Isaiah 19-21

New King James Version

Behold, the Lord ^(B)rides on a swift cloud,
And will come into Egypt;
^(C)The idols of Egypt will ^[b]totter at His presence,
And the heart of Egypt will melt in its midst.

² “I will ^(D)set Egyptians against Egyptians;
Everyone will fight against his brother,
And everyone against his neighbor,
City against city, kingdom against kingdom.
³ The spirit of Egypt will fail in its midst;
I will destroy their counsel,
And they will ^(E)consult the idols and the charmers,
The mediums and the sorcerers.
⁴ And the Egyptians I will give
^(F)Into the hand of a cruel master,
And a fierce king will rule over them,”
Says the Lord, the Lord of hosts.

^5 (G)The waters will fail from the sea,
And the river will be wasted and dried up.
⁶ The rivers will turn foul;
The brooks ^(H)of defense will be emptied and dried up;
The reeds and rushes will wither.
⁷ The papyrus reeds by ^[c]the River, by the mouth of the River,
And everything sown by the River,
Will wither, be driven away, and be no more.
⁸ The fishermen also will mourn;
All those will lament who cast hooks into the River,
And they will languish who spread nets on the waters.
⁹ Moreover those who work in ^(I)fine flax
And those who weave fine fabric will be ashamed;
¹⁰ And its foundations will be broken.
All who make wages will be troubled of soul.

¹¹ Surely the princes of ^(J)Zoan are fools;
Pharaoh’s wise counselors give foolish counsel.
^(K)How do you say to Pharaoh, “I am the son of the wise,
The son of ancient kings?”
^12 (L)Where are they?
Where are your wise men?
Let them tell you now,
And let them know what the Lord of hosts has ^(M)purposed against Egypt.
¹³ The princes of Zoan have become fools;
^(N)The princes of ^[d]Noph are deceived;
They have also ^[e]deluded Egypt,
Those who are the ^[f]mainstay of its tribes.
¹⁴ The Lord has mingled ^(O)a perverse spirit in her midst;
And they have caused Egypt to err in all her work,
As a drunken man staggers in his vomit.
¹⁵ Neither will there be any work for Egypt,
Which ^(P)the head or tail,
Palm branch or bulrush, may do.

As ^(AN)whirlwinds in the South pass through,
So it comes from the desert, from a terrible land.
² A distressing vision is declared to me;
^(AO)The treacherous dealer deals treacherously,
And the plunderer plunders.
^(AP)Go up, O Elam!
Besiege, O Media!
All its sighing I have made to cease.

³ Therefore ^(AQ)my loins are filled with pain;
^(AR)Pangs have taken hold of me, like the pangs of a woman in labor.
I was ^[k]distressed when I heard it;
I was dismayed when I saw it.
⁴ My heart wavered, fearfulness frightened me;
^(AS)The night for which I longed He turned into fear for me.
^5 (AT)Prepare the table,
Set a watchman in the tower,
Eat and drink.
Arise, you princes,
Anoint the shield!

⁶ For thus has the Lord said to me:
“Go, set a watchman,
Let him declare what he sees.”
⁷ And he saw a chariot with a pair of horsemen,
A chariot of donkeys, and a chariot of camels,
And he listened earnestly with great care.
^8 [l]Then he cried, “A lion, my Lord!
I stand continually on the ^(AU)watchtower in the daytime;
I have sat at my post every night.
⁹ And look, here comes a chariot of men with a pair of horsemen!”
Then he answered and said,
^(AV)“Babylon is fallen, is fallen!
And ^(AW)all the carved images of her gods
He has broken to the ground.”

^10 (AX)Oh, my threshing and the grain of my floor!
That which I have heard from the Lord of hosts,
The God of Israel,
I have declared to you.

He calls to me out of ^(AZ)Seir,
“Watchman, what of the night?
Watchman, what of the night?”
¹² The watchman said,
“The morning comes, and also the night.
If you will inquire, inquire;
Return! Come back!”

In the forest in Arabia you will lodge,
O you traveling companies ^(BB)of Dedanites.
¹⁴ O inhabitants of the land of Tema,
Bring water to him who is thirsty;
With their bread they met him who fled.
¹⁵ For they fled from the swords, from the drawn sword,
From the bent bow, and from the distress of war.