Chronological Plan

¹Woe to the land shadowed with buzzing wings, Which is beyond the rivers of Ethiopia,

²Which sends ambassadors by sea, Even in vessels of reed on the waters, saying, “Go, swift messengers, to a nation tall and smooth of skin, To a people terrible from their beginning onward, A nation powerful and treading down, Whose land the rivers divide.”

³All inhabitants of the world and dwellers on the earth: When he lifts up a banner on the mountains, you see it; And when he blows a trumpet, you hear it.

⁴For so the LORD said to me, “I will take My rest, And I will look from My dwelling place Like clear heat in sunshine, Like a cloud of dew in the heat of harvest.”

⁵For before the harvest, when the bud is perfect And the sour grape is ripening in the flower, He will both cut off the sprigs with pruning hooks And take away and cut down the branches.

⁶They will be left together for the mountain birds of prey And for the beasts of the earth; The birds of prey will summer on them, And all the beasts of the earth will winter on them.

⁷In that time a present will be brought to the LORD of hosts From a people tall and smooth of skin, And from a people terrible from their beginning onward, A nation powerful and treading down, Whose land the rivers divide— To the place of the name of the LORD of hosts, To Mount Zion.

¹The burden against Egypt. Behold, the LORD rides on a swift cloud, And will come into Egypt; The idols of Egypt will totter at His presence, And the heart of Egypt will melt in its midst.

²“I will set Egyptians against Egyptians; Everyone will fight against his brother, And everyone against his neighbor, City against city, kingdom against kingdom.

³The spirit of Egypt will fail in its midst; I will destroy their counsel, And they will consult the idols and the charmers, The mediums and the sorcerers.

⁴And the Egyptians I will give Into the hand of a cruel master, And a fierce king will rule over them,” Says the Lord, the LORD of hosts.

⁵The waters will fail from the sea, And the river will be wasted and dried up.

⁶The rivers will turn foul; The brooks of defense will be emptied and dried up; The reeds and rushes will wither.

⁷The papyrus reeds by the River, by the mouth of the River, And everything sown by the River, Will wither, be driven away, and be no more.

⁸The fishermen also will mourn; All those will lament who cast hooks into the River, And they will languish who spread nets on the waters.

⁹Moreover those who work in fine flax And those who weave fine fabric will be ashamed;

¹⁰And its foundations will be broken. All who make wages will be troubled of soul.

¹¹Surely the princes of Zoan are fools; Pharaoh’s wise counselors give foolish counsel. How do you say to Pharaoh, “I am the son of the wise, The son of ancient kings?”

¹²Where are they? Where are your wise men? Let them tell you now, And let them know what the LORD of hosts has purposed against Egypt.

¹³The princes of Zoan have become fools; The princes of Noph are deceived; They have also deluded Egypt, Those who are the mainstay of its tribes.

¹⁴The LORD has mingled a perverse spirit in her midst; And they have caused Egypt to err in all her work, As a drunken man staggers in his vomit.

¹⁵Neither will there be any work for Egypt, Which the head or tail, Palm branch or bulrush, may do.

¹⁶In that day Egypt will be like women, and will be afraid and fear because of the waving of the hand of the LORD of hosts, which He waves over it.

¹⁷And the land of Judah will be a terror to Egypt; everyone who makes mention of it will be afraid in himself, because of the counsel of the LORD of hosts which He has determined against it.

¹⁸In that day five cities in the land of Egypt will speak the language of Canaan and swear by the LORD of hosts; one will be called the City of Destruction.

¹⁹In that day there will be an altar to the LORD in the midst of the land of Egypt, and a pillar to the LORD at its border.

²⁰And it will be for a sign and for a witness to the LORD of hosts in the land of Egypt; for they will cry to the LORD because of the oppressors, and He will send them a Savior and a Mighty One, and He will deliver them.

²¹Then the LORD will be known to Egypt, and the Egyptians will know the LORD in that day, and will make sacrifice and offering; yes, they will make a vow to the LORD and perform it.

²²And the LORD will strike Egypt, He will strike and heal it; they will return to the LORD, and He will be entreated by them and heal them.

²³In that day there will be a highway from Egypt to Assyria, and the Assyrian will come into Egypt and the Egyptian into Assyria, and the Egyptians will serve with the Assyrians.

²⁴In that day Israel will be one of three with Egypt and Assyria—a blessing in the midst of the land,

²⁵whom the LORD of hosts shall bless, saying, “Blessed is Egypt My people, and Assyria the work of My hands, and Israel My inheritance.”

¹In the year that Tartan came to Ashdod, when Sargon the king of Assyria sent him, and he fought against Ashdod and took it,

²at the same time the LORD spoke by Isaiah the son of Amoz, saying, “Go, and remove the sackcloth from your body, and take your sandals off your feet.” And he did so, walking naked and barefoot.

³Then the LORD said, “Just as My servant Isaiah has walked naked and barefoot three years for a sign and a wonder against Egypt and Ethiopia,

⁴so shall the king of Assyria lead away the Egyptians as prisoners and the Ethiopians as captives, young and old, naked and barefoot, with their buttocks uncovered, to the shame of Egypt.

⁵Then they shall be afraid and ashamed of Ethiopia their expectation and Egypt their glory.

⁶And the inhabitant of this territory will say in that day, ‘Surely such is our expectation, wherever we flee for help to be delivered from the king of Assyria; and how shall we escape?’ ”

¹The burden against the Wilderness of the Sea. As whirlwinds in the South pass through, So it comes from the desert, from a terrible land.

²A distressing vision is declared to me; The treacherous dealer deals treacherously, And the plunderer plunders. Go up, O Elam! Besiege, O Media! All its sighing I have made to cease.

³Therefore my loins are filled with pain; Pangs have taken hold of me, like the pangs of a woman in labor. I was distressed when I heard it; I was dismayed when I saw it.

⁴My heart wavered, fearfulness frightened me; The night for which I longed He turned into fear for me.

⁵Prepare the table, Set a watchman in the tower, Eat and drink. Arise, you princes, Anoint the shield!

⁶For thus has the Lord said to me: “Go, set a watchman, Let him declare what he sees.”

⁷And he saw a chariot with a pair of horsemen, A chariot of donkeys, and a chariot of camels, And he listened earnestly with great care.

⁸Then he cried, “A lion, my Lord! I stand continually on the watchtower in the daytime; I have sat at my post every night.

⁹And look, here comes a chariot of men with a pair of horsemen!” Then he answered and said, “Babylon is fallen, is fallen! And all the carved images of her gods He has broken to the ground.”

¹⁰Oh, my threshing and the grain of my floor! That which I have heard from the LORD of hosts, The God of Israel, I have declared to you.

¹¹The burden against Dumah. He calls to me out of Seir, “Watchman, what of the night? Watchman, what of the night?”

¹²The watchman said, “The morning comes, and also the night. If you will inquire, inquire; Return! Come back!”

¹³The burden against Arabia. In the forest in Arabia you will lodge, O you traveling companies of Dedanites.

¹⁴O inhabitants of the land of Tema, Bring water to him who is thirsty; With their bread they met him who fled.

¹⁵For they fled from the swords, from the drawn sword, From the bent bow, and from the distress of war.

¹⁶For thus the LORD has said to me: “Within a year, according to the year of a hired man, all the glory of Kedar will fail;

¹⁷and the remainder of the number of archers, the mighty men of the people of Kedar, will be diminished; for the LORD God of Israel has spoken it.”

¹The burden against the Valley of Vision. What ails you now, that you have all gone up to the housetops,

²You who are full of noise, A tumultuous city, a joyous city? Your slain men are not slain with the sword, Nor dead in battle.

³All 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.

⁴Therefore 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.”

⁵For it is a day of trouble and treading down and perplexity By the Lord GOD of hosts In the Valley of Vision— Breaking down the walls And of crying to the mountain.

⁶Elam bore the quiver With chariots of men and horsemen, And Kir uncovered the shield.

⁷It shall come to pass that your choicest valleys Shall be full of chariots, And the horsemen shall set themselves in array at the gate.

⁸He removed the protection of Judah. You looked in that day to the armor of the House of the Forest;

⁹You also saw the damage to the city of David, That it was great; And you gathered together the waters of the lower pool.

¹⁰You numbered the houses of Jerusalem, And the houses you broke down To fortify the wall.

¹¹You also made a reservoir between the two walls For the water of the old pool. But you did not look to its Maker, Nor did you have respect for Him who fashioned it long ago.

¹²And in that day the Lord GOD of hosts Called for weeping and for mourning, For baldness and for girding with sackcloth.

¹³But instead, joy and gladness, Slaying oxen and killing sheep, Eating meat and drinking wine: “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die!”

¹⁴Then it was revealed in my hearing by the LORD of hosts, “Surely for this iniquity there will be no atonement for you, Even to your death,” says the Lord GOD of hosts.

¹⁵Thus says the Lord GOD of hosts: “Go, proceed to this steward, To Shebna, who is over the house, and say:

¹⁶‘What have you here, and whom have you here, That you have hewn a sepulcher here, As he who hews himself a sepulcher on high, Who carves a tomb for himself in a rock?

¹⁷Indeed, the LORD will throw you away violently, O mighty man, And will surely seize you.

¹⁸He will surely turn violently and toss you like a ball Into a large country; There you shall die, and there your glorious chariots Shall be the shame of your master’s house.

¹⁹So 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 servant Eliakim the son of Hilkiah;

²¹I 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.

²²The key of the house of David I will lay on his shoulder; So he shall open, and no one shall shut; And he shall shut, and no one shall open.

²³I will fasten him as a 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.

²⁵In that day,’ says the LORD of hosts, ‘the peg that is fastened in the secure place will be removed and be cut down and fall, and the burden that was on it will be cut off; for the LORD has spoken.’ ”