Isaiah 13:20 is a prophecy of total desolation. It says that the city of Babylon will become so empty and unwanted that no one will ever settle there again, and that even nomads and shepherds will avoid it. The verse was spoken by the prophet Isaiah, who was writing to the people of Judah and to the wider nations of the ancient Near East, announcing God’s judgment on the proud capital that had dominated the region.
It will never be inhabited, neither will it be lived in from generation to generation. The Arabian will not pitch a tent there, neither will shepherds make their flocks lie down there.
Isaiah 13:20 (WEB)
What Isaiah 13:20 Means
The verse begins with a plain statement: the place “will never be inhabited” and “will not be lived in from generation to generation.” Ancient cities depended on people coming back, rebuilding walls, and passing homes down to their children. Isaiah is saying that Babylon’s story as a living city will end completely, with no family line continuing there.
The second half makes the picture concrete. The Arabian tribes, who moved with their tents across the desert, will not stop there to camp, and shepherds will not bring their flocks to rest in its ruins. Even the people who could survive on the edges of empty land will treat Babylon as a place to pass by. The image is of a site so abandoned that it no longer offers water, shelter, or grazing.
The verse does not promise that Babylon’s people will be restored or that the city will someday be happy again. It is a warning about judgment and a declaration that human pride in power has limits. It describes what God will do, not a formula for how ordinary believers should measure their own safety or success.
The Context of Isaiah 13:20
Isaiah 13 belongs to a section of the book often called the “oracles against the nations,” where the prophet speaks God’s word concerning various peoples and empires. Chapter 13 is a prophecy of judgment against Babylon, which in Isaiah’s time was the great power of the day. The book is traditionally attributed to the eighth-century prophet Isaiah of Jerusalem, though many scholars note later editing, and its first readers were the people of Judah living under the shadow of foreign empires.
The verses just before and after set the scene. Verse 17 speaks of the Medes rising against Babylon, and verse 19 compares the city’s fate to the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. Verses 21 and 22 then describe wild animals taking over the ruins, with jackals, ostriches, and wolves replacing human voices. Read in this setting, verse 20 is the turning point in a sequence that moves from military defeat to total abandonment.
Key Phrases in Isaiah 13:20
Revelation 18:2
He cried with a mighty voice, saying, “Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great, and she has become a habitation of demons, a prison of every unclean spirit, and a prison of every unclean and hateful bird!
(WEB)
This verse in Revelation describes the fall of Babylon in apocalyptic language and echoes Isaiah’s picture of a city become a haunt for wild creatures. Reading the two together shows how the biblical writers used Babylon as a lasting symbol of human pride and divine judgment across the centuries.
Jeremiah 51:37
Babylon will become heaps, a dwelling place for jackals, an astonishment, and a hissing, without inhabitant.
(WEB)
Jeremiah also prophesied Babylon’s ruin, and this verse pictures the city becoming a heap of ruins and a home for jackals. It confirms that the desolation Isaiah described was part of a consistent prophetic message about Babylon’s downfall.
A Short Prayer From Isaiah 13:20
Lord, you see the proud cities of this world and you know how quickly their glory can fade. Keep my heart from trusting in what I build or control. Where I have leaned on my own strength, turn me back to you, and where I feel fear about what is coming, steady me with your presence. Teach me to live faithfully today and to leave the future in your hands, because you alone are the one who judges rightly and remains faithful forever. Amen.
