The Arvadites ¹  joined your army on your walls all around, and the Gammadites ²  were in your towers. They hung their quivers ³  on your walls all around; they perfected your beauty.

I placed you there with an anointed ¹  guardian ²  cherub; ³  you were on the holy mountain of God; you walked about amidst fiery stones.

“‘No longer will Israel suffer from the sharp briers ¹  or painful thorns of all who surround and scorn them. ²  Then they will know that I am the sovereign Lord.

Then all those living in Egypt will know that I am the Lord because they were a reed staff ¹  for the house of Israel;

The land of Egypt will become a desolate ruin. Then they will know that I am the Lord. Because he said, “The Nile is mine and I made it,”

I will restore the fortunes of Egypt, and will bring them back ¹  to the land of Pathros, to the land of their origin; there they will be an insignificant kingdom.

It will be the most insignificant of the kingdoms; it will never again exalt itself over the nations. I will make them so small that they will not rule over the nations.

It will never again be Israel’s source of confidence, but a reminder of how they sinned by turning to Egypt for help. ¹  Then they will know that I am the sovereign Lord.’”

A sword will come against Egypt and panic will overtake Ethiopia when the slain fall in Egypt and they carry away her wealth and dismantle her foundations.

On that day messengers will go out from me in ships to frighten overly confident Ethiopia; panic will overtake them on the day of Egypt’s doom; ¹  for beware – it is coming!

Consider Assyria, ¹  a cedar in Lebanon, ²  with beautiful branches, like a forest giving shade, and extremely tall; its top reached into the clouds.

Their ¹  graves are located in the remote slopes of the pit. ²  Her assembly is around her grave, all of them struck down by the sword, those who spread terror in the land of the living.

but there is one who hears the sound of the trumpet yet does not heed the warning. Then the sword comes and sweeps him away. He will be responsible for his own death. ¹ 

He heard the sound of the trumpet but did not heed the warning, so he is responsible for himself. ¹  If he had heeded the warning, he would have saved his life.

In the twelfth year of our exile, in the tenth month, on the fifth of the month, ¹  a refugee came to me from Jerusalem ²  saying, “The city has been defeated!” ³ 

I will set one shepherd over them, and he will feed them – namely, my servant David. ¹  He will feed them and will be their shepherd.

They will no longer be prey for the nations and the wild beasts will not devour them. They will live securely and no one will make them afraid.

I will prepare for them a healthy ¹  planting. They will no longer be victims ²  of famine in the land and will no longer bear the insults of the nations.

“‘You have shown unrelenting hostility and poured the people of Israel onto the blades of a sword ¹  at the time of their calamity, at the time of their final punishment.

This is what the sovereign Lord says: The enemy has spoken against you, saying “Aha!” and, “The ancient heights ¹  have become our property!”’