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"So desert creatures and hyenas will live there, and there the owl will dwell. It will never again be inhabited or lived in from generation to generation.

As I overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah along with their neighboring towns," declares the Lord , "so no one will live there; no people will dwell in it.

The land trembles and writhes, for the Lord 's purposes against Babylon stand— to lay waste the land of Babylon so that no one will live there.

But while they are aroused, I will set out a feast for them and make them drunk, so that they shout with laughter— then sleep forever and not awake," declares the Lord .

Then say, ‘ Lord , you have said you will destroy this place, so that neither people nor animals will live in it; it will be desolate forever.'

Then say, ‘So will Babylon sink to rise no more because of the disaster I will bring on her. And her people will fall.'" The words of Jeremiah end here.

So in the ninth year of Zedekiah's reign, on the tenth day of the tenth month, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon marched against Jerusalem with his whole army. They encamped outside the city and built siege works all around it.

By the ninth day of the fourth month the famine in the city had become so severe that there was no food for the people to eat.

There at Riblah, in the land of Hamath, the king had them executed. So Judah went into captivity, away from her land.

So Jehoiachin put aside his prison clothes and for the rest of his life ate regularly at the king's table.

How deserted lies the city, once so full of people! How like a widow is she, who once was great among the nations! She who was queen among the provinces has now become a slave.

Jerusalem has sinned greatly and so has become unclean. All who honored her despise her, for they have all seen her naked; she herself groans and turns away.

"People have heard my groaning, but there is no one to comfort me. All my enemies have heard of my distress; they rejoice at what you have done. May you bring the day you have announced so they may become like me.

"As you summon to a feast day, so you summoned against me terrors on every side. In the day of the Lord 's anger no one escaped or survived; those I cared for and reared my enemy has destroyed."

He has walled me in so I cannot escape; he has weighed me down with chains.

So I say, "My splendor is gone and all that I had hoped from the Lord ."

Though he brings grief, he will show compassion, so great is his unfailing love.

You have covered yourself with a cloud so that no prayer can get through.

Now they grope through the streets as if they were blind. They are so defiled with blood that no one dares to touch their garments.

People stalked us at every step, so we could not walk in our streets. Our end was near, our days were numbered, for our end had come.