Isaiah Chapter 23

¹ Oracle About Tyre

Wail, you merchant ships of Tarshish,

      because Tyre’s destroyed without home or harbor,

      just like the rumor you heard all the way over at Cyprus.

² Be quiet, you people on the coast, merchants of Sidon;

      your traders crossed the sea

                  ³and sailed on many bodies of water.

         Grain from the Nile, harvest from the Shihor was your revenue;

            you were the international marketplace.

⁴ But now be disgraced, Sidon,

      because the fortress by the sea says,

            “I’m childless, without young men and virgins.”

⁵ When the report reaches Egypt,

      they’ll agonize over Tyre.

⁶ Pass the news on to Tarshish;

      wail, people in distant places.

⁷ Is this your joyous city

      that originated in antiquity

      and colonized distant lands?                                            

Is 23:1-7

⁸ Who planned this against Tyre, the granter of crowns,

      whose merchants were princes,

      whose traders the world honored?

⁹ Yahveh of Hosts planned it to dampen the pride of all beauty,

            to humble the honored in the world.

¹⁰ Tyre’s land has been flooded like the Nile, Tarshish;

      its defenses are gone.

¹¹ Yahveh has stretched out his hand over the sea

      and shaken the kingdoms;

      he has commanded to demolish Phoenicia’s fortresses.

¹² He said, “You won’t celebrate anymore,

            crushed virgin of Sidon;

      even if you escape to Cyprus,

            you won’t find rest.”                                                  

Is 23:8-12

¹³ Look at the land of the Babylonians; it’s gone. The Assyrians delivered it to the desert animals; they erected siege ramps, stripped its palaces, and reduced it to ruins.

            ¹⁴ Wail, ships of Tarshish;

            the harbor you sailed to has been destroyed.

¹⁵ Tyre will pass from memory for 70 years, the lifetime of one king. Then it will come back to life like the woman in “The Song of the Prostitute”:

            ¹⁶ “Take your harp and walk the streets,

                        forgotten prostitute;

                  pluck the strings skillfully and sing your songs

                        so they’ll remember you again.”

¹⁷ After 70 years Yahveh will revisit Tyre. It’ll go back to playing the prostitute with kingdoms everywhere. ¹⁸ In the end, her pay won’t be saved up or hoarded; it will be set aside to feed and dress the Yahveh’s priests.             

Is 23:13-18