18. for it is tested, and why not?Since you rejected my staff,should it not happen?—oracle of the Lord God.
19. As for you, son of man, prophesy,and clap your hands!Let the sword strike twice, a third time.It is a sword of slaughter,A sword for slaughtering,whirling around them all,
20. That every heart may tremble;for many will be made to stumble.At all their gatesI have stationed the sword for slaughter,Made it flash lightning,drawn for slaughter.
21. Slash to the right!turn to the left,Wherever your edge is directed!
22. Then I, too, shall clap my hands,and spend my fury.I, the Lord, have spoken.
23. The word of the Lord came to me:
24. Son of man, make for yourself two roads over which the sword of the king of Babylon can come. Both roads shall start out from the same land. Then put a signpost at the head of each road
25. so the sword can come to Rabbah of the Ammonites or to Judah and its fortress, Jerusalem.
26. For the king of Babylon is standing at the fork of the two roads to read the omens: he shakes out the arrows, inquires of the teraphim, inspects the liver.
27. Into his right hand has fallen the lot marked “Jerusalem”: to order the slaughter, to raise the battle cry, to set the battering rams against the gates, to throw up a ramp, to build siege works.