Isaiah 14:12-16

New International Version - UK

¹² How you have fallen from heaven,
    morning star, son of the dawn!
You have been cast down to the earth,
    you who once laid low the nations!
¹³ You said in your heart,
    ‘I will ascend to the heavens;
I will raise my throne
    above the stars of God;
I will sit enthroned on the mount of assembly,
    on the utmost heights of Mount Zaphon.^[a]
14 I will ascend above the tops of the clouds;
    I will make myself like the Most High.’
¹⁵ But you are brought down to the realm of the dead,
    to the depths of the pit.

¹⁶ Those who see you stare at you,
    they ponder your fate:
‘Is this the man who shook the earth
    and made kingdoms tremble,
¹⁷ the man who made the world a wilderness,
    who overthrew its cities
    and would not let his captives go home?’

¹⁸ All the kings of the nations lie in state,
    each in his own tomb.
¹⁹ But you are cast out of your tomb
    like a rejected branch;
you are covered with the slain,
    with those pierced by the sword,
    those who descend to the stones of the pit.
Like a corpse trampled underfoot,
²⁰     you will not join them in burial,
for you have destroyed your land
    and killed your people.

Let the offspring of the wicked
    never be mentioned again.
²¹ Prepare a place to slaughter his children
    for the sins of their ancestors;
they are not to rise to inherit the land
    and cover the earth with their cities.

²² ‘I will rise up against them,’
    declares the Lord Almighty.
‘I will wipe out Babylon’s name and survivors,
    her offspring and descendants,’
declares the Lord.
²³ ‘I will turn her into a place for owls
    and into swampland;
I will sweep her with the broom of destruction,’
    declares the Lord Almighty.

‘Surely, as I have planned, so it will be,
    and as I have purposed, so it will happen.
²⁵ I will crush the Assyrian in my land;
    on my mountains I will trample him down.
His yoke will be taken from my people,
    and his burden removed from their shoulders.’

²⁶ This is the plan determined for the whole world;
    this is the hand stretched out over all nations.
²⁷ For the Lord Almighty has purposed, and who can thwart him?
    His hand is stretched out, and who can turn it back?

²⁹ Do not rejoice, all you Philistines,
    that the rod that struck you is broken;
from the root of that snake will spring up a viper,
    its fruit will be a darting, venomous serpent.
³⁰ The poorest of the poor will find pasture,
    and the needy will lie down in safety.
But your root I will destroy by famine;
    it will slay your survivors.

³¹ Wail, you gate! Howl, you city!
    Melt away, all you Philistines!
A cloud of smoke comes from the north,
    and there is not a straggler in its ranks.
³² What answer shall be given
    to the envoys of that nation?
‘The Lord has established Zion,
    and in her his afflicted people will find refuge.’

Ar in Moab is ruined,
    destroyed in a night!
Kir in Moab is ruined,
    destroyed in a night!
² Dibon goes up to its temple,
    to its high places to weep;
    Moab wails over Nebo and Medeba.
Every head is shaved
    and every beard cut off.
³ In the streets they wear sackcloth;
    on the roofs and in the public squares
they all wail,
    prostrate with weeping.
⁴ Heshbon and Elealeh cry out,
    their voices are heard all the way to Jahaz.
Therefore the armed men of Moab cry out,
    and their hearts are faint.

⁵ My heart cries out over Moab;
    her fugitives flee as far as Zoar,
    as far as Eglath Shelishiyah.
They go up the hill to Luhith,
    weeping as they go;
on the road to Horonaim
    they lament their destruction.
⁶ The waters of Nimrim are dried up
    and the grass is withered;
the vegetation is gone
    and nothing green is left.
⁷ So the wealth they have acquired and stored up
    they carry away over the Ravine of the Poplars.
⁸ Their outcry echoes along the border of Moab;
    their wailing reaches as far as Eglaim,
    their lamentation as far as Beer Elim.
⁹ The waters of Dimon^[b] are full of blood,
    but I will bring still more upon Dimon^[c] –
a lion upon the fugitives of Moab
    and upon those who remain in the land.

16 Send lambs as tribute
    to the ruler of the land,
from Sela, across the desert,
    to the mount of Daughter Zion.
² Like fluttering birds
    pushed from the nest,
so are the women of Moab
    at the fords of the Arnon.

³ ‘Make up your mind,’ Moab says.
    ‘Render a decision.
Make your shadow like night –
    at high noon.
Hide the fugitives,
    do not betray the refugees.
⁴ Let the Moabite fugitives stay with you;
    be their shelter from the destroyer.’

The oppressor will come to an end,
    and destruction will cease;
    the aggressor will vanish from the land.
⁵ In love a throne will be established;
    in faithfulness a man will sit on it –
    one from the house^[d] of David –
one who in judging seeks justice
    and speeds the cause of righteousness.

⁶ We have heard of Moab’s pride –
    how great is her arrogance! –
of her conceit, her pride and her insolence;
    but her boasts are empty.
⁷ Therefore the Moabites wail,
    they wail together for Moab.
Lament and grieve
    for the raisin cakes of Kir Hareseth.
⁸ The fields of Heshbon wither,
    the vines of Sibmah also.
The rulers of the nations
    have trampled down the choicest vines,
which once reached Jazer
    and spread towards the desert.
Their shoots spread out
    and went as far as the sea.^[e]
9 So I weep, as Jazer weeps,
    for the vines of Sibmah.
Heshbon and Elealeh,
    I drench you with tears!
The shouts of joy over your ripened fruit
    and over your harvests have been stilled.
¹⁰ Joy and gladness are taken away from the orchards;
    no one sings or shouts in the vineyards;
no one treads out wine at the presses,
    for I have put an end to the shouting.
¹¹ My heart laments for Moab like a harp,
    my inmost being for Kir Hareseth.
¹² When Moab appears at her high place,
    she only wears herself out;
when she goes to her shrine to pray,
    it is to no avail.