1 ‘Go down, sit in the dust,Virgin Daughter Babylon;sit on the ground without a throne,queen city of the Babylonians.No more will you be calledtender or delicate.
2 Take millstones and grind flour;take off your veil.Lift up your skirts, bare your legs,and wade through the streams.
3 Your nakedness will be exposedand your shame uncovered.I will take vengeance;I will spare no one.’
4 Our Redeemer – the Lord Almighty is his name –is the Holy One of Israel.
5 ‘Sit in silence, go into darkness,queen city of the Babylonians;no more will you be calledqueen of kingdoms.
6 I was angry with my peopleand desecrated my inheritance;I gave them into your hand,and you showed them no mercy.Even on the agedyou laid a very heavy yoke.
7 You said, “I am for ever –the eternal queen!”But you did not consider these thingsor reflect on what might happen.
8 ‘Now then, listen, you lover of pleasure,lounging in your securityand saying to yourself,“I am, and there is none besides me.I will never be a widowor suffer the loss of children.”
9 Both of these will overtake youin a moment, on a single day:loss of children and widowhood.They will come upon you in full measure,in spite of your many sorceriesand all your potent spells.
10 You have trusted in your wickednessand have said, “No one sees me.”Your wisdom and knowledge mislead youwhen you say to yourself,“I am, and there is none besides me.”
11 Disaster will come upon you,and you will not know how to conjure it away.A calamity will fall upon youthat you cannot ward off with a ransom;a catastrophe you cannot foreseewill suddenly come upon you.
12 ‘Keep on, then, with your magic spellsand with your many sorceries,which you have laboured at since childhood.Perhaps you will succeed,perhaps you will cause terror.
13 All the counsel you have received has only worn you out!Let your astrologers come forward,those stargazers who make predictions month by month,let them save you from what is coming upon you.
14 Surely they are like stubble;the fire will burn them up.They cannot even save themselvesfrom the power of the flame.These are not coals for warmth;this is not a fire to sit by.
15 That is all they are to you –these you have dealt withand laboured with since childhood.All of them go on in their error;there is not one that can save you.