Isaiah
Chapter 34
1 Come close, all you countries, to listen; and pay attention, all you peoples: let the earth and everything on it hear; the world and all that comes out of it.
2 God is angry with all nations and furious with their armies; he has completely destroyed them and handed them over to be killed.
3 Their dead bodies will be thrown away, and they will smell bad. The mountains will flow with their blood.
4 Every star in the sky will disappear, and the sky will close up like a scroll. All the stars will fall, like leaves drop from a grapevine, and like figs drop from a fig tree.
5 My sword will be ready in the sky; it will fall on Edom and the people I have decided to punish, for punishment.
6 God’s sword is covered with blood, it is thick with fat, from the blood of lambs and goats, and from the fat of ram’s kidneys: because God has a sacrifice in Bozrah and a big killing in the land of Idumea.
7 The unicorns will come down with them, and the young bulls with the grown bulls; their land will be wet with blood, and their soil rich with fat.
8 It is the day of God’s revenge, and the time to pay back for the dispute over Zion.
9 Its rivers will turn into tar, its soil into sulfur, and its ground will burn like tar.
10 It will not stop burning day or night; its smoke will rise forever. It will remain empty from one generation to another; no one will ever pass through it again.
11 The cormorant and bittern will live there; the owl and raven will make it their home. God will mark it with lines of chaos and stones of emptiness.
12 They will invite its nobles to rule, but no one will be there, and all its leaders will become nothing.
13 Thorns will grow in her palaces, nettles and brambles in her strongholds; it will be a home for dragons and a place for owls.
14 Desert animals will meet with island creatures, and goat-demons will call to each other; the night bird will also settle there and find a resting place.
15 The great owl will build its nest there, lay eggs, hatch them, and protect them under its wings; vultures will also meet there, each with its partner.
16 Look in God’s book and read: none of these will be missing, none will be without a partner, because God has ordered it, and his spirit has brought them together.
17 He has decided their share by casting lots, and his hand has distributed it to them with measuring lines: they will own it forever, and they will live there from one generation to the next.