Isaiah 17

1 A message about Damascus. Look, Damascus will cease to exist as city. Instead it will become a pile of ruins.

The word about Damascus. See, they have made Damascus a town no longer; it has become a waste place.

2 The towns of Aroer will be abandoned. Flocks will live in the streets and rest there, because there won't be anyone to chase them away.

Her towns are unpeopled for ever; there the flocks take their rest in peace, without fear.

3 The fortified city will disappear from Ephraim, Damascus will no longer be a kingdom, and those that are left of the Arameans will be like the lost glory of Israel, declares the Lord Almighty.

The strong tower has gone from Ephraim, and the kingdom from Damascus: the rest of Aram will come to destruction, and be made like the glory of the children of Israel, says the Lord of armies.

4 At that time the glory of Jacob will fade away; he will lose his strength.

And it will be in that day that the glory of Jacob will be made small, and the strength of his body will become feeble.

5 It will look as empty as fields after reapers have harvested the grain, gathering up the grain in their arms. It will be like when people pick the heads of grain in the Valley of Rephaim.

And it will be like a man cutting the growth of his grain, pulling together the heads of the grain with his arm; even as when they get in the grain in the valley of Rephaim.

6 Yet there will be some left behind, like an olive tree that has been shaken—two or three ripe olives are left at the top of the tree, four or five on its lower branches, declares the Lord, the God of Israel.

But it will be like a man shaking an olive-tree, something will still be there, two or three berries on the top of the highest branch, four or five on the outside branches of a fertile tree, says the Lord, the God of Israel.

7 At that time people will pay attention to their Creator and look to the Holy One of Israel.

In that day a man's heart will be turned to his Maker, and his eyes to the Holy One of Israel.

8 They won't believe in the altars they built and the idols they made; they will not look to the Asherah poles or the altars of incense.

He will not be looking to the altars, the work of his hands, or to the wood pillars or to the sun-images which his fingers have made.

9 At that time their fortified cities will be like places left to be taken over by bushes and trees, just as they were previously abandoned when the Israelites invaded. The country will become completely desolate.

In that day your towns will be like the waste places of the Hivites and the Amorites which the children of Israel took for a heritage, and they will come to destruction.

10 You have forgotten the God who saves you; you have not remembered the Rock who protects you. So, even though you plant beautiful plants and grow exotic vines,

For you have not given honour to the God of your salvation, and have not kept in mind the Rock of your strength; for this cause you made a garden of Adonis, and put in it the vine-cuttings of a strange god;

11 even though you make them grow on the day that you plant them, and have them blossom in the morning that you sow them, your harvest will heap of trouble on a day of grief and pain that cannot be cured.

In the day of your planting you were watching its growth, and in the morning your seed was flowering: but its fruit is wasted away in the day of grief and bitter sorrow.

12 Disaster is coming to the many nations that growl, growling like the raging sea! Disaster is coming to the peoples who roar, roaring like thundering waters!

Ah! the voice of peoples, like the loud sounding of the seas, and the thundering of great nations rushing on like the bursting out of waters!

13 The nations roar like the roaring of crashing waves. But he confronts them, and they run far away, blown by the wind like chaff on the mountains, like tumbleweeds driven by a storm.

But he will put a stop to them, and make them go in flight far away, driving them like the waste of the grain on the tops of the mountains before the wind, and like the circling dust before the storm.

14 Sudden terror comes in the evening! By morning, they're gone! This is what happens to those who loot us, the fate of those who plunder us.

In the evening there is fear, and in the morning they are gone. This is the fate of those who take our goods, and the reward of those who violently take our property for themselves.