”“Come down, virgin daughter of Babylon, and sit in the dust. For your days of sitting on a throne have ended. O daughter of Babylonia, never again will you be the lovely princess, tender and delicate. Take heavy millstones and grind flour. Remove your veil, and strip off your robe. Expose yourself to public view. You will be naked and burdened with shame. I will take vengeance against you without pity.” Our Redeemer, whose name is the Lord of Heaven’s Armies, is the Holy One of Israel. “O beautiful Babylon, sit now in darkness and silence. Never again will you be known as the queen of kingdoms. For I was angry with my chosen people and punished them by letting them fall into your hands. But you, Babylon, showed them no mercy. You oppressed even the elderly. You said, ‘I will reign forever as queen of the world!’ You did not reflect on your actions or think about their consequences. “Listen to this, you pleasure-loving kingdom, living at ease and feeling secure. You say, ‘I am the only one, and there is no other. I will never be a widow or lose my children.’ Well, both these things will come upon you in a moment: widowhood and the loss of your children. Yes, these calamities will come upon you, despite all your witchcraft and magic. “You felt secure in your wickedness. ‘No one sees me,’ you said. But your ‘wisdom’ and ‘knowledge’ have led you astray, and you said, ‘I am the only one, and there is no other.’ So disaster will overtake you, and you won’t be able to charm it away. Calamity will fall upon you, and you won’t be able to buy your way out. A catastrophe will strike you suddenly, one for which you are not prepared. “Now use your magical charms! Use the spells you have worked at all these years! Maybe they will do you some good. Maybe they can make someone afraid of you. All the advice you receive has made you tired. Where are all your astrologers, those stargazers who make predictions each month? Let them stand up and save you from what the future holds. But they are like straw burning in a fire; they cannot save themselves from the flame. You will get no help from them at all; their hearth is no place to sit for warmth. And all your friends, those with whom you’ve done business since childhood, will go their own ways, turning a deaf ear to your cries.“
Isaiah 47:1-15 NLT
In the book of Proverbs, we find Wisdom mocking the fool. Here we see something similar as God continues to make commentary on the nations used to pass Judgments upon Israel. As is the downfall of Israel and every other nation, they forget that their are merely stewards of God’s plan. They forget that their power is an extension of his own. Here we see him chastise them and predict their death and destruction. Beyond this, we see him mock them as he tells them to work every magic they have as a sort of test as to their own power and authority. But of course, history tells us that their power was limited, and only for a time. Once they brought in the Jews to captivity, their days became numbered. It was always to be so. But it never had to be that way. Had they treated them with respect, in carrying out their captivity and exile, their kingdoms would’ve thrived. This we’ve seen with Joseph and Nebbedchudnezzar. But whenever one mistakes his own power for God’s and forgets him for their handmade idolatry, they inevitably deal their fate amongst the tombs.
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