1: The Master, GOD-of-the-Angel-Armies, is emptying Jerusalem and Judah Of all the basic necessities, plain bread and water to begin with.
2: He's withdrawing police and protection, judges and courts, pastors and teachers,
3: captains and generals, doctors and nurses, and, yes, even the repairmen and jacks-of-all--trades.
4: He says, "I'll put little kids in charge of the city. Schoolboys and schoolgirls will order everyone around.
5: People will be at each other's throats, stabbing one another in the back: Neighbor against neighbor, young against old, the no-account against the well-respected.
6: One brother will grab another and say, "You look like you've got a head on your shoulders. Do something! Get us out of this mess.'
7: And he'll say, "Me? Not me! I don't have a clue. Don't put me in charge of anything.'
8: "Jerusalem's on its last legs. Judah is soon down for the count. Everything people say and do is at cross-purposes with GOD, a slap in my face.
9: Brazen in their depravity, they flout their sins like degenerate Sodom. Doom to their eternal souls! They've made their bed; now they'll sleep in it.
10: "Reassure the righteous that their good living will pay off.
11: But doom to the wicked! Disaster! Everything they did will be done to them.
12: "Skinny kids terrorize my people. Silly girls bully them around. My dear people! Your leaders are taking you down a blind alley. They're sending you off on a wild goose chase."
13: GOD enters the courtroom. He takes his place at the bench to judge his people.
14: GOD calls for order in the court, hauls the leaders of his people into the dock: "You've played havoc with this country. Your houses are stuffed with what you've stolen from the poor.
15: What is this anyway? Stomping on my people, grinding the faces of the poor into the dirt?" That's what the Master, GOD-of-the-Angel-Armies, says.
16: GOD says, "Zion women are stuck-up, prancing around in their high heels, Making eyes at all the men in the street, swinging their hips, Tossing their hair, gaudy and garish in cheap jewelry."
17: The Master will fix it so those Zion women will all turn bald--Scabby, bald--headed women. The Master will do it.
18: The time is coming when the Master will strip them of their fancy baubles--
19: the dangling earrings, anklets and bracelets,
20: combs and mirrors and silk scarves, diamond brooches and pearl necklaces,
21: the rings on their fingers and the rings on their toes,
22: the latest fashions in hats, exotic perfumes and aphrodisiacs, gowns and capes,
23: all the world's finest in fabrics and design.
24: Instead of wearing seductive scents, these women are going to smell like rotting cabbages; Instead of modeling flowing gowns, they'll be sporting rags; Instead of their stylish hairdos, scruffy heads; Instead of beauty marks, scabs and scars.
25: Your finest fighting men will be killed, your soldiers left dead on the battlefield.
26: The entrance gate to Zion will be clotted with people mourning their dead--A city stooped under the weight of her loss, brought to her knees by her sorrows. [JC]