Isaiah, 17

1. Proclamation about Damascus: Damascus will soon cease to be a city, it will become a heap of ruins.

1. The burden of Damascus. Behold, Damascus is taken away from [being] a city, and it shall be a ruinous heap.

2. Its towns, abandoned for ever, will be pastures for flocks; there they will rest with no one to disturb them.

2. The cities of Aroer [are] forsaken: they shall be for flocks, which shall lie down, and none shall make [them] afraid.

3. Ephraim will be stripped of its defences and Damascus of its sovereignty; and the remnant of Aram will be treated like the glory of the Israelites -- declares Yahweh Sabaoth.

3. The fortress also shall cease from Ephraim, and the kingdom from Damascus, and the remnant of Syria: they shall be as the glory of the children of Israel, saith the LORD of hosts.

4. When that day comes, Jacob's glory will diminish, from being fat he will grow lean;

4. And in that day it shall come to pass, [that] the glory of Jacob shall be made thin, and the fatness of his flesh shall wax lean.

5. as when a reaper gathers in the standing corn, harvesting the ears of corn with his arm, or when they glean the ears in the Valley of Rephaim,

5. And it shall be as when the harvestman gathereth the corn, and reapeth the ears with his arm; and it shall be as he that gathereth ears in the valley of Rephaim.

6. nothing will remain but pickings, as when an olive tree is beaten; two or three berries left on the topmost bough, four or five berries on the branches of the tree -- declares Yahweh, God of Israel.

6. Yet gleaning grapes shall be left in it, as the shaking of an olive tree, two [or] three berries in the top of the uppermost bough, four [or] five in the outmost fruitful branches thereof, saith the LORD God of Israel.

7. That day, a man will look to his Creator and his eyes will turn to the Holy One of Israel.

7. At that day shall a man look to his Maker, and his eyes shall have respect to the Holy One of Israel.

8. He will no longer look to altars, his own handiwork, or to what his own fingers have made: the sacred poles and incense-altars.

8. And he shall not look to the altars, the work of his hands, neither shall respect [that] which his fingers have made, either the groves, or the images.

9. That day, its cities of refuge will be abandoned as were the woods and heaths at the Israelites' advance: there will be desolation.

9. In that day shall his strong cities be as a forsaken bough, and an uppermost branch, which they left because of the children of Israel: and there shall be desolation.

10. Since you have forgotten the God of your salvation, and failed to keep the Rock, your refuge, in mind, you plant pleasure-gardens, you sow exotic seeds;

10. Because thou hast forgotten the God of thy salvation, and hast not been mindful of the rock of thy strength, therefore shalt thou plant pleasant plants, and shalt set it with strange slips:

11. the day you plant them, you get them to sprout, and, next morning, your seedlings are in flower; but the harvest will vanish on the day of disease and incurable pain.

11. In the day shalt thou make thy plant to grow, and in the morning shalt thou make thy seed to flourish: [but] the harvest [shall be] a heap in the day of grief and of desperate sorrow.

12. Disaster! The thunder of vast hordes, a thunder like the thunder of the seas, the roar of nations roaring like the roar of mighty floods,

12. Woe to the multitude of many people, [which] make a noise like the noise of the seas; and to the rushing of nations, [that] make a rushing like the rushing of mighty waters!

13. of nations roaring like the roar of ocean! He rebukes them and far away they flee, driven like chaff on the mountains before the wind, like an eddy of dust before the storm.

13. The nations shall rush like the rushing of many waters: but [God] shall rebuke them, and they shall flee far off, and shall be chased as the chaff of the mountains before the wind, and like a rolling thing before the whirlwind.

14. At evening all is terror, by morning all have disappeared. Such will be the lot of those who plunder us, such, the fate of our despoilers.

14. And behold at eveningtide trouble; [and] before the morning he [is] not. This [is] the portion of them that spoil us, and the lot of them that rob us.