefore, because you trample on the poor, exacting from him a burden of grain, you built houses of hewn stone, but will not dwell in them, you planted pleasant vineyards, but will not drink their wine.
My anger burns against the shepherds and I will punish the leaders. Adonai-Tzva’ot cares for His flock, the house of Judah. He will make them His valiant steed in battle.