A reading from the book of Isaiah.

Woe to those who decree iniquitous decrees, and the writers who keep writing oppression,

to turn aside the needy from justice and to rob the poor of my people of their right,

that widows may be their spoil, and that they may make the fatherless their prey.

What will you do, on the day of punishment, in the ruin that will come from afar?

To whom will you flee for help, and where will you leave your wealth?

Nothing remains but to crouch among the prisoners or fall among the slain.

For all this his anger has not turned away, and his hand is stretched out still.

Woe to Assyria, the rod of my anger, the staff in their hands is my fury.

Against a godless nation I sent him, and against the people

of my wrath, I command him, to take spoil and seize plunder, and to tread them down like the

mire of the streets. But he does not so intend, and his heart does not so think, but it is in his heart to destroy

and to cut off nations not a few. For he says,

Are not my commanders all kings? Is not Kalno like Kerkamesh? Is not Hamath like Arpod?

Is not Samaria like Damascus?

As my hand has reached to the kingdoms of the idols,

whose carved images were greater than those of Jerusalem and Samaria,

shall I not do to Jerusalem and her idols,

as I have done to Samaria and her images.

When the Lord has finished all his work on Mount Zion and on Jerusalem, I have done to Samaria and her images.

When the Lord has finished all his work on Mount Zion and on Jerusalem, he will punish

the speech of the arrogant heart of the King of Assyria and the boastful look in his eyes,

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