The Valley of Vision

1The burden of the valley of vision. What does it mean to you, then, that each of you have even climbed to the rooftops?

2Filled with clamor, a busy city, an exultant city: your dead have not been slain by the sword, nor did they die in battle.

3All your leaders have fled together, and they have been bound by hardship. All who were found were chained together. They have fled far away.

4For this reason, I said: “Depart from me. I will weep bitterly. Make no attempt to console me, over the devastation of the daughter of my people.”

5For it is a day of death, and of trampling, and of weeping to the Lord, the God of hosts, in the valley of vision: examining the wall and the magnificence above the mountain.

6And Elam took up the quiver and the chariot of the horseman; and he stripped the wall of the shield.

7And your elect valleys will be filled with chariots, and the horsemen will position themselves at the gates.

8And the covering of Judah will be exposed, and in that day, you will see the weaponry of the forest house.

9And you will see breaches in the city of David, for these have been multiplied. But you have gathered together the waters of the lower fish-pool.

10And you have numbered the houses of Jerusalem. And you have destroyed the houses in order to fortify the wall.

11And you have made a pit between two walls for the waters of the ancient fish-pool. But you have not gazed upward to him who made it, and you have not considered, even from a distance, its Maker.

12And in that day, the Lord, the God of hosts, will call to weeping and mourning, to baldness and the wearing of sackcloth.

13But behold: gladness and rejoicing, the killing of calves and the slaughter of rams, the eating of meat and the drinking of wine: “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we will die.”

14And the voice of the Lord of hosts was revealed in my ears: “Surely this iniquity will not be forgiven you, until you die,” says the Lord, the God of hosts.

A Message for Shebna

15Thus says the Lord, the God of hosts: Go forth and enter to him who lives in the tabernacle, to Shebna, who is in charge of the temple, and you shall say to him:

16“What are you here, or who are you claiming to be here? For you have hewn a sepulcher for yourself here. You have diligently hewn a memorial in a rock, as a tabernacle to yourself.

17Behold, the Lord will cause you to be carried away, like a domesticated rooster, and he will remove you, like an outer garment.

18He will crown you with a crown of tribulation. He will toss you like a ball into a broad and spacious land. There you will die, and there the chariot of your glory will be, for it is a shame to the house of your Lord.”

19And I will expel you from your station, and I will depose you from your ministry.

20And this shall be in that day: I will call my servant Eliakim, the son of Hilkiah.

21And I will clothe him with your vestment, and I will strengthen him with your belt, and I will give your authority to his hand. And he shall be like a father to the inhabitants of Jerusalem and to the house of Judah.

22And I will place the key of the house of David upon his shoulder. And when he opens, no one will close. And when he closes, no one will open.

23And I will fasten him like a peg in a trustworthy place. And he will be upon a throne of glory in the house of his father.

24And they will suspend over him all the glory of his father’s house: various kinds of vessels and every little article, from the vessels of bowls even to every instrument of music. 25In that day, says the Lord of hosts, the peg which was fastened in a trustworthy place shall be taken away. And he will be broken, and he will fall, and he will perish, along with all that had depended upon him, because the Lord has spoken it.