God will punish people who are not fair
1You will suffer, all of you
who make laws that are not fair,
laws that make some people do wrong
and make other people suffer.
2You don't do what is right
to poor people,
you don't do what is right to people
who can not help themselves,
and you take the things of widows and orphans.
3What will you do
when the Lord comes to punish you
and you start suffering?
Where will you run to?
Who will help you?
Where will you hide everything that you have?
4The enemies will catch you
and you will have to bow down before them,
or you will die in war.
But the Lord said: ‘That is not enough.’
He stayed angry and
He did not stop punishing them.
The Assyrians will suffer
5The Assyrians will suffer.
They are like a staff and a stick to Me.
I am beating my people with this stick
because I am angry with them.
6I am sending the Assyrians to these bad people,
to the people who have made Me angry.
The Assyrians must take everything
that my people have
and they must trample them
like you walk on mud in the streets.
7But the Assyrians say: ‘That is not enough.’
They want to kill more people.
They want to kill a lot of people.
8The king of Assyria says:
‘My officials are kings of other nations.
9I have defeated a lot of cities,
the cities of Kalno, Carchemish,
Hamath, Arpad,
Samaria and Damascus.
10I have defeated cities that had a lot of idols.
There are more images in the other cities
than in Jerusalem and Samaria.
11I will do the same to Jerusalem
and the images of its idols
as I did to Samaria and its idols.’
12The Lord will finish the work
that He wants to do on Mount_Zion
and in Jerusalem, and then
He will punish the king of Assyria,
the king who is so proud,
13because the king of Assyria said:
‘I am strong and I am clever.
I have taken the lands of other people
and everything that they had
and those people are my slaves.
14I have taken everything for myself,
everything that belonged to other people,
and all their lands have become mine.
It was like someone taking eggs
from a nest but the bird
does not try to stop him,
and she does not open her mouth
to make a noise.’
15An axe can not boast against the man
who uses the axe to cut down a tree.
A saw can not think he is better than
the man who uses it to saw wood,
a staff is not stronger than the man
who takes it in his hand,
and a stick can not lift up the man
who picks it up.
16That is why the Lord who rules over all
will punish the Assyrians.
The Assyrians are fat,
but He will make them thin,
and He will burn all the beautiful things they have.
17The Light of Israel,
the holy God of Israel,
will become a fire that will burn
the thorns and bushes in one day.
18He will also burn
the beautiful bushes and trees,
all of the Assyrians.
He will kill all who breathe,
everyone who is alive.
They will become like an old man
who becomes sick and dies.
19Assyria is a forest
but there will be only a few trees left,
and a child will be able to count them.
Only a few people will come back
20On that day the Israelites
who are left over,
the descendants of Jacob
who are still_alive,
will stop thinking that Assyria
can help them.
It was the Assyrians
who did bad things to them.
They will know that it is
only the Lord, the holy God of Israel,
who can help them.
21The people who are left over
will come back.
The descendants of Jacob
who are still_alive
will come back to God Almighty.
22People of Israel,
there were as many of you as the sand of the sea,
but only a few of you
will stay alive and come back.
The Lord has decided that
a lot of you will die.
Your punishment will come
like a flood of water
that flows over everything.
23This is what the Lord
who rules over all has decided.
He will not change his plan.
He will punish all the people of this land.
Do not be afraid of the Assyrians
24But the Lord who rules over all
says: ‘My people who live in Jerusalem,
you must not be afraid of the Assyrians.
They are doing bad things to you
like the Egyptians did to your forefathers,
25but it will not be for a long time.
Then I will not be angry with you anymore.
I will then be angry with the Assyrians
and I will kill them all.
26I, the Lord who rules over all,
will beat them with a whip
like I beat the Midianites
at the Oreb Rock.
I will put out my staff over the water
as I did when I killed the Egyptians.
27When I have done that,
the Assyrians will not make you suffer anymore.
I will take away their yoke from your neck,
and you will not be their slaves anymore.’
The Assyrians are coming
28The Assyrians will come to make war.
They will come to the town of Aja,
they will go past Migron,
and they will put away their food in Mikmash.
29They will go over the mountains
to sleep in Geba.
The people in the town of Ramah will tremble,
and they will flee from Gibeah, the town of Saul.
30The people of Gallim will shout,
and the people of Laishah must listen.
The people of Anathoth
will not be able to help themselves.
31The people of Madmenah will flee,
and the people who live in Gebim will try to hide.
32The Assyrians will be
in the town of Nob tomorrow.
They will point with their fingers
to the mountain where Jerusalem is,
and where the temple is.
33Yes, the Lord who rules over all
will cut off the branches.
He is strong. He will cut down
the big and high trees,
the people who think they are important.
34The Strong God will cut down
the plants in the forest with an axe.
He will make the trees of the forest
of Lebanon fall down.
