Isaiah 23
1RAISE the mournful cry, O ships of Carthage! for Tyre is destroyed and there are no arrivals from the land of the Kitians. She is carried away captive.
2Who could be compared with the dwellers in this island—these merchants of Phœnicia, who traversed the ocean,
3this offspring of merchants on many a water, who made a traffic of nations as of an ingathered harvest?
4Be ashamed, O Sidon, said the sea—even the strength of the sea said: I did not travail nor did I bring her forth; nor did I nourish her youths, nor educate her virgins;
5yet when the news shall reach Egypt, sorrow for Tyre will take hold on them.
6Away to Carthage! Raise the mournful cry, ye who inhabit that isle!
7Was not she your boast of old, before she was delivered up?
8Who hath taken this counsel against the Tyrians? Is she inferior? Or hath she not power? Her merchants are glorious chiefs of the earth.
9The Lord of Hosts hath determined to destroy all the haughtiness of the glorious; and to bring to contempt everything renowned on the earth.
10Work thy land: for ships no more arrive from Carthage,
11nor is thy hand which vexed kings, any more powerful by sea. The Lord of Hosts hath given a command, concerning Chanaan, to destroy its power:
12and shall it be said, You must not proceed to insult and distress the daughter of Sidon? Nay though thou shouldst go to the Kitians; yet even there thou shalt not have rest.
13Away to the land of the Chaldeans, though it hath been wasted by the Assyrians; because its walls had fallen.
14Raise the mournful cry, O ships of Carthage, because your stronghold is destroyed.
15And it shall come to pass in that day, that Tyre shall be forsaken seventy years, according to the days of a king, according to the time of a man. And it shall come to pass after seventy years, that Tyre shall be as the song of a harlot.
16Take a kithara, stroll about, O city, O harlot long forgotten! Play skilfully; sing many songs, that thou mayst be remembered.
17And it shall come to pass after seventy years, that God will take account of Tyre, and she shall be restored to her former state, and be a mart for all the kingdoms of the world; which are on the face of the earth.
18And her traffic and gain shall be holy to the Lord. All her gain shall not be treasured up for themselves, but for them who dwell before the Lord, that they may eat and drink and be filled, and for contributions to be kept in remembrance before the Lord.