Ezekiel 29

1In the tenth year, in the tenth month, on the twelfth of the month, the word of Yahweh came to me, saying.

2Son of man, turn your face against Pharaoh, king of Egypt, and prophesy against him and against all Egypt.

3Speak and say: Thus says the Lord Yahweh, Behold, I am against you, Pharaoh king of Egypt, the great dragon that lies in the midst of his rivers, who said, "My river is mine, and I have made it for myself."

4I will set hooks in your jaws and cause the fish of your rivers to cling to your scales; I will bring you up from the midst of your rivers with all the fish of your rivers clinging to your scales.

5I will cast you off into the wilderness, you and all the fish of your rivers; you will fall on the face of the field. You will not be gathered, nor collected, to the beasts of the earth and to the birds of the sky—I have given you for food.

6All the inhabitants of Egypt will know that I am Yahweh, because they have been a staff of reed to the house of Israel.

7When they took hold of you by the hand, you bruised and rent all their shoulders, and when they leaned upon you, you broke and paralyzed all their loins.

8Therefore, thus says the Lord Yahweh: See, I will bring a sword upon you and cut off man and beast from you.

9The land of Egypt will become a desolation and a ruin, and they will know that I am Yahweh because he said, "The river belongs to me, and I made it."

10Therefore, behold, I am against you and against your rivers, and I will make the land of Egypt desolations—desolation and waste—from Migdol to Syene even to the border of Cush.

11No human foot will pass through it, nor any beast's foot, and it will lie uninhabited forty years.

12I will set Egypt's land as a desolation amid lands left desolate, and her cities amid cities laid waste shall become desolate for forty years; I will scatter the Egyptians among the nations and disperse them through the lands.

13For thus says the Lord Yahweh: At the end of forty years I will gather the Egyptians from the peoples among whom they were scattered.

14I will restore the captivity of Egypt and bring them back to the land of Pathros, to the land of their nativity, and they will be there a lowly kingdom.

15It will be the lowliest among the kingdoms and will no longer exalt itself above the nations, and I will make them few so they no longer rule over the nations.

16It will no longer be a confidence for the house of Israel, a reminder of iniquity when they turn toward it, and they will know that I am Lord Yahweh.

17In the twenty-seventh year, in the first month, on the first day of the month, Yahweh's word came to me, saying,

18Son of man, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon drove his army to exhaustive labor against Tyre—every head shorn bald, every shoulder rubbed raw—yet neither he nor his forces received reward from Tyre for the service they performed against it.

19Therefore this is what the Lord Yahweh says: See, I give the land of Egypt to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and he will carry off her multitude, take her spoil, and plunder her booty, and it will be wages for his army.

20I have given him the land of Egypt as his wages for which he served against it, because they worked for me, says the Lord Yahweh.

21On that day I will sprout a horn for the house of Israel, and I will give you an opening of the mouth among them, and they will know that I am Yahweh.