15. Does an ax exalt itself over the one who wields it,or a saw magnify itself over the one who cuts with it?As if a scepter should brandish the one who raises it,or a staff should lift up what is not made of wood!
16. For this reason the sovereign master, the Lord who commands armies, will make his healthy ones emaciated. His majestic glory will go up in smoke.
17. The light of Israel will become a fire,their Holy One will become a flame;it will burn and consume the Assyrian king’s briersand his thorns in one day.
18. The splendor of his forest and his orchardwill be completely destroyed, as when a sick man’s life ebbs away.
19. There will be so few trees left in his forest,a child will be able to count them.
20. At that time those left in Israel, those who remain of the family of Jacob, will no longer rely on a foreign leader that abuses them. Instead they will truly rely on the Lord, the Holy One of Israel.
21. A remnant will come back, a remnant of Jacob, to the mighty God.
22. For though your people, Israel, are as numerous as the sand on the seashore, only a remnant will come back. Destruction has been decreed; just punishment is about to engulf you.
23. The sovereign master, the Lord who commands armies, is certainly ready to carry out the decreed destruction throughout the land.
24. So here is what the sovereign master, the Lord who commands armies, says: “My people who live in Zion, do not be afraid of Assyria, even though they beat you with a club and lift their cudgel against you as Egypt did.
25. For very soon my fury will subside, and my anger will be directed toward their destruction.”