1 COME NEAR, you nations, to hear; and hearken, you peoples! Let the earth hear, and all that is in it; the world, and all things that come forth from it. 2 For the Lord is indignant against all nations, and His wrath is against all their host. He has utterly doomed them, He has given them over to slaughter. 3 Their slain also shall be cast out, and the stench of their dead bodies shall rise, and the mountains shall flow with their blood. 4 All the host of the heavens shall be dissolved and crumble away, and the skies shall be rolled together like a scroll; and all their host [the stars and the planets] shall drop like a faded leaf from the vine, and like a withered fig from the fig tree.
5 Because My sword has been bathed and equipped in heaven, behold, it shall come down upon Edom [the descendants of Esau], upon the people whom I have doomed for judgment. 6 The sword of the Lord is filled with blood [of sacrifices], it is gorged and greased with fatness--with the blood of lambs and goats, with the fat of the kidneys of rams. For the Lord has a sacrifice in Bozrah [capital of Edom] and a great slaughter in the land of Edom. 7 And the wild oxen shall fall with them, and the [young] bullocks with the [old and mighty] bulls; and their land shall be drunk and soaked with blood, and their dust made rich with fatness.
8 For the Lord has a day of vengeance, a year of recompense, for the cause of Zion. 9 And the streams [of Edom] will be turned into pitch and its dust into brimstone, and its land will become burning pitch. 10 [The burning of Edom] shall not be quenched night or day; its smoke shall go up forever. From generation to generation it shall lie waste; none shall pass through it forever and ever. 11 But the pelican and the porcupine will possess it; the owl and the bittern and the raven will dwell in it. And He will stretch over it [Edom] the measuring line of confusion and the plummet stones of chaos [over its nobles]. 12 They shall call its nobles to proclaim the kingdom, but nothing shall be there, and all its princes shall be no more.
13 And thorns shall come up in its palaces and strongholds, nettles and brambles in its fortresses; and it shall be a habitation for jackals, an abode for ostriches. 14 And the wild beasts of the desert will meet here with howling creatures [wolves and hyenas] and the [shaggy] wild goat will call to his fellow; the night monster will settle there and find a place of rest.
15 There shall the arrow snake make her nest and lay her eggs and hatch them and gather her young under her shade; there shall the kites be gathered [also to breed] every one with its mate. 16 Seek out of the book of the Lord and read: not one of these [details of prophecy] shall fail, none shall want and lack her mate [in fulfillment]. For the mouth [of the Lord] has commanded, and His Spirit has gathered them. 17 And He has cast the lot for them, and His hand has portioned [Edom] to [the wild beasts] by measuring line. They shall possess it forever; from generation to generation they shall dwell in it.