5. Ah! Assyria, the rod of my wrath,the staff I wield in anger.
6. Against an impious nation I send him,and against a people under my wrath I order himTo seize plunder, carry off loot,and to trample them like the mud of the street.
7. But this is not what he intends,nor does he have this in mind;Rather, it is in his heart to destroy,to make an end of not a few nations.
8. For he says, “Are not my commanders all kings?”
9. “Is not Calno like Carchemish,Or Hamath like Arpad,or Samaria like Damascus?
10. Just as my hand reached out to idolatrous kingdomsthat had more images than Jerusalem and Samaria—
11. Just as I treated Samaria and her idols,shall I not do to Jerusalem and her graven images?”
12. But when the Lord has brought to an end all his work on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem,I will punish the utteranceof the king of Assyria’s proud heart,and the boastfulness of his haughty eyes.
13. For he says:“By my own power I have done it,and by my wisdom, for I am shrewd.I have moved the boundaries of peoples,their treasures I have pillaged,and, like a mighty one, I have brought down the enthroned.
14. My hand has seized, like a nest,the wealth of nations.As one takes eggs left alone,so I took in all the earth;No one fluttered a wing,or opened a mouth, or chirped!”
15. Will the ax boast against the one who hews with it?Will the saw exalt itself above the one who wields it?As if a rod could sway the one who lifts it,or a staff could lift the one who is not wood!
16. Therefore the Lord, the Lord of hosts,will send leanness among his fat ones,And under his glory there will be a kindlinglike the kindling of fire.
17. The Light of Israel will become a fire,the Holy One, a flame,That burns and consumes its briersand its thorns in a single day.
18. And the glory of its forests and orchardswill be consumed, soul and body,and it will be like a sick man who wastes away.
19. And the remnant of the trees in his forestwill be so few,that any child can record them.
20. On that dayThe remnant of Israel,the survivors of the house of Jacob,will no more lean upon the one who struck them;But they will lean upon the Lord,the Holy One of Israel, in truth.