I will bring terror on you from every side,” says the Lord God who rules over all. “You will be scattered in every direction. No one will gather the fugitives back together.

Turn and flee! Take up refuge in remote places, you people who live in Dedan. For I will bring disaster on the descendants of Esau. I have decided it is time for me to punish them.

Look! Like an eagle with outspread wings, a nation will soar up and swoop down on Bozrah. At that time the soldiers of Edom will be as fearful as a woman in labor.”

Their tents and their flocks will be taken away. Their tent curtains, equipment, and camels will be carried off. People will shout to them, ‘Terror is all around you!’”

“Take up your battle positions all around Babylon, all you soldiers who are armed with bows. Shoot all your arrows at her! Do not hold any back! For she has sinned against the Lord.

The Lord says, “I will cause a destructive wind to blow against Babylon and the people who inhabit Babylonia.

I will send people to winnow Babylonia like a wind blowing away chaff. They will winnow her and strip her land bare. This will happen when they come against her from every direction, when it is time to destroy her.

Babylonia had been a gold cup in the Lord’s hand. She had made the whole world drunk. The nations had drunk from the wine of her wrath. So they have all gone mad.

Prepare the nations to do battle against her. Prepare the kings of the Medes. Prepare their governors and all their leaders. Prepare all the countries they rule to do battle against her.

The earth will tremble and writhe in agony. For the Lord will carry out his plan. He plans to make the land of Babylonia a wasteland where no one lives.

The person who lives in Zion says, “May Babylon pay for the violence done to me and to my relatives.” Jerusalem says, “May those living in Babylonia pay for the bloodshed of my people.”

I will punish the god Bel in Babylon. I will make him spit out what he has swallowed. The nations will not come streaming to him any longer. Indeed, the walls of Babylon will fall.”

Do not lose your courage or become afraid because of the reports that are heard in the land. For a report will come in one year. Another report will follow it in the next. There will be violence in the land with ruler fighting against ruler.”

“So the time will certainly come when I will punish the idols of Babylon. Her whole land will be put to shame. All her mortally wounded will collapse in her midst.

Then heaven and earth and all that is in them will sing for joy over Babylon. For destroyers from the north will attack it,” says the Lord.

You who have escaped the sword, go, do not delay. Remember the Lord in a faraway land. Think about Jerusalem.

‘We are ashamed because we have been insulted. Our faces show our disgrace. For foreigners have invaded the holy rooms in the Lord’s temple.’

Yes, but the time will certainly come,” says the Lord, “when I will punish her idols. Throughout her land the mortally wounded will groan.

When you finish reading this scroll aloud, tie a stone to it and throw it into the middle of the Euphrates River.

Then say, ‘In the same way Babylon will sink and never rise again because of the judgments I am ready to bring upon her; they will grow faint.’” The prophecies of Jeremiah end here.