1. Woe to those who decree iniquitous decrees,and the writers who keep writing oppression,
2. to turn aside the needy from justiceand to rob the poor of my people of their right,that widows may be their spoil,and that they may make the fatherless their prey!
3. What will you do on the day of punishment,in the ruin that will come from afar?To whom will you flee for help,and where will you leave your wealth?
4. Nothing remains but to crouch among the prisonersor fall among the slain. For all this his anger has not turned away,and his hand is stretched out still.
5. Ah, Assyria, the rod of my anger;the staff in their hands is my fury!
6. Against a godless nation I send him,and against the people of my wrath I command him,to take spoil and seize plunder,and to tread them down like the mire of the streets.
7. But he does not so intend,and his heart does not so think;but it is in his heart to destroy,and to cut off nations not a few;
8. for he says: “Are not my commanders all kings?
9. Is not Calno like Carchemish?Is not Hamath like Arpad? Is not Samaria like Damascus?
10. As my hand has reached to the kingdoms of the idols,whose carved images were greater than those of Jerusalem and Samaria,
11. shall I not do to Jerusalem and her idols as I have done to Samaria and her images?”
12. When the Lord has finished all his work on Mount Zion and on Jerusalem, he will punish the speech of the arrogant heart of the king of Assyria and the boastful look in his eyes.
13. For he says:“By the strength of my hand I have done it,and by my wisdom, for I have understanding;I remove the boundaries of peoples,and plunder their treasures;like a bull I bring down those who sit on thrones.