Proclamation Against Jerusalem
1 The burden against the Valley of Vision.
What ails you now, that you have all gone up to the housetops,
2 You who are full of noise,
# A tumultuous city,a joyous city?
Your slainmenarenot slain with the sword,
Nor dead in battle.
3 All your rulers have fled together;
They are captured by the archers.
All who are found in you are bound together;
They have fled from afar.
4 Therefore I said, “Look away from me,
# I will weep bitterly;
Do not labor to comfort me
Because of the plundering of the daughter of my people.”
5 Foritisa day of trouble and treading down and perplexity
# By the LordGodof hosts
In the Valley of Vision—
Breaking down the walls
And of crying to the mountain.
6 Elam bore the quiver
With chariots of menandhorsemen,
# AndKir uncovered the shield.
7 It shall come to passthatyour choicest valleys
Shall be full of chariots,
And the horsemen shall set themselves in array at the gate.
8 He removed the protection of Judah.
# You looked in that day to the armorof the House of the Forest;
9 You also saw the damage to the city of David,
That it was great;
And you gathered together the waters of the lower pool.
10 You numbered the houses of Jerusalem,
And the houses you broke down
To fortify the wall.
11 You also made a reservoir between the two walls
# For the water of the oldpool.
But you did not look to its Maker,
Nor did you have respect for Him who fashioned it long ago.
12 And in that day the LordGodof hosts
# Called for weeping and for mourning,
# For baldness and for girding with sackcloth.
13 But instead, joy and gladness,
Slaying oxen and killing sheep,
# Eating meat anddrinking wine:
# “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die!”
14 Then it was revealed in my hearing by theLordof hosts,
# “Surely for this iniquity therewill be no atonement for you,
Even to your death,” says the LordGodof hosts.
The Judgment on Shebna
15 Thus says the LordGodof hosts:
“Go, proceed to this steward,
# ToShebna, whoisover the house,andsay:
16 ‘What have you here, and whom have you here,
That you have hewn a sepulcher here,
# Ashewho hews himself a sepulcher on high,
Who carves a tomb for himself in a rock?
17 Indeed, theLordwill throw you away violently,
O mighty man,
# And will surely seize you.
18 He will surely turn violently and toss you like a ball
Into a large country;
# There you shall die, and thereyour glorious chariots
Shallbethe shame of your master’s house.
19 So I will drive you out of your office,
And from your position he will pull you down.
20 ‘Then it shall be in that day,
# That I will call My servantEliakim the son of Hilkiah;
21 I will clothe him with your robe
And strengthen him with your belt;
I will commit your responsibility into his hand.
He shall be a father to the inhabitants of Jerusalem
And to the house of Judah.
22 The key of the house of David
# I will lay on hisshoulder;
# So he shallopen, and no one shall shut;
And he shall shut, and no one shall open.
23 I will fasten himasa peg in a secure place,
And he will become a glorious throne to his father’s house.
24 ‘They will hang on him all the glory of his father’s house, the offspring and the posterity, all vessels of small quantity, from the cups to all the pitchers.
25 In that day,’ says theLordof hosts, ‘the peg that is fastened in the secure place will be removed and be cut down and fall, and the burden thatwason it will be cut off; for theLordhas spoken.’ ”