No human foot will pass through it, and no animal’s foot will pass through it; it will be uninhabited for forty years.

I will turn my face away from them and they will desecrate my treasured place. Vandals will enter it and desecrate it.

Say, ‘This is what the sovereign Lord says: “‘Look, I am against you, Sidon, and I will magnify myself in your midst. Then they will know that I am the Lord when I execute judgments on her and reveal my sovereign power in her.

“And you, son of man, say to your people, ‘The righteousness of the righteous will not deliver him if he rebels. As for the wicked, his wickedness will not make him stumble if he turns from it. The righteous will not be able to live by his righteousness if he sins.’

Consider! It is planted, but will it prosper? Will it not wither completely when the east wind blows on it? Will it not wither in the soil where it sprouted?’”

A fire has gone out from its branch; it has consumed its shoot and its fruit. No strong branch was left in it, nor a scepter to rule.’ This is a lament song, and has become a lament song.”

They exposed her nakedness, seized her sons and daughters, and killed her with the sword. She became notorious among women, and they executed judgments against her.

I will send a plague into the city and bloodshed into its streets; the slain will fall within it, by the sword that attacks it from every side. Then they will know that I am the Lord.

I have given him the land of Egypt as his compensation for attacking Tyre, because they did it for me, declares the sovereign Lord.

“‘This is what the Lord says: Egypt’s supporters will fall; her confident pride will crumble. From Migdol to Syene they will die by the sword within her, declares the sovereign Lord.

In Tahpanhes the day will be dark when I break the yoke of Egypt there. Her confident pride will cease within her; a cloud will cover her, and her daughters will go into captivity.

When I turn the land of Egypt into desolation and the land is destitute of everything that fills it, when I strike all those who live in it, then they will know that I am the Lord.’

Then say to the people of the land, ‘This is what the sovereign Lord says about the inhabitants of Jerusalem and of the land of Israel: They will eat their bread with anxiety and drink their water in fright, for their land will be stripped bare of all it contains because of the violence of all who live in it.

“Son of man, suppose a country sins against me by being unfaithful, and I stretch out my hand against it, cut off its bread supply, cause famine to come on it, and kill both people and animals.

Yet some survivors will be left in it, sons and daughters who will be brought out. They will come out to you, and when you see their behavior and their deeds, you will be consoled about the catastrophe I have brought on Jerusalem – for everything I brought on it.

They will console you when you see their behavior and their deeds, because you will know that it was not without reason that I have done everything which I have done in it, declares the sovereign Lord.”

The sound of a carefree crowd accompanied her, including all kinds of men; even Sabeans were brought from the desert. The sisters put bracelets on their wrists and beautiful crowns on their heads.

“‘Therefore this is what the sovereign Lord says: Woe to the city of bloodshed, the pot whose rot is in it, whose rot has not been removed from it! Empty it piece by piece. No lot has fallen on it.

They will live in the land I gave to my servant Jacob, in which your fathers lived; they will live in it – they and their children and their grandchildren forever. David my servant will be prince over them forever.

Therefore speak to them and say to them, ‘This is what the sovereign Lord says: When any one from the house of Israel erects his idols in his heart and sets the obstacle leading to his iniquity before his face, and then consults a prophet, I the Lord am determined to answer him personally according to the enormity of his idolatry.