Isaiah 17

¹ LOAD OF DAMASCUS Behold! Damascus is being taken away from being a city, and becomes a fallen rubbish heap. ² Forsaken are the cities in the future. For droves shall they become. And they recline, and there is no trembling. ³ And the fortress for Ephraim to flee to, has ceased, and no longer shall there be a kingdom in Damascus, and the dignity of Syria shall perish. They shall become as the glory of the sons of Israel, averring is Yahweh of hosts. ⁴ And it comes in that day, that the glory of Jacob shall be impoverished, and the stoutness of his flesh shall be lean. ⁵ And it comes to be as in gathering the harvest of raised grain, and with his arm, he is reaping the spikes. Then it comes as the gleaning of spikes in the healers vale. ⁶ Yet there remain some clean-gleanings in it. As at the after-gleaning of an olive, two, three fixed fast berries are in the tip top, four, five, in its fruitful forks, averring is Yahweh, the Elohim of Israel. ⁷ In that day the human will heed his Maker, and his eyes shall see the Holy One of Israel. ⁸ And he will not heed the altars, the make of his hands, and that made by his fingers he shall not see, even the fetishes of happiness, and the warmed horn-altars. ⁹ In that day his stronghold cities shall become as forsaken as the plowland and the mountain tip which the Amorite and the Hivite forsake in view of the sons of Israel, and there comes to be desolation. ¹⁰ For you have forgotten the Elohim of your salvation, and Yahweh, the Rock, your Stronghold, you do not remember. Therefore you will plant pleasant plants, and with pruned slips of the alien will you sow. ¹¹ In a day you will force your plant to grow rank, and in the morning you will cause your seed to bud. Yet the harvest will flit in a day of illness, and mortal pain will be allotted you for your sons. ¹² Woe! A clamor of many peoples! As the clamor of seas are they clamoring. And the tumult of many folkstems! As the tumult of abundant waters are they tumulting. ¹³ The folkstems shall be tumulted as the tumult of many waters, yet He rebukes them, and they flee far off, and they will be pursued as the trash of the winnowers before the wind, and as a tumbleweed before a sweeping whirlwind. ¹⁴ At eventide comes mourning. Ere morning, there is no one. This is the portion of our robbers, and the lot of our plunderers.