¹⁷ You cut down the forests of Lebanon.
    Now you will be cut down.
You destroyed the wild animals,
    so now their terror will be yours.
You committed murder throughout the countryside
    and filled the towns with violence.

⁸ Because you have plundered many nations,
    now all the survivors will plunder you.
You committed murder throughout the countryside
    and filled the towns with violence.

11 Open your doors, Lebanon,
    so that fire may devour your cedar forests.

²³ But you, O God, will send the wicked
    down to the pit of destruction.
Murderers and liars will die young,
    but I am trusting you to save me.

²⁰ Rejoice over her fate, O heaven
    and people of God and apostles and prophets!
For at last God has judged her
    for your sakes.

“Just like this, the great city Babylon
    will be thrown down with violence
    and will never be found again.
²² The sound of harps, singers, flutes, and trumpets
    will never be heard in you again.
No craftsmen and no trades
    will ever be found in you again.
The sound of the mill
    will never be heard in you again.
²³ The light of a lamp
    will never shine in you again.
The happy voices of brides and grooms
    will never be heard in you again.
For your merchants were the greatest in the world,
    and you deceived the nations with your sorceries.
²⁴ In your^[a] streets flowed the blood of the prophets and of God’s holy people
    and the blood of people slaughtered all over the world.”

³⁴ “King Nebuchadnezzar^[a] of Babylon has eaten and crushed us
    and drained us of strength.
He has swallowed us like a great monster
    and filled his belly with our riches.
    He has thrown us out of our own country.
³⁵ Make Babylon suffer as she made us suffer,”
    say the people of Zion.
“Make the people of Babylonia pay for spilling our blood,”
    says Jerusalem.

“I will be your lawyer to plead your case,
    and I will avenge you.
I will dry up her river,
    as well as her springs,
³⁷ and Babylon will become a heap of ruins,
    haunted by jackals.
She will be an object of horror and contempt,
    a place where no one lives.

²⁴ “I will repay Babylon
    and the people of Babylonia^[a]
for all the wrong they have done
    to my people in Jerusalem,” says the Lord.

³³ This is what the Lord of Heaven’s Armies says:
“The people of Israel and Judah have been wronged.
    Their captors hold them and refuse to let them go.
³⁴ But the one who redeems them is strong.
    His name is the Lord of Heaven’s Armies.
He will defend them
    and give them rest again in Israel.
But for the people of Babylon
    there will be no rest!