The Book of the Prophet Isaiah 34

 The Book of the Prophet Isaiah 34

1 Come near, O nations, and listen, and give ear, O peoples! Let the earth hear, and all its fullness, the world, and all that comes from it.

2 For the indignation of the Lord is against all the nations, and his fury against all their host; he has utterly destroyed them, he has given them over to slaughter.

3 Their slain will be thrown down, and a stench will rise from their bodies; and the mountains will melt with their blood.

4 All the host of heaven will be consumed, and the heavens will be rolled together like a scroll; all their host will fall, as a leaf falls from the vine, and as a fig falls from the fig tree.

5 For my sword has drunk its fill in the heavens; behold, it will come down on Edom, and on the people of my curse, to execute judgment. 

6 The sword of the Lord is filled with blood, it is filled with fat, with the blood of lambs and goats, with the fat of the kidneys of rams; for the Lord has a sacrifice in Bozrah, and a great slaughter in the land of Edom.

7 And the unicorns will come down with them, and the calves with the bulls; and their land will drink its fill of blood, and their dust will be filled with fat.

8 For it will be the day of the Lord's vengeance, a year of recompense for the warfare of Zion.

9 And her streams will be turned into pitch, and her dust into sulfur, and her land into burning pitch.

10 It will not be quenched night or day; its smoke will ascend forever; from generation to generation it will lie desolate; from age to age no one will pass through it.

11 But the pelican and the owl will possess it, and the owl and the raven will inhabit it; and he will stretch out over it a line of confusion and a level of vanity. 

12 They will call its nobles to the kingdom, but none will be there, and all its princes will be nothing.

13 Thorns will grow in its palaces, nettles and thistles in its fortresses; it will be a den for dragons, and savanna for the young ostrich.

14 Wild dogs will meet wild cats, and the satyr will cry to its mate. The night creatures will rest there and find a resting place for themselves.

15 There the mermaid will line up and lay her eggs, and will hatch her chicks and gather them under her shadow. There the vultures will gather together.

16 Seek in the book of the Lord and read; none of these things will fail, neither will one thing be missing; for my own mouth has commanded, and his spirit will gather them. 

17 For he cast the lot for them, and his hand divided the land to them by line: they shall possess it forever; from generation to generation they shall dwell therein.