14. And you, human one, prophesy!Strike hand to hand.Let the sword strike twice, three times!It’s a deadly sword,a great deadly sword.It whirls around them
15. to make hearts shudder,to make many stumble and fall.I’ve set the slaughtering swordagainst all their gates.Oh! It’s crafted to flash like lightning,polished for slaughter!
16. Stab again and again! Plunge right,plunge left, wherever your edge goes.
17. It is I who strike hand to hand!I’ll satisfy my wrath! I, the Lord, have spoken.
18. The Lord’s word came to me:
19. You, human one, mark two roads for the coming of the sword of the king of Babylon. They should diverge from a single country. Where the road to the city begins, set up a sign,
20. and point out the way for the sword to come: "To Rabbah of the Ammonites" or "To Judah in its stronghold Jerusalem."
21. The king of Babylon stands at the fork in the road where the two roads begin and performs his divinations. He shakes the arrows, consults the divine images, and inspects the liver.
22. On his right side appeared the omen for Jerusalem: to put battering rams in place, to proclaim war and raise the alarm, to place battering rams against the gates, and to set up siege ramps and build towers.
23. It seems to them like a lying divination, because solemn pledges had been sworn to them. But he will remind them of their guilt, and they will be captured.
24. So the Lord God proclaims: Now that you have remembered your guilt and your treacheries are exposed, your sins can be seen in everything you do. Because you have brought your guilt to light, you will be captured!
25. But you vile, wicked prince of Israel whose day has come, the time of final punishment,
26. this is what the Lord God says: Remove the turban, take off the crown! Nothing will be as it was. Bring down the exalted, and exalt the lowly.
27. A ruin, ruin, ruin, I’ll make it! Such a thing has never happened! Even before the rightful judge comes, I’ve handed it over to him.
28. You, human one, prophesy and say, The Lord God proclaims to the Ammonites concerning their disgrace. Say, Sword! Sword unsheathed for slaughter, burnished, battle-ready, flashing like lightning:
29. False visions and lying divinations set you against the necks of vile, wicked men whose day had come, the time of final punishment.
30. Return it to its sheath. In the place where you were created, in the land of your origin, I will judge you.
31. I will pour out my wrath against you. With a raging fire I will blow against you, and I will hand you over to those who burn and forge destruction.