1 I will stand at my post and take my place on the rampart; I will look out to see what he will say to me, and what reply I should give to my complaint.
2 The LORD replied to me: Write down the vision; set it out clearly on tablets, so that whoever reads it can run with it.
3 The vision is still waiting for its set time; it pants toward the end and will not prove false. Though it lingers, wait for it; it is sure to come and will not be late.
4 Look, he is puffed up; his soul is not upright within him; but the righteous shall live by his faith.
5 Moreover, wine is treacherous; the proud man does not stay at home. He opens his throat wide like Sheol, and like death he is never satisfied; he gathers to himself all nations and collects to himself all peoples.
6 Will not all of them make him the subject of a proverb, of mocking verses and riddles? They will say: "Woe to the one who piles up what is not his — how long can it go on? — and weighs himself down with pledges!"
7 Will not those who bite you rise up without warning, and those who shake you wake up? Then you will be their prey.
8 Since you have looted many nations, all the peoples who are left will loot you, for the human blood you shed and the violence you did to the land, to the city and everyone living there.
9 Woe to the one who grabs wicked profit for his household, to put his nest up high, to escape the grasp of disaster!
10 Your scheming has brought shame on your house; by wiping out many peoples you have sinned against your own life.
11 The very stones will shout from the wall, and a rafter in the timbers will answer them.
12 Woe to the one who builds a city with bloodshed and sets up a town by injustice!
13 Is it not the LORD of hosts who has decreed that peoples toil only to feed the fire and nations exhaust themselves for emptiness?
14 For the earth will be filled with knowing the glory of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea.
15 Woe to the one who gives his neighbor drink, pouring out your fury until they are drunk, so you can stare at their nakedness!
16 You have had your fill of disgrace instead of honor. Now you drink, and show your foreskin! The cup in the LORD's right hand is coming around to you, and disgrace will smother your glory.
17 The violence you did to Lebanon will engulf you, and the slaughter of the animals will terrify them, for the human blood you shed and the violence you did to the land, to the city and everyone living there.
18 What use is an idol once its craftsman has carved it, or a cast image, a teacher of falsehood? The one who shaped it puts his trust in what he formed, making idols that cannot speak.
19 Woe to the one who tells a block of wood, "Wake up!" or a mute stone, "Get up!" Will that teach anything? It is plated with gold and silver, but there is not a breath inside it.
20 But the LORD is in his holy temple; hush before him, all the earth!