Pharaoh Warned of Assyria’s Fate
1 In the eleventh year [after King Jehoiachin was taken captive to Babylon], in the thirdmonth,on the first of the month, the word of the Lordcame to me, saying,
2 “Son of man, say to Pharaoh king of Egypt and to his hordes,
‘Whom are you like in your greatness?
3 ‘Behold (listen carefully), Assyria was a cedar in Lebanon
With beautiful branches and with forest shade,
And of high stature,
With its top among the clouds.
4 ‘The waters nourished it, the deep [underground waters] made it grow tall.
Its rivers ran all around the place where it was planted,
Sending out its streams to all the trees (other nations) of the field.
5 ‘Therefore it towered higher than all the trees of the forest
And its boughs multiplied and its branches grew long;
Because there was so much water they spread outward.
6 ‘All the birds of the sky made their nests in its twigs,
And under its branches all the animals of the field gave birth [to their young],
And all of the great nations lived under its shadow.
7 ‘So it was beautiful in its greatness, in the length of its branches;
For its roots extended [downward] to great waters.
8 ‘The cedars in the garden of God could not hideorrival it;
The cypress trees did not have boughs like it,
And theplane trees did not have branches like it.
No tree in the garden of God was like it in its beauty.
9 ‘I made it beautiful with the great mass of its branches,
So that all the trees ofEden which were in the garden of God were jealous of it (Assyria).
10 ‘Therefore thus says the Lord God, “Because it is high in stature and has set its top among the thick boughsandthe clouds, and its heart is proud of its height,
11 I willhand it over to a mighty oneanda mighty one of the nations; he will most certainly deal with it. I have driven it away in accordance with its wickedness.
12 Alien tyrants of the nations have cut it down and left it; its foliage has fallen on the mountains and in all the valleys and its branches have been broken in all the ravines of the land. And all the nations of the earth have come from under its shade and have left it.
13 All the birds of the sky will nest in its ruins, and all the animals of the field will rest on itsfallenbranches
14 so that none of the trees by the waters may exalt themselves because of their height, nor set their top among the clouds, nor their well-watered mighty ones stand [arrogantly] in their height. For they have all been handed over to death, to the earth beneath, among the sons of men, with those who go down to the pit (the grave).”
15 ‘Thus says the Lord God, “On the day when Assyria went down to Sheol (the place of the dead) I caused mourning; I closed the deep [subterranean waters] over it and restrained its rivers. And the many waters [that contributed to its prosperity] were held back; and I made [the heart of] Lebanon mourn for it, and all the trees of the field wilted away because of it.
16 I made the nations quake at the sound of its fall when I cast it down to Sheol with those who descend into the pit; and all the well-watered trees of Eden, the choicest and the best of Lebanon, will be comforted in the earth beneath [at Assyria’s downfall].
17 They also went down to Sheol with it to those who were slain by the sword; those who were its strength lived under its shade among the nations.
18 “Which among the trees of Eden do you equal in glory and in greatness [O Egypt]? Yet you [also] will be brought down with the trees of Eden to the earth beneath (nether world). You will lie among theuncircumcised (the barbaric, the boorish, the crude) with those who were slain by the sword. This ishow it shall bewith Pharaoh and all his hordes!”’ says the Lord God.”