Isaiah 34

1 Come near, O nations, to listen; pay attention, O peoples. Let the earth hear, and all that fills it, the world and all that springs from it.

Come near, you nations, and give ear; take note, you peoples: let the earth and everything in it give ear; the world and all those living in it.

2 The LORD is angry with all the nations and furious with all their armies. He will devote them to destruction; He will give them over to slaughter.

For the Lord is angry with all the nations, and his wrath is burning against all their armies: he has put them to the curse, he has given them to destruction.

3 Their slain will be left unburied, and the stench of their corpses will rise; the mountains will flow with their blood.

Their dead bodies will be thick on the face of the earth, and their smell will come up, and the mountains will be flowing with their blood, and all the hills will come to nothing.

4 All the stars of heaven will be dissolved. The skies will be rolled up like a scroll, and all their stars will fall like withered leaves from the vine, like foliage from the fig tree.

And the heavens will be rolled together like the roll of a book: and all their army will be gone, like a dead leaf from the vine, or a dry fruit from the fig-tree.

5 When My sword has drunk its fill in the heavens, then it will come down upon Edom, upon the people I have devoted to destruction.

For my sword in heaven is full of wrath: see, it is coming down on Edom, in punishment on the people of my curse.

6 The sword of the LORD is bathed in blood. It drips with fat— with the blood of lambs and goats, with the fat of the kidneys of rams. For the LORD has a sacrifice in Bozrah, a great slaughter in the land of Edom.

The sword of the Lord is full of blood, it is fat with the best of the meat, with the blood of lambs and goats, with the best parts of the sheep: for the Lord has a feast in Bozrah, and much cattle will be put to death in the land of Edom.

7 And the wild oxen will fall with them, the young bulls with the strong ones. Their land will be drenched with blood, and their soil will be soaked with fat.

And the strong oxen will go down to death together with the smaller cattle.

8 For the LORD has a day of vengeance, a year of recompense for the cause of Zion.

For it is the day of the Lord's punishment, when he gives payment for the wrongs done to Zion.

9 Edom’s streams will be turned to tar, and her soil to sulfur; her land will become a blazing pitch.

And its streams will be turned into boiling oil, and its dust into burning stone, and all the land will be on fire.

10 It will not be quenched—day or night. Its smoke will ascend forever. From generation to generation it will lie desolate; no one will ever again pass through it.

It will not be put out day or night; its smoke will go up for ever: it will be waste from generation to generation; no one will go through it for ever.

11 The desert owl and screech owl will possess it, and the great owl and raven will dwell in it. The LORD will stretch out over Edom a measuring line of chaos and a plumb line of destruction.

But the birds of the waste land will have their place there; it will be a heritage for the bittern and the raven: and it will be measured out with line and weight as a waste land.

12 No nobles will be left to proclaim a king, and all her princes will come to nothing.

The jackals will be there, and her great ones will be gone; they will say, There is no longer a kingdom there, and all her chiefs will have come to an end.

13 Her towers will be overgrown with thorns, her fortresses with thistles and briers. She will become a haunt for jackals, an abode for ostriches.

And thorns will come up in her fair houses, and waste plants in her strong towers: and foxes will make their holes there, and it will be a meeting-place for ostriches.

14 The desert creatures will meet with hyenas, and one wild goat will call to another. There the night creature will settle and find her place of repose.

And the beasts of the waste places will come together with the jackals, and the evil spirits will be crying to one another, even the night-spirit will come and make her resting-place there.

15 There the owl will make her nest; she will lay and hatch her eggs and gather her brood under her shadow. Even there the birds of prey will gather, each with its mate.

The arrowsnake will make her hole and put her eggs there, and get her young together under her shade: there the hawks will come together by twos.

16 Search and read the scroll of the LORD: Not one of these will go missing, not one will lack her mate, because He has ordered it by His mouth, and He will gather them by His Spirit.

See what is recorded in the book of the Lord: all these will be there, not one without the other: the mouth of the Lord has given the order, and his spirit has made them come together.

17 He has allotted their portion; His hand has distributed it by measure. They will possess it forever; they will dwell in it from generation to generation.

And he has given them their heritage, and by his hand it has been measured out to them: it will be theirs for ever, their resting-place from generation to generation.