Isaiah 13:19-22

13:19 Babylon, the most admired ¹  of kingdoms,

the Chaldeans’ source of honor and pride, ² 

will be destroyed by God

just as Sodom and Gomorrah were. ³ 

13:20 No one will live there again;

no one will ever reside there again. ⁴ 

No bedouin ⁵  will camp ⁶  there,

no shepherds will rest their flocks ⁷  there.

13:21 Wild animals will rest there,

the ruined ⁸  houses will be full of hyenas. ⁹ 

Ostriches will live there,

wild goats will skip among the ruins. ¹⁰ 

13:22 Wild dogs will yip in her ruined fortresses,

jackals will yelp in the once-splendid palaces. ¹¹ 

Her time is almost up, ¹² 

her days will not be prolonged. ¹³ 

Isaiah 64:10

64:10 Your chosen ¹⁴  cities have become a desert;

Zion has become a desert,

Jerusalem ¹⁵  is a desolate ruin.

Ezekiel 6:14

6:14 I will stretch out my hand against them ¹⁶  and make the land a desolate waste from the wilderness to Riblah, ¹⁷  in all the places where they live. Then they will know that I am the Lord!”

Joel 2:3

2:3 Like fire they devour everything in their path; ¹⁸ 

a flame blazes behind them.

The land looks like the Garden of Eden ¹⁹  before them,

but behind them there is only a desolate wilderness –

for nothing escapes them! ²⁰ 

Zephaniah 2:13-14

2:13 The Lord ²¹  will attack the north ²² 

and destroy Assyria.

He will make Nineveh a heap of ruins;

it will be as barren ²³  as the desert.

2:14 Flocks and herds ²⁴  will lie down in the middle of it,

as well as every kind of wild animal. ²⁵ 

Owls ²⁶  will sleep in the tops of its support pillars;

they will hoot through the windows. ²⁷ 

Rubble will cover the thresholds; ²⁸ 

even the cedar work ²⁹  will be exposed to the elements. ³⁰ 

[13:19]  ¹ tn Or “most beautiful” (NCV, TEV).

[13:19]  ² tn Heb “the beauty of the pride of the Chaldeans.”

[13:19]  ³ tn Heb “and Babylon…will be like the overthrow by God of Sodom and Gomorrah.” On מַהְפֵּכַת (mahpekhat, “overthrow”) see the note on the word “destruction” in 1:7.

[13:20]  ⁴ tn Heb “she will not be inhabited forever, and she will not be dwelt in to generation and generation (i.e., forever).” The Lord declares that Babylon, personified as a woman, will not be inhabited. In other words, her people will be destroyed and the Chaldean empire will come to a permanent end.

[13:20]  ⁵ tn Or “Arab” (NAB, NASB, NIV); cf. CEV, NLT “nomads.”

[13:20]  ⁶ tn יַהֵל (yahel) is probably a corrupted form of יֶאֱהַל (ye’ehal). See GKC 186 §68.k.

[13:20]  ⁷ tn The words “their flocks” are supplied in the translation for clarification. The Hebrew text does not supply the object here, but see Jer 33:12.

[13:21]  ⁸ tn The word “ruined” is supplied in the translation for clarification.

[13:21]  ⁹ tn The precise referent of this word in uncertain. See HALOT 29 s.v. *אֹחַ. Various English versions translate as “owls” (e.g., NAB, NASB), “wild dogs” (NCV); “jackals” (NIV); “howling creatures” (NRSV, NLT).

[13:21]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “will skip there.”

[13:22]  ¹¹ tc The Hebrew text reads literally, “wild dogs will yip among his widows, and jackals in the palaces of pleasure.” The verb “yip” is supplied in the second line; it does double duty in the parallel structure. “His widows” makes little sense in this context; many emend the form (אַלְמנוֹתָיו, ’almnotayv) to the graphically similar אַרְמְנוֹתֶיהָ (’armÿnoteha, “her fortresses”), a reading that is assumed in the present translation. The use of “widows” may represent an intentional wordplay on “fortresses,” indicating that the fortresses are like dejected widows (J. N. Oswalt, Isaiah [NICOT], 1:308, n. 1).

[13:22]  ¹² tn Heb “near to come is her time.”

[13:22]  ¹³ sn When was the prophecy of Babylon’s fall fulfilled? Some argue that the prophecy was fulfilled in 689 b.c. when the Assyrians under Sennacherib sacked and desecrated the city (this event is alluded to in 23:13). This may have been an initial phase in the fulfillment of the prophecy, but the reference to the involvement of the Medes (v. 17) and the suggestion that Babylon’s demise will bring about the restoration of Israel (14:1-2) indicate that the fall of Babylon to the Medes and Persians in 538 b.c. is the primary focus of the prophecy. (After all, the Lord did reveal to Isaiah that the Chaldeans [not the Assyrians] would someday conquer Jerusalem and take the people into exile [see 39:5-7].) However, the vivid picture of destruction in vv. 15-22 raises a problem. The Medes and Persians did not destroy the city; in fact Cyrus’ takeover of Babylon, though preceded by a military campaign, was relatively peaceful and even welcomed by some Babylonian religious officials. How then does one explain the prophecy’s description of the city’s violent fall? As noted above, the events of 689 b.c. and 538 b.c. may have been merged in the prophecy. However, it is more likely that the language is stylized and exaggerated for rhetorical effect. See Isa 34:11-15; Jer 50:39-40 (describing Babylon’s fall in 538 b.c.); 51:36-37 (describing Babylon’s fall in 538 b.c.); Zeph 2:13-15; the extra-biblical Sefire treaty curses; and Ashurbanipal’s description of the destruction of Elam in his royal annals. In other words, the events of 538 b.c. essentially, though not necessarily literally, fulfill the prophecy.

[64:10]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “holy” (so KJV, NASB, NRSV, NLT); NIV “sacred.”

[64:10]  ¹⁵ map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[6:14]  ¹⁶ sn I will stretch out my hand against them is a common expression in the book of Ezekiel (14:9, 13; 16:27; 25:7; 35:3).

[6:14]  ¹⁷ tc The Vulgate reads the name as “Riblah,” a city north of Damascus. The MT reads Diblah, a city otherwise unknown. The letters resh (ר) and dalet (ד) may have been confused in the Hebrew text. The town of Riblah was in the land of Hamath (2 Kgs 23:33) which represented the northern border of Israel (Ezek 47:14).

[2:3]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “a fire devours before it.”

[2:3]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “like the garden of Eden, the land is before them.”

[2:3]  ²⁰ tn Heb “and surely a survivor there is not for it.” The antecedent of the pronoun “it” is apparently עַם (’am, “people”) of v. 2, which seems to be a figurative way of referring to the locusts. K&D 26:191-92 thought that the antecedent of this pronoun was “land,” but the masculine gender of the pronoun does not support this.

[2:13]  ²¹ tn Heb “He”; the referent (the Lord) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[2:13]  ²² tn Heb “he will stretch out his hand against the north.”

[2:13]  ²³ tn Or “dry.”

[2:14]  ²⁴ tn Heb “flocks.” The Hebrew word can refer to both flocks of sheep and herds of cattle.

[2:14]  ²⁵ tn Heb “[and] all the wild animals of a nation.” How גוֹי (goy, “nation”) relates to what precedes is unclear. It may be a corruption of another word. See J. J. M. Roberts, Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah (OTL), 193.

[2:14]  ²⁶ tn The Hebrew text reads here גַּם־קָאַת גַּם־קִפֹּד (gam-qa’at gam-qippod). The term קָאַת refers to some type of bird (see Lev 11:18; Deut 14:17) that was typically found near ruins (Isa 34:11); one of the most common translations is “owl” (cf. NEB “horned owl”; NIV, NRSV “desert owl”; contra NASB “pelican”). The term קִפֹּד may also refer to a type of bird (cf. NEB “ruffed bustard”; NIV, NRSV “screech owl”). Some suggest a rodent may be in view (cf. NASB “hedgehog”); this is not unreasonable, for a rodent or some other small animal would be able to sleep in the tops of pillars which would be lying in the ruins of the fallen buildings.

[2:14]  ²⁷ tn Heb “a sound will sing in the window.” If some type of owl is in view, “hoot” is a more appropriate translation (cf. NEB, NRSV).

[2:14]  ²⁸ tn Heb “rubble [will be] on the threshold.” “Rubble” translates the Hebrew word חֹרֶב (khorev, “desolation”). Some emend to עֹרֵב (’orev, “raven”) following the LXX and Vulgate; Adele Berlin translates, “A voice shall shriek from the window – a raven at the sill” (Zephaniah [AB 25A], 104).

[2:14]  ²⁹ tn The meaning of the Hebrew word translated “cedar work” (so NASB, NRSV) is unclear; NIV has “the beams of cedar.”

[2:14]  ³⁰ tn Heb “one will expose.” The subject is probably indefinite, though one could translate, “for he [i.e., God] will lay bare.”