CHAPTER 2

                 ¹On my watch let me stand,

                     and let me take my station at the watchtower and look out

                 to see what He will speak to me

                     and what He will respond to my complaint.

                 ²And the LORD answered me and said:

                 Write the vision, make it clear on the tablets,

                     so that one may read it readily.

                 ³For there is yet a vision for the appointed time

                     and a witness for the end who is not false.

                 Though it tarries, wait for it,

                     for it shall surely come, it shall not delay.

                 ⁴Look, the spirit within him is callous, not upright,

                     but the righteous man lives through his faithfulness.

                 ⁵How much more so the arrogant treacherous one who presumes

                     and who does not prosper,

                 who gapes open his maw like Sheol

                     and like death he is never sated.

                 And he rounds up for himself all the nations,

                     gathers in to him all the peoples.

                 ⁶Will not all these an adage pronounce against him,

                     verses and maxims against him, and say:

                 Woe, who amasses what is not his—for how long?—

                     and weighs himself down with debt.

                 ⁷Will not your creditors suddenly rise

                     and those who will shake you will awake?

                 ⁸For as you despoiled many nations,

                     the remnant of nations shall despoil you

                 for the bloodshed of people and the outrage of lands,

                     the town and all who dwell in it.

                 ⁹Woe, who takes illicit gain,

                     through evil, to his house

                 to set his nest on high

                     to be saved from the clutch of harm.

                 ¹⁰You have counseled shame for your house

                     when you maimed many peoples

                         and gravely offended.

                 ¹¹For a stone from the wall shall shriek

                     and a wooden beam answer it:

                 ¹²Woe, who builds a town with bloodshed

                     founds a city with wrongdoing.

                 ¹³Is it not from the LORD of Armies?

                     And peoples shall strive for the fire

                         and nations for naught shall be wearied.

                 ¹⁴For the earth shall be filled

                     with knowing the LORD’s glory

                         as water covers the sea.

                 ¹⁵Woe, who gives drink to his friend,

                     adding venom and making him drunk

                         so as to look on his nakedness.

                 ¹⁶You shall be sated with shame instead of glory.

                     You, too, drink and expose yourself.

                 The cup of the LORD’s right hand shall come round to you,

                     and noxious shame instead of your glory.

                 ¹⁷For the outrage of Lebanon shall cover you,

                     and the plunder of beasts shall dismay you

                 for the bloodshed of people and the outrage of lands,

                     the town and all who dwell in it.

                 ¹⁸What will the idol avail when its fashioner carves it,

                     the molten image that gives false oracles,

                 Though its fashioner puts his trust in it,

                     making speechless ungods.

                 ¹⁹Woe, who says to wood, “Awake,”

                     “Bestir” to lifeless stone.

                 “It will give oracles.” Look, it is inlaid with gold and silver

                     and no spirit is there within it.

                 ²⁰But the LORD is in His holy palace.

                     Hush before Him all the earth!