Isaiah 21

Modern English Version

As whirlwinds in the Negev pass through,
    so it comes from the desert,
    from a terrible land.

² A grievous vision is declared to me;
    the treacherous one still deals treacherously, and the destroyer still destroys.
Go up, O Elam. Lay siege, O Media.
    All her sighing I have made to cease.

³ Therefore, my loins are filled with pain;
    pangs have taken hold of me as the pangs of a woman who travails.
I am so perplexed at the hearing of it;
    I am so dismayed at the seeing of it.
⁴ My heart panted,
    fearfulness overwhelmed me;
the night for which I longed
    has turned into trembling for me.

⁵ Prepare the table,
    watch in the watchtower,
    eat and drink.
Arise, you princes,
    and oil the shields.

“Go, station a watchman;
    let him declare what he sees.
⁷ When he sees chariots
    with horsemen in pairs,
a chariot of donkeys,
    and a chariot of camels,
then let him pay close attention,
    very close attention.”

“O Lord, I stand continually on the watchtower in the daytime,
    and I am stationed at my guard post every night.
⁹ Look, here comes a chariot of men,
    horsemen in pairs.”
And he answered and said,
    “Fallen, fallen is Babylon.
And all the graven images of her gods
    lie shattered on the ground.”

¹⁰ O my threshed people and my afflicted of the threshing floor!
    What I have heard from the Lord of Hosts,
the God of Israel,
    I have declared to you.

He calls to me out of Seir,
    “Watchman, how far gone is the night?
    Watchman, how far gone is the night?”
¹² The watchman says,
    “The morning comes and also the night.
If you would inquire, inquire;
    return again.”

In the forest of Arabia you shall lodge,
    O traveling companies of Dedanites.
¹⁴     Bring water for the thirsty,
O inhabitants of the land of Tema;
    meet the fugitive with bread.
¹⁵ For they fled from the swords,
    from the drawn sword,
and from the bent bow,
    and from the grievousness of war.