I hear my dear people crying out throughout the length and breadth of the land. They are crying, ‘Is the Lord no longer in Zion? Is her divine King no longer there?’” The Lord answers, “Why then do they provoke me to anger with their images, with their worthless foreign idols?”

They offer only superficial help for the harm my people have suffered. They say, ‘Everything will be all right!’ But everything is not all right!

Because you did that, I, the Lord, affirm that a time is coming when I will make Rabbah, the capital city of Ammon, hear the sound of the battle cry. It will become a mound covered with ruins. Its villages will be burned to the ground. Then Israel will take back its land from those who took their land from them. I, the Lord, affirm it!

You who live in Aroer, stand by the road and watch. Question the man who is fleeing and the woman who is escaping. Ask them, ‘What has happened?’

Wail, you people in Heshbon, because Ai in Ammon is destroyed. Cry out in anguish, you people in the villages surrounding Rabbah. Put on sackcloth and cry out in mourning. Run about covered with gashes. For your god Milcom will go into exile along with his priests and officials.

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.”