The book of Isaiah
Chapter 1
To really understand the the disaster heading our way substitute
Judah & Israel with United States & America; and Jerusalem with
Washington D.C.
The vision concerning Judah (United States) and Jerusalem
(Washington D.C.) that Isaiah son of Amoz saw during the reigns of Uzziah,
Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah, kings of Judah.
Hear, O heavens! Listen, O earth!
For the LORD has spoken:
"I reared children and brought them up,
but they have rebelled against me.
The ox knows his master,
the donkey his owner's manger,
but Israel (America) does not know,
my people do not understand."
Ah, sinful nation,
a people loaded with guilt,
a brood of evildoers,
children given to corruption!
They have forsaken the LORD;
they have spurned the Holy One of Israel
and turned their backs on him.
Why should you be beaten anymore?
Why do you persist in rebellion?
Your whole head is injured,
your whole heart afflicted.
From the sole of your foot to the top of your head
there is no soundness--
only wounds and welts
and open sores,
not cleansed or bandaged
or soothed with oil.
Your country is desolate,
your cities burned with fire;
your fields are being stripped by foreigners
right before you,
laid waste as when overthrown by strangers.
The Daughter of Zion is left
like a shelter in a vineyard,
like a hut in a field of melons,
like a city under siege.
Unless the LORD Almighty
had left us some survivors,
we would have become like Sodom,
we would have been like Gomorrah.
Hear the word of the LORD,
you rulers of Sodom;
listen to the law of our God,
you people of Gomorrah!
"The multitude of your sacrifices--
what are they to me?" says the LORD.
"I have more than enough of burnt offerings,
of rams and the fat of fattened animals;
I have no pleasure
in the blood of bulls and lambs and goats.
When you come to appear before me,
who has asked this of you,
this trampling of my courts?
Stop bringing meaningless offerings!
Your incense is detestable to me.
New Moons, Sabbaths and convocations--
I cannot bear your evil assemblies.
Your New Moon festivals and your appointed feasts
my soul hates.
They have become a burden to me;
I am weary of bearing them.
When you spread out your hands in prayer,
I will hide my eyes from you;
even if you offer many prayers,
I will not listen.
Your hands are full of blood;
wash and make yourselves clean.
Take your evil deeds
out of my sight!
Stop doing wrong,
learn to do right!
Seek justice,
encourage the oppressed.
Defend the cause of the fatherless,
plead the case of the widow.
"Come now, let us reason together,"
says the LORD.
"Though your sins are like scarlet,
they shall be as white as snow;
though they are red as crimson,
they shall be like wool.
If you are willing and obedient,
you will eat the best from the land;
but if you resist and rebel,
you will be devoured by the sword."
For the mouth of the LORD has spoken.
See how the faithful city
has become a harlot!
She once was full of justice;
righteousness used to dwell in her--
but now murderers!
Your silver has become dross,
your choice wine is diluted with water.
Your rulers are rebels,
companions of thieves;
they all love bribes
and chase after gifts.
They do not defend the cause of the fatherless;
the widow's case does not come before them.
Therefore the Lord, the LORD Almighty,
the Mighty One of Israel, declares:
"Ah, I will get relief from my foes
and avenge myself on my enemies.
I will turn my hand against you;
I will thoroughly purge away your dross
and remove all your impurities.
I will restore your judges as in days of old,
your counselors as at the beginning.
Afterward you will be called
the City of Righteousness,
the Faithful City."
Zion will be redeemed with justice,
her penitent ones with righteousness.
But rebels and sinners will both be broken,
and those who forsake the LORD will perish.
"You will be ashamed because of the sacred oaks
in which you have delighted;
you will be disgraced because of the gardens
that you have chosen.
You will be like an oak with fading leaves,
like a garden without water.
The mighty man will become tinder
and his work a spark;
both will burn together,
with no one to quench the fire."
Chapter 2
This is what Isaiah son of
Amoz saw concerning Judah ( United States) and Jerusalem (Washington D.C.):
In the last days
the mountain of the LORD's temple will be established
as chief among the mountains;
it will be raised above the hills,
and all nations will stream to it.
Many peoples will come and say,
"Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD,
to the house of the God of Jacob.
He will teach us his ways,
so that we may walk in his paths."
The law will go out from Zion,
the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.
He will judge between the nations
and will settle disputes for many peoples.
They will beat their swords into plowshares
and their spears into pruning hooks.
Nation will not take up sword against nation,
nor will they train for war anymore.
Come, O house of Jacob,
let us walk in the light of the LORD.
You have abandoned your people,
the house of Jacob.
They are full of superstitions from the East;
they practice divination like the Philistines
and clasp hands with pagans.
Their land is full of silver and gold;
there is no end to their treasures.
Their land is full of horses;
there is no end to their chariots.
Their land is full of idols;
they bow down to the work of their hands,
to what their fingers have made.
So man will be brought low
and mankind humbled--
do not forgive them.
Go into the rocks,
hide in the ground
from dread of the LORD
and the splendor of his majesty!
The eyes of the arrogant man will be humbled
and the pride of men brought low;
the LORD alone will be exalted in that day.
The LORD Almighty has a day in store
for all the proud and lofty,
for all that is exalted
(and they will be humbled),
for all the cedars of Lebanon, tall and lofty,
and all the oaks of Bashan,
for all the towering mountains
and all the high hills,
for every lofty tower
and every fortified wall,
for every trading ship
and every stately vessel.
The arrogance of man will be brought low
and the pride of men humbled;
the LORD alone will be exalted in that day,
and the idols will totally disappear.
Men will flee to caves in the rocks
and to holes in the ground
from dread of the LORD
and the splendor of his majesty,
when he rises to shake the earth.
In that day men will throw away
to the rodents and bats
their idols of silver and idols of gold,
which they made to worship.
They will flee to caverns in the rocks
and to the overhanging crags
from dread of the LORD
and the splendor of his majesty,
when he rises to shake the earth.
Stop trusting in man,
who has but a breath in his nostrils.
Of what account is he?
Chapter 3
See now, the Lord, the LORD Almighty,
is about to take from Jerusalem (Washington) and Judah (United States) both
supply and support: all supplies of food and all supplies of water, the
hero and warrior, the judge and prophet, the soothsayer and elder, the
captain of fifty and man of rank, the counselor, skilled craftsman and clever
enchanter.
I will make boys their officials; mere children will govern them.
People will oppress each other--man against man, neighbor against
neighbor.
The young will rise up against the old, the base against the honorable.
A man will seize one of his brothers at his father's home, and say,
"You have a cloak, you be our leader;
take charge of this heap of ruins!"
But in that day he will cry out, "I have no remedy. I have no
food or clothing in my house; do not make me the leader of the people."
Jerusalem (Washington) staggers, Judah (America) is falling; their
words and deeds are against the LORD, defying his glorious presence.
The look on their faces testifies against them; they parade their
sin like Sodom; they do not hide it. Woe to them! They have brought disaster upon
themselves.
Tell the righteous it will be well with them, for they will enjoy
the fruit of their deeds.
Woe to the wicked! Disaster is upon them! They will be paid back
for what their hands have done.
Youths oppress my people, women rule over them. O my people, your
guides lead you astray; they turn you from the path.
The LORD takes his place in court; he rises to judge the people.
The LORD enters into judgment against the elders and leaders of his
people: "It is you who have ruined my vineyard; the plunder from the poor
is in your houses.
What do you mean by crushing my people and grinding the faces of
the poor?" declares the Lord, the LORD Almighty.
The LORD says, "The women of Zion (America) are haughty,
walking along with outstretched necks, flirting with their eyes, tripping along
with mincing steps, with ornaments jingling on their ankles.
Therefore the Lord will bring sores on the heads of the women of
Zion (America); the LORD will make their scalps bald."
In that day the Lord will snatch away their finery: the
bangles and headbands and crescent necklaces, the earrings and bracelets
and veils, the headdresses and ankle chains and sashes, the perfume
bottles and charms, the signet rings and nose rings, the fine robes
and the capes and cloaks, the purses and mirrors, and the linen garments
and tiaras and shawls.
Instead of fragrance there will be a stench; instead of a sash, a
rope; instead of well-dressed hair, baldness; instead of fine clothing,
sackcloth; instead of beauty, branding.
Your men will fall by the sword, your warriors in battle.
The gates of Zion (America) will lament and mourn; destitute, she
will sit on the ground.
Chapter 4
In that day seven women will take hold of one
man
and say, "We will eat our own food and provide our own clothes;
only let us be called by your name. Take away our disgrace!"
In that day the Branch of the LORD will be beautiful
and glorious, and the fruit of the land will be the pride and glory of the
survivors in Israel. Those who are left in Zion, who remain in Jerusalem,
will be called holy, all who are recorded among the living in
Jerusalem. The Lord will wash away the filth of the women of Zion; he will
cleanse the bloodstains from Jerusalem by a spirit of judgment and a spirit of
fire. Then the LORD will create over all of Mount Zion and over those who
assemble there a cloud of smoke by day and a glow of flaming fire by night;
over all the glory will be a canopy. It will be a shelter and shade from
the heat of the day, and a refuge and hiding place from the storm and rain.
Chapter 5
I will sing for the one I love
a song about his vineyard:
My loved one had a vineyard
on a fertile hillside.
He dug it up and cleared it of stones
and planted it with the choicest vines.
He built a watchtower in it
and cut out a winepress as well.
Then he looked for a crop of good grapes,
but it yielded only bad fruit.
"Now you dwellers in Jerusalem (Washington) and men of Judah
(United States),
judge between me and my vineyard.
What more could have been done for my vineyard than I have done for
it? When I looked for good grapes, why did it yield only bad?
Now I will tell you what I am going to do to my vineyard: I will
take away its hedge, and it will be destroyed; I will break down its wall, and
it will be trampled.
I will make it a wasteland, neither pruned nor cultivated, and briers
and thorns will grow there. I will command the clouds not to rain on it."
The vineyard of the LORD Almighty is the house of Israel (United
States), and the men of Judah (America) are the garden of his delight. And he
looked for justice, but saw bloodshed; for righteousness, but heard cries of
distress.
Woe to you who add house to house and join field to field till no
space is left and you live alone in the land.
The LORD Almighty has declared in my hearing:
"Surely the great houses will become desolate, the fine mansions left
without occupants.
A ten-acre vineyard will produce only a bath of wine, a homer of
seed only an ephah of grain."
Woe to those who rise early in the morning to run after their
drinks, who stay up late at night till they are inflamed with wine.
They have harps and lyres at their banquets, tambourines and flutes
and wine, but they have no regard for the deeds of the LORD, no respect for the
work of his hands.
Therefore my people will go into exile for lack of understanding;
their men of rank will die of hunger and their masses will be parched with
thirst.
Therefore the grave enlarges its appetite and opens its mouth without
limit; into it will descend their nobles and masses with all their brawlers and
revelers.
So man will be brought low and mankind humbled, the eyes of the
arrogant humbled.
But the LORD Almighty will be exalted by his justice, and the holy
God will show himself holy by his righteousness.
Then sheep will graze as in their own pasture; lambs will feed
among the ruins of the rich.
Woe to those who draw sin along with cords of deceit, and
wickedness as with cart ropes, to those who say, "Let God hurry, let
him hasten his work so we may see it. Let it approach, let the plan of the Holy
One of Israel come, so we may know it."
Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for
light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter.
Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes and clever in their own
sight.
Woe to those who are heroes at drinking wine and champions at
mixing drinks, who acquit the guilty for a bribe, but deny justice to the
innocent.
Therefore, as tongues of fire lick up straw and as dry grass sinks
down in the flames, so their roots will decay and their flowers blow away like
dust; for they have rejected the law of the LORD Almighty and spurned the word
of the Holy One of Israel.
Therefore the LORD's anger burns against his people; his hand is raised
and he strikes them down. The mountains shake, and the dead bodies are like
refuse in the streets.
Yet for all this, his anger is not turned away, his hand is still
upraised. He lifts up a banner for the distant nations, he whistles for those
at the ends of the earth. Here they come, swiftly and speedily!
Not one of them grows tired or stumbles, not one slumbers or
sleeps; not a belt is loosened at the waist, not a sandal thong is broken.
Their arrows are sharp, all their bows are strung; their horses'
hoofs seem like flint, their chariot wheels like a whirlwind.
Their roar is like that of the lion, they roar like young lions;
they growl as they seize their prey and carry it off with no one to rescue.
In that day they will roar over it like the roaring of the sea. And
if one looks at the land, he will see darkness and distress; even the light
will be darkened by the clouds.
Chapter 6
In the year that King Uzziah died, I
saw the Lord seated on a throne, high and exalted, and the train of his robe
filled the temple. Above him were seraphs, each with six wings: With two
wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two
they were flying. And they were calling to one another:
"Holy, holy, holy is the LORD Almighty;
the whole earth is full of his glory."
At the sound of their voices the doorposts and thresholds shook and the temple
was filled with smoke.
"Woe to me!" I cried. "I am ruined! For
I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my
eyes have seen the King, the LORD Almighty."
Then one of the seraphs flew to me with a live coal in
his hand, which he had taken with tongs from the altar. With it he touched
my mouth and said, "See, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken
away and your sin atoned for."
Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, "Whom
shall I send? And who will go for us?"
And I said, "Here am I. Send me!"
He said, "Go and tell this people:
" `Be ever hearing, but never understanding;
be ever seeing, but never perceiving.'
Make the heart of this people calloused;
make their ears dull
and close their eyes.
Otherwise they might see with their eyes,
hear with their ears,
understand with their hearts,
and turn and be healed."
Then I said, "For how long, O Lord?"
And he answered:
"Until the cities lie ruined
and without inhabitant,
until the houses are left deserted
and the fields ruined and ravaged,
until the LORD has sent everyone far away
and the land is utterly forsaken.
And though a tenth remains in the land,
it will again be laid waste.
But as the terebinth and oak
leave stumps when they are cut down,
so the holy seed will be the stump in the land."
Chapter 7
When Ahaz son of Jotham, the son of
Uzziah, was king of Judah, King Rezin of Aram and Pekah son of Remaliah king of
Israel marched up to fight against Jerusalem, but they could not overpower it.
Now the house of David was told, "Aram has allied
itself with Ephraim"; so the hearts of Ahaz and his people were shaken, as
the trees of the forest are shaken by the wind.
Then the LORD said to Isaiah, "Go out, you and
your son Shear-Jashub, to meet Ahaz at the end of the aqueduct of the Upper
Pool, on the road to the Washerman's Field. Say to him, `Be careful, keep
calm and don't be afraid. Do not lose heart because of these two smoldering
stubs of firewood--because of the fierce anger of Rezin and Aram and of the son
of Remaliah. Aram, Ephraim and Remaliah's son have plotted your ruin,
saying, "Let us invade Judah; let us tear it apart and divide it
among ourselves, and make the son of Tabeel king over it." Yet this
is what the Sovereign LORD says:
" `It will not take place,
it will not happen,
for the head of Aram is Damascus,
and the head of Damascus is only Rezin.
Within sixty-five years
Ephraim will be too shattered to be a people.
The head of Ephraim is Samaria,
and the head of Samaria is only Remaliah's son.
If you do not stand firm in your faith,
you will not stand at all.' "
Again the LORD spoke to Ahaz, "Ask the LORD
your God for a sign, whether in the deepest depths or in the highest
heights."
But Ahaz said, "I will not ask; I will not put the
LORD to the test."
Then Isaiah said, "Hear now, you house of David!
Is it not enough to try the patience of men? Will you try the patience of my
God also? Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will
be with child and will give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel. He
will eat curds and honey when he knows enough to reject the wrong and choose
the right. But before the boy knows enough to reject the wrong and choose
the right, the land of the two kings you dread will be laid waste. The
LORD will bring on you and on your people and on the house of your father a
time unlike any since Ephraim broke away from Judah--he will bring the king of
Assyria."
In that day the LORD will whistle for flies from the
distant streams of Egypt and for bees from the land of Assyria. They will
all come and settle in the steep ravines and in the crevices in the rocks, on
all the thornbushes and at all the water holes. In that day the Lord will
use a razor hired from beyond the River--the king of Assyria--to shave your head
and the hair of your legs, and to take off your beards also. In that day,
a man will keep alive a young cow and two goats. And because of the
abundance of the milk they give, he will have curds to eat. All who remain in
the land will eat curds and honey. In that day, in every place where there
were a thousand vines worth a thousand silver shekels, there will be only
briers and thorns. Men will go there with bow and arrow, for the land will
be covered with briers and thorns. As for all the hills once cultivated by
the hoe, you will no longer go there for fear of the briers and thorns; they
will become places where cattle are turned loose and where sheep run.
Chapter8
The LORD said to me, "Take a
large scroll and write on it with an ordinary pen: Maher-Shalal-Hash-Baz. And
I will call in Uriah the priest and Zechariah son of Jeberekiah as reliable
witnesses for me."
Then I went to the prophetess, and she conceived and
gave birth to a son. And the LORD said to me, "Name him
Maher-Shalal-Hash-Baz. Before the boy knows how to say `My father' or `My
mother,' the wealth of Damascus and the plunder of Samaria will be carried off
by the king of Assyria."
The LORD spoke to me again:
"Because this people has rejected
the gently flowing waters of Shiloah
and rejoices over Rezin
and the son of Remaliah,
therefore the Lord is about to bring against them
the mighty floodwaters of the River--
the king of Assyria with all his pomp.
It will overflow all its channels,
run over all its banks
and sweep on into Judah, swirling over it,
passing through it and reaching up to the neck.
Its outspread wings will cover the breadth of your land,
O Immanuel!"
Raise the war cry, you nations, and be shattered!
Listen, all you distant lands.
Prepare for battle, and be shattered!
Prepare for battle, and be shattered!
Devise your strategy, but it will be thwarted;
propose your plan, but it will not stand,
for God is with us.
The LORD spoke to me with his strong hand upon me,
warning me not to follow the way of this people. He said:
"Do not call conspiracy
everything that these people call conspiracy;
do not fear what they fear,
and do not dread it.
The LORD Almighty is the one you are to regard as holy,
he is the one you are to fear,
he is the one you are to dread,
and he will be a sanctuary;
but for both houses of Israel he will be
a stone that causes men to stumble
and a rock that makes them fall.
And for the people of Jerusalem (America) he will be
a trap and a snare.
Many of them will stumble;
they will fall and be broken,
they will be snared and captured."
Bind up the testimony
and seal up the law among my disciples.
I will wait for the LORD,
who is hiding his face from the house of Jacob.
I will put my trust in him.
Here am I, and the children the LORD has given me. We
are signs and symbols in Israel from the LORD Almighty, who dwells on Mount
Zion.
When men tell you to consult mediums and spiritists,
who whisper and mutter, should not a people inquire of their God? Why consult
the dead on behalf of the living? To the law and to the testimony! If they
do not speak according to this word, they have no light of dawn. Distressed
and hungry, they will roam through the land; when they are famished, they will
become enraged and, looking upward, will curse their king and their
God. Then they will look toward the earth and see only distress and
darkness and fearful gloom, and they will be thrust into utter darkness.
Chapter 9
Nevertheless, there will be no more
gloom for those who were in distress. In the past he humbled the land of
Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the future he will honor Galilee of
the Gentiles, by the way of the sea, along the Jordan--
The people walking in darkness
have seen a great light;
on those living in the land of the shadow of death
a light has dawned.
You have enlarged the nation
and increased their joy;
they rejoice before you
as people rejoice at the harvest,
as men rejoice
when dividing the plunder.
For as in the day of Midian's defeat,
you have shattered
the yoke that burdens them,
the bar across their shoulders,
the rod of their oppressor.
Every warrior's boot used in battle
and every garment rolled in blood
will be destined for burning,
will be fuel for the fire.
For to us a child is born,
to us a son is given,
and the government will be on his shoulders.
And he will be called
Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
Of the increase of his government and peace
there will be no end.
He will reign on David's throne
and over his kingdom,
establishing and upholding it
with justice and righteousness
from that time on and forever.
The zeal of the LORD Almighty
will accomplish this.
The Lord has sent a message against Jacob;
it will fall on Israel.
All the people will know it--
Ephraim and the inhabitants of Samaria--
who say with pride
and arrogance of heart,
"The bricks have fallen down,
but we will rebuild with dressed stone;
the fig trees have been felled,
but we will replace them with cedars."
But the LORD has strengthened Rezin's foes against them
and has spurred their enemies on.
Arameans from the east and Philistines from the west
have devoured Israel with open mouth.
Yet for all this, his anger is not turned away,
his hand is still upraised.
But the people have not returned to him who struck them,
nor have they sought the LORD Almighty.
So the LORD will cut off from Israel (United States) both head and
tail,
both palm branch and reed in a single day;
the elders and prominent men are the head,
the prophets who teach lies are the tail.
Those who guide this people mislead them,
and those who are guided are led astray.
Therefore the Lord will take no pleasure in the young men,
nor will he pity the fatherless and widows,
for everyone is ungodly and wicked,
every mouth speaks vileness.
Yet for all this, his anger is not turned away,
his hand is still upraised.
Surely wickedness burns like a fire;
it consumes briers and thorns,
it sets the forest thickets ablaze,
so that it rolls upward in a column of smoke.
By the wrath of the LORD Almighty
the land will be scorched
and the people will be fuel for the fire;
no one will spare his brother.
On the right they will devour,
but still be hungry;
on the left they will eat,
but not be satisfied.
Each will feed on the flesh of his own offspring:
Manasseh will feed on Ephraim, and Ephraim on Manasseh;
together they will turn against Judah.
Yet for all this, his anger is not turned away,
his hand is still upraised.
Chapter 10
Woe to those who make unjust laws,
to those who issue oppressive decrees,
to deprive the poor of their rights
and withhold justice from the oppressed of my people,
making widows their prey
and robbing the fatherless.
What will you do on the day of reckoning,
when disaster comes from afar?
To whom will you run for help?
Where will you leave your riches?
Nothing will remain but to cringe among the captives
or fall among the slain.
Yet for all this, his anger is not turned away,
his hand is still upraised.
"Woe to the Assyrian, the rod of my anger,
in whose hand is the club of my wrath!
I send him against a godless nation,
I dispatch him against a people who anger me,
to seize loot and snatch plunder,
and to trample them down like mud in the streets.
But this is not what he intends,
this is not what he has in mind;
his purpose is to destroy,
to put an end to many nations.
`Are not my commanders all kings?' he says.
`Has not Calno fared like Carchemish?
Is not Hamath like Arpad,
and Samaria like Damascus?
As my hand seized the kingdoms of the idols,
kingdoms whose images excelled those of Jerusalem and
Samaria--
shall I not deal with Jerusalem and her images
as I dealt with Samaria and her idols?' "
When the Lord has finished all his work against Mount
Zion and Jerusalem, he will say, "I will punish the king of Assyria for
the willful pride of his heart and the haughty look in his eyes. For he
says:
" `By the strength of my hand I have done this,
and by my wisdom, because I have understanding.
I removed the boundaries of nations,
I plundered their treasures;
like a mighty one I subdued their kings.
As one reaches into a nest,
so my hand reached for the wealth of the nations;
as men gather abandoned eggs,
so I gathered all the countries;
not one flapped a wing,
or opened its mouth to chirp.' "
Does the ax raise itself above him who swings it,
or the saw boast against him who uses it?
As if a rod were to wield him who lifts it up,
or a club brandish him who is not wood!
Therefore, the Lord, the LORD Almighty,
will send a wasting disease upon his sturdy warriors;
under his pomp a fire will be kindled
like a blazing flame.
The Light of Israel will become a fire,
their Holy One a flame;
in a single day it will burn and consume
his thorns and his briers.
The splendor of his forests and fertile fields
it will completely destroy,
as when a sick man wastes away.
And the remaining trees of his forests will be so few
that a child could write them down.
In that day the remnant of Israel,
the survivors of the house of Jacob,
will no longer rely on him
who struck them down
but will truly rely on the LORD,
the Holy One of Israel.
A remnant will return, a remnant of Jacob
will return to the Mighty God.
Though your people, O Israel (America), be like the sand by the
sea,
only a remnant will return.
Destruction has been decreed,
overwhelming and righteous.
The Lord, the LORD Almighty, will carry out
the destruction decreed upon the whole land.
Therefore, this is what the Lord, the LORD Almighty,
says:
"O my people who live in Zion,
do not be afraid of the Assyrians,
who beat you with a rod
and lift up a club against you, as Egypt did.
Very soon my anger against you will end
and my wrath will be directed to their destruction."
The LORD Almighty will lash them with a whip,
as when he struck down Midian at the rock of Oreb;
and he will raise his staff over the waters,
as he did in Egypt.
In that day their burden will be lifted from your shoulders,
their yoke from your neck;
the yoke will be broken
because you have grown so fat.
They enter Aiath;
they pass through Migron;
they store supplies at Micmash.
They go over the pass, and say,
"We will camp overnight at Geba."
Ramah trembles;
Gibeah of Saul flees.
Cry out, O Daughter of Gallim!
Listen, O Laishah!
Poor Anathoth!
Madmenah is in flight;
the people of Gebim take cover.
This day they will halt at Nob;
they will shake their fist
at the mount of the Daughter of Zion,
at the hill of Jerusalem.
See, the Lord, the LORD Almighty,
will lop off the boughs with great power.
The lofty trees will be felled,
the tall ones will be brought low.
He will cut down the forest thickets with an ax;
Lebanon will fall before the Mighty One.
Chapter 11
A shoot will come up from the stump of
Jesse;
from his roots a Branch will bear fruit.
The Spirit of the LORD will rest on him--
the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding,
the Spirit of counsel and of power,
the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD--
and he will delight in the fear of the LORD.
He will not judge by what he sees with his eyes,
or decide by what he hears with his ears;
but with righteousness he will judge the needy,
with justice he will give decisions for the poor of the
earth.
He will strike the earth with the rod of his mouth;
with the breath of his lips he will slay the wicked.
Righteousness will be his belt
and faithfulness the sash around his waist.
The wolf will live with the lamb,
the leopard will lie down with the goat,
the calf and the lion and the yearling together;
and a little child will lead them.
The cow will feed with the bear,
their young will lie down together,
and the lion will eat straw like the ox.
The infant will play near the hole of the cobra,
and the young child put his hand into the viper's nest.
They will neither harm nor destroy
on all my holy mountain,
for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the LORD
as the waters cover the sea.
In that day the Root of Jesse will stand as a banner
for the peoples; the nations will rally to him, and his place of rest will be
glorious. In that day the Lord will reach out his hand a second time to
reclaim the remnant that is left of his people from Assyria, from Lower Egypt,
from Upper Egypt, from Cush, from Elam, from Babylonia, from Hamath and from
the islands of the sea.
He will raise a banner for the nations
and gather the exiles of Israel;
he will assemble the scattered people of Judah
from the four quarters of the earth.
Ephraim's jealousy will vanish,
and Judah's enemies will be cut off;
Ephraim will not be jealous of Judah,
nor Judah hostile toward Ephraim.
They will swoop down on the slopes of Philistia to the west;
together they will plunder the people to the east.
They will lay hands on Edom and Moab,
and the Ammonites will be subject to them.
The LORD will dry up
the gulf of the Egyptian sea;
with a scorching wind he will sweep his hand
over the Euphrates River.
He will break it up into seven streams
so that men can cross over in sandals.
There will be a highway for the remnant of his people
that is left from Assyria,
as there was for Israel
when they came up from Egypt.
Chapter 12
In that day you will say:
"I will praise you, O LORD.
Although you were angry with me,
your anger has turned away
and you have comforted me.
Surely God is my salvation;
I will trust and not be afraid.
The LORD, the LORD, is my strength and my song;
he has become my salvation."
With joy you will draw water
from the wells of salvation.
In that day you will say:
"Give thanks to the LORD, call on his name;
make known among the nations what he has done,
and proclaim that his name is exalted.
Sing to the LORD, for he has done glorious things;
let this be known to all the world.
Shout aloud and sing for joy, people of Zion,
for great is the Holy One of Israel among you."
Chapter 13
An oracle concerning Babylon
that Isaiah son of Amoz saw:
Raise a banner on a bare hilltop,
shout to them;
beckon to them
to enter the gates of the nobles.
I have commanded my holy ones;
I have summoned my warriors to carry out my wrath--
those who rejoice in my triumph.
Listen, a noise on the mountains,
like that of a great multitude!
Listen, an uproar among the kingdoms,
like nations massing together!
The LORD Almighty is mustering
an army for war.
They come from faraway lands,
from the ends of the heavens--
the LORD and the weapons of his wrath--
to destroy the whole country.
Wail, for the day of the LORD is near;
it will come like destruction from the Almighty.
Because of this, all hands will go limp,
every man's heart will melt.
Terror will seize them,
pain and anguish will grip them;
they will writhe like a woman in labor.
They will look aghast at each other,
their faces aflame.
See, the day of the LORD is coming
--a cruel day, with wrath and fierce anger--
to make the land desolate
and destroy the sinners within it.
The stars of heaven and their constellations
will not show their light.
The rising sun will be darkened
and the moon will not give its light.
I will punish the world for its evil,
the wicked for their sins.
I will put an end to the arrogance of the haughty
and will humble the pride of the ruthless.
I will make man scarcer than pure gold,
more rare than the gold of Ophir.
Therefore I will make the heavens tremble;
and the earth will shake from its place
at the wrath of the LORD Almighty,
in the day of his burning anger.
Like a hunted gazelle,
like sheep without a shepherd,
each will return to his own people,
each will flee to his native land.
Whoever is captured will be thrust through;
all who are caught will fall by the sword.
Their infants will be dashed to pieces before their eyes;
their houses will be looted and their wives ravished.
See, I will stir up against them the Medes,
who do not care for silver
and have no delight in gold.
Their bows will strike down the young men;
they will have no mercy on infants
nor will they look with compassion on children.
Babylon, the jewel of kingdoms,
the glory of the Babylonians' pride,
will be overthrown by God
like Sodom and Gomorrah.
She will never be inhabited
or lived in through all generations;
no Arab will pitch his tent there,
no shepherd will rest his flocks there.
But desert creatures will lie there,
jackals will fill her houses;
there the owls will dwell,
and there the wild goats will leap about.
Hyenas will howl in her strongholds,
jackals in her luxurious palaces.
Her time is at hand,
and her days will not be prolonged.
Chapter 14
The LORD will have compassion on Jacob;
once again he will choose Israel
and will settle them in their own land.
Aliens will join them
and unite with the house of Jacob.
Nations will take them
and bring them to their own place.
And the house of Israel will possess the nations
as menservants and maidservants in the LORD's land.
They will make captives of their captors
and rule over their oppressors.
On the day the LORD gives you relief from suffering and
turmoil and cruel bondage, you will take up this taunt against the king of
Babylon:
How the oppressor has come to an end!
How his fury has ended!
The LORD has broken the rod of the wicked,
the scepter of the rulers,
which in anger struck down peoples
with unceasing blows,
and in fury subdued nations
with relentless aggression.
All the lands are at rest and at peace;
they break into singing.
Even the pine trees and the cedars of Lebanon
exult over you and say,
"Now that you have been laid low,
no woodsman comes to cut us down."
The grave below is all astir
to meet you at your coming;
it rouses the spirits of the departed to greet you--
all those who were leaders in the world;
it makes them rise from their thrones--
all those who were kings over the nations.
They will all respond,
they will say to you,
"You also have become weak, as we are;
you have become like us."
All your pomp has been brought down to the grave,
along with the noise of your harps;
maggots are spread out beneath you
and worms cover you.
How you have fallen from heaven,
O morning star, son of the dawn!
You have been cast down to the earth,
you who once laid low the nations!
You said in your heart,
"I will ascend to heaven;
I will raise my throne
above the stars of God;
I will sit enthroned on the mount of assembly,
on the utmost heights of the sacred mountain.
I will ascend above the tops of the clouds;
I will make myself like the Most High."
But you are brought down to the grave,
to the depths of the pit.
Those who see you stare at you,
they ponder your fate:
"Is this the man who shook the earth
and made kingdoms tremble,
the man who made the world a desert,
who overthrew its cities
and would not let his captives go home?"
All the kings of the nations lie in state,
each in his own tomb.
But you are cast out of your tomb
like a rejected branch;
you are covered with the slain,
with those pierced by the sword,
those who descend to the stones of the pit.
Like a corpse trampled underfoot,
you will not join them in burial,
for you have destroyed your land
and killed your people.
The offspring of the wicked
will never be mentioned again.
Prepare a place to slaughter his sons
for the sins of their forefathers;
they are not to rise to inherit the land
and cover the earth with their cities.
"I will rise up against them,"
declares the LORD Almighty.
"I will cut off from Babylon her name and survivors,
her offspring and descendants,"
declares the LORD.
"I will turn her into a place for owls
and into swampland;
I will sweep her with the broom of destruction,"
declares the LORD Almighty.
The LORD Almighty has sworn,
"Surely, as I have planned, so it will be,
and as I have purposed, so it will stand.
I will crush the Assyrian in my land;
on my mountains I will trample him down.
His yoke will be taken from my people,
and his burden removed from their shoulders."
This is the plan determined for the whole world;
this is the hand stretched out over all nations.
For the LORD Almighty has purposed, and who can thwart him?
His hand is stretched out, and who can turn it back?
This oracle came in the year King Ahaz died:
Do not rejoice, all you Philistines,
that the rod that struck you is broken;
from the root of that snake will spring up a viper,
its fruit will be a darting, venomous serpent.
The poorest of the poor will find pasture,
and the needy will lie down in safety.
But your root I will destroy by famine;
it will slay your survivors.
Wail, O gate! Howl, O city!
Melt away, all you Philistines!
A cloud of smoke comes from the north,
and there is not a straggler in its ranks.
What answer shall be given
to the envoys of that nation?
"The LORD has established Zion,
and in her his afflicted people will find refuge."
Chapter 15
An oracle concerning Moab:
Ar in Moab is ruined,
destroyed in a night!
Kir in Moab is ruined,
destroyed in a night!
Dibon goes up to its temple,
to its high places to weep;
Moab wails over Nebo and Medeba.
Every head is shaved
and every beard cut off.
In the streets they wear sackcloth;
on the roofs and in the public squares
they all wail,
prostrate with weeping.
Heshbon and Elealeh cry out,
their voices are heard all the way to Jahaz.
Therefore the armed men of Moab cry out,
and their hearts are faint.
My heart cries out over Moab;
her fugitives flee as far as Zoar,
as far as Eglath Shelishiyah.
They go up the way to Luhith,
weeping as they go;
on the road to Horonaim
they lament their destruction.
The waters of Nimrim are dried up
and the grass is withered;
the vegetation is gone
and nothing green is left.
So the wealth they have acquired and stored up
they carry away over the Ravine of the Poplars.
Their outcry echoes along the border of Moab;
their wailing reaches as far as Eglaim,
their lamentation as far as Beer Elim.
Dimon's waters are full of blood,
but I will bring still more upon Dimon--
a lion upon the fugitives of Moab
and upon those who remain in the land.
Chapter 16
Send lambs as tribute
to the ruler of the land,
from Sela, across the desert,
to the mount of the Daughter of Zion.
Like fluttering birds
pushed from the nest,
so are the women of Moab
at the fords of the Arnon.
"Give us counsel,
render a decision.
Make your shadow like night--
at high noon.
Hide the fugitives,
do not betray the refugees.
Let the Moabite fugitives stay with you;
be their shelter from the destroyer."
The oppressor will come to an end,
and destruction will cease;
the aggressor will vanish from the land.
In love a throne will be established;
in faithfulness a man will sit on it--
one from the house of David--
one who in judging seeks justice
and speeds the cause of righteousness.
We have heard of Moab's pride--
her overweening pride and conceit,
her pride and her insolence--
but her boasts are empty.
Therefore the Moabites wail,
they wail together for Moab.
Lament and grieve
for the men of Kir Hareseth.
The fields of Heshbon wither,
the vines of Sibmah also.
The rulers of the nations
have trampled down the choicest vines,
which once reached Jazer
and spread toward the desert.
Their shoots spread out
and went as far as the sea.
So I weep, as Jazer weeps,
for the vines of Sibmah.
O Heshbon, O Elealeh,
I drench you with tears!
The shouts of joy over your ripened fruit
and over your harvests have been stilled.
Joy and gladness are taken away from the orchards;
no one sings or shouts in the vineyards;
no one treads out wine at the presses,
for I have put an end to the shouting.
My heart laments for Moab like a harp,
my inmost being for Kir Hareseth.
When Moab appears at her high place,
she only wears herself out;
when she goes to her shrine to pray,
it is to no avail.
This is the word the LORD has already spoken concerning
Moab. But now the LORD says: "Within three years, as a servant bound
by contract would count them, Moab's splendor and all her many people will be
despised, and her survivors will be very few and feeble."
Chapter 17
An oracle concerning
Damascus:
"See, Damascus will no longer be a city
but will become a heap of ruins.
The cities of Aroer will be deserted
and left to flocks, which will lie down,
with no one to make them afraid.
The fortified city will disappear from Ephraim,
and royal power from Damascus;
the remnant of Aram will be
like the glory of the Israelites,"
declares the LORD Almighty.
"In that day the glory of Jacob will fade;
the fat of his body will waste away.
It will be as when a reaper gathers the standing grain
and harvests the grain with his arm--
as when a man gleans heads of grain
in the Valley of Rephaim.
Yet some gleanings will remain,
as when an olive tree is beaten,
leaving two or three olives on the topmost branches,
four or five on the fruitful boughs,"
declares the LORD, the God of Israel.
In that day men will look to their Maker
and turn their eyes to the Holy One of Israel.
They will not look to the altars,
the work of their hands,
and they will have no regard for the Asherah poles
and the incense altars their fingers have made.
In that day their strong cities, which they left because
of the Israelites, will be like places abandoned to thickets and undergrowth.
And all will be desolation.
You have forgotten God your Savior;
you have not remembered the Rock, your fortress.
Therefore, though you set out the finest plants
and plant imported vines,
though on the day you set them out, you make them grow,
and on the morning when you plant them, you bring them to
bud,
yet the harvest will be as nothing
in the day of disease and incurable pain.
Oh, the raging of many nations--
they rage like the raging sea!
Oh, the uproar of the peoples--
they roar like the roaring of great waters!
Although the peoples roar like the roar of surging waters,
when he rebukes them they flee far away,
driven before the wind like chaff on the hills,
like tumbleweed before a gale.
In the evening, sudden terror!
Before the morning, they are gone!
This is the portion of those who loot us,
the lot of those who plunder us.
Chapter 18
Woe to the land of whirring wings
along the rivers of Cush,
which sends envoys by sea
in papyrus boats over the water.
Go, swift messengers,
to a people tall and smooth-skinned,
to a people feared far and wide,
an aggressive nation of strange speech,
whose land is divided by rivers.
All you people of the world,
you who live on the earth,
when a banner is raised on the mountains,
you will see it,
and when a trumpet sounds,
you will hear it.
This is what the LORD says to me:
"I will remain quiet and will look on from my dwelling
place,
like shimmering heat in the sunshine,
like a cloud of dew in the heat of harvest."
For, before the harvest, when the blossom is gone
and the flower becomes a ripening grape,
he will cut off the shoots with pruning knives,
and cut down and take away the spreading branches.
They will all be left to the mountain birds of prey
and to the wild animals;
the birds will feed on them all summer,
the wild animals all winter.
At that time gifts will be brought to the LORD Almighty
from a people tall and smooth-skinned,
from a people feared far and wide,
an aggressive nation of strange speech,
whose land is divided by rivers--
the gifts will be brought to Mount Zion, the place of the Name of the LORD
Almighty.
Chapter 19
An oracle concerning Egypt:
See, the LORD rides on a swift cloud
and is coming to Egypt.
The idols of Egypt tremble before him,
and the hearts of the Egyptians melt within them.
"I will stir up Egyptian against Egyptian--
brother will fight against brother,
neighbor against neighbor,
city against city,
kingdom against kingdom.
The Egyptians will lose heart,
and I will bring their plans to nothing;
they will consult the idols and the spirits of the dead,
the mediums and the spiritists.
I will hand the Egyptians over
to the power of a cruel master,
and a fierce king will rule over them,"
declares the Lord, the LORD Almighty.
The waters of the river will dry up,
and the riverbed will be parched and dry.
The canals will stink;
the streams of Egypt will dwindle and dry up.
The reeds and rushes will wither,
also the plants along the Nile,
at the mouth of the river.
Every sown field along the Nile
will become parched, will blow away and be no more.
The fishermen will groan and lament,
all who cast hooks into the Nile;
those who throw nets on the water
will pine away.
Those who work with combed flax will despair,
the weavers of fine linen will lose hope.
The workers in cloth will be dejected,
and all the wage earners will be sick at heart.
The officials of Zoan are nothing but fools;
the wise counselors of Pharaoh give senseless advice.
How can you say to Pharaoh,
"I am one of the wise men,
a disciple of the ancient kings"?
Where are your wise men now?
Let them show you and make known
what the LORD Almighty
has planned against Egypt.
The officials of Zoan have become fools,
the leaders of Memphis are deceived;
the cornerstones of her peoples
have led Egypt astray.
The LORD has poured into them
a spirit of dizziness;
they make Egypt stagger in all that she does,
as a drunkard staggers around in his vomit.
There is nothing Egypt can do--
head or tail, palm branch or reed.
In that day the Egyptians will be like women. They will
shudder with fear at the uplifted hand that the LORD Almighty raises against
them. And the land of Judah will bring terror to the Egyptians; everyone
to whom Judah is mentioned will be terrified, because of what the LORD Almighty
is planning against them.
In that day five cities in Egypt will speak the
language of Canaan and swear allegiance to the LORD Almighty. One of them will
be called the City of Destruction.
In that day there will be an altar to the LORD in the
heart of Egypt, and a monument to the LORD at its border. It will be a
sign and witness to the LORD Almighty in the land of Egypt. When they cry out
to the LORD because of their oppressors, he will send them a savior and
defender, and he will rescue them. So the LORD will make himself known to
the Egyptians, and in that day they will acknowledge the LORD. They will
worship with sacrifices and grain offerings; they will make vows to the LORD
and keep them. The LORD will strike Egypt with a plague; he will strike
them and heal them. They will turn to the LORD, and he will respond to their
pleas and heal them.
In that day there will be a highway from Egypt to
Assyria. The Assyrians will go to Egypt and the Egyptians to Assyria. The
Egyptians and Assyrians will worship together. In that day Israel will be
the third, along with Egypt and Assyria, a blessing on the earth. The LORD
Almighty will bless them, saying, "Blessed be Egypt my people, Assyria my
handiwork, and Israel my inheritance."
Chapter 20
In the year that the supreme
commander, sent by Sargon king of Assyria, came to Ashdod and attacked and
captured it-- at that time the LORD spoke through Isaiah son of Amoz. He
said to him, "Take off the sackcloth from your body and the sandals from
your feet." And he did so, going around stripped and barefoot.
Then the LORD said, "Just as my servant Isaiah has
gone stripped and barefoot for three years, as a sign and portent against Egypt
and Cush, so the king of Assyria will lead away stripped and barefoot the
Egyptian captives and Cushite exiles, young and old, with buttocks bared--to
Egypt's shame. Those who trusted in Cush and boasted in Egypt will be
afraid and put to shame. In that day the people who live on this coast
will say, `See what has happened to those we relied on, those we fled to for
help and deliverance from the king of Assyria! How then can we escape?' "
Chapter 21
An oracle concerning the
Desert by the Sea:
Like whirlwinds sweeping through the southland,
an invader comes from the desert,
from a land of terror.
A dire vision has been shown to me:
The traitor betrays, the looter takes loot.
Elam, attack! Media, lay siege!
I will bring to an end all the groaning she caused.
At this my body is racked with pain,
pangs seize me, like those of a woman in labor;
I am staggered by what I hear,
I am bewildered by what I see.
My heart falters,
fear makes me tremble;
the twilight I longed for
has become a horror to me.
They set the tables,
they spread the rugs,
they eat, they drink!
Get up, you officers,
oil the shields!
This is what the Lord says to me:
"Go, post a lookout
and have him report what he sees.
When he sees chariots
with teams of horses,
riders on donkeys
or riders on camels,
let him be alert,
fully alert."
And the lookout shouted,
"Day after day, my lord, I stand on the watchtower;
every night I stay at my post.
Look, here comes a man in a chariot
with a team of horses.
And he gives back the answer:
`Babylon has fallen, has fallen!
All the images of its gods
lie shattered on the ground!' "
O my people, crushed on the threshing floor,
I tell you what I have heard
from the LORD Almighty,
from the God of Israel.
An oracle concerning Dumah:
Someone calls to me from Seir,
"Watchman, what is left of the night?
Watchman, what is left of the night?"
The watchman replies,
"Morning is coming, but also the night.
If you would ask, then ask;
and come back yet again."
An oracle concerning Arabia:
You caravans of Dedanites,
who camp in the thickets of Arabia,
bring water for the thirsty;
you who live in Tema,
bring food for the fugitives.
They flee from the sword,
from the drawn sword,
from the bent bow
and from the heat of battle.
This is what the Lord says to me: "Within one year,
as a servant bound by contract would count it, all the pomp of Kedar will come
to an end. The survivors of the bowmen, the warriors of Kedar, will be
few." The LORD, the God of Israel, has spoken.
Chapter 22
An oracle concerning the
Valley of Vision:
What troubles you now,
that you have all gone up on the roofs,
O town full of commotion,
O city of tumult and revelry?
Your slain were not killed by the sword,
nor did they die in battle.
All your leaders have fled together;
they have been captured without using the bow.
All you who were caught were taken prisoner together,
having fled while the enemy was still far away.
Therefore I said, "Turn away from me;
let me weep bitterly.
Do not try to console me
over the destruction of my people."
The Lord, the LORD Almighty, has a day
of tumult and trampling and terror
in the Valley of Vision,
a day of battering down walls
and of crying out to the mountains.
Elam takes up the quiver,
with her charioteers and horses;
Kir uncovers the shield.
Your choicest valleys are full of chariots,
and horsemen are posted at the city gates;
the defenses of Judah are stripped away.
And you looked in that day
to the weapons in the Palace of the Forest;
you saw that the City of David
had many breaches in its defenses;
you stored up water
in the Lower Pool.
You counted the buildings in Jerusalem
and tore down houses to strengthen the wall.
You built a reservoir between the two walls
for the water of the Old Pool,
but you did not look to the One who made it,
or have regard for the One who planned it long ago.
The Lord, the LORD Almighty,
called you on that day
to weep and to wail,
to tear out your hair and put on sackcloth.
But see, there is joy and revelry,
slaughtering of cattle and killing of sheep,
eating of meat and drinking of wine!
"Let us eat and drink," you say,
"for tomorrow we die!"
The LORD Almighty has revealed this in my hearing:
"Till your dying day this sin will not be atoned for," says the Lord,
the LORD Almighty.
This is what the Lord, the LORD Almighty, says:
"Go, say to this steward,
to Shebna, who is in charge of the palace:
What are you doing here and who gave you permission
to cut out a grave for yourself here,
hewing your grave on the height
and chiseling your resting place in the rock?
"Beware, the LORD is about to take firm hold of you
and hurl you away, O you mighty man.
He will roll you up tightly like a ball
and throw you into a large country.
There you will die
and there your splendid chariots will remain--
you disgrace to your master's house!
I will depose you from your office,
and you will be ousted from your position.
"In that day I will summon my servant, Eliakim son
of Hilkiah. I will clothe him with your robe and fasten your sash around
him and hand your authority over to him. He will be a father to those who live
in Jerusalem and to the house of Judah. I will place on his shoulder the
key to the house of David; what he opens no one can shut, and what he shuts no
one can open. I will drive him like a peg into a firm place; he will be a
seat of honor for the house of his father. All the glory of his family
will hang on him: its offspring and offshoots--all its lesser vessels, from the
bowls to all the jars.
"In that day," declares the LORD Almighty,
"the peg driven into the firm place will give way; it will be sheared off
and will fall, and the load hanging on it will be cut down." The LORD has
spoken.
Chapter 23
An oracle concerning Tyre:
Wail, O ships of Tarshish!
For Tyre is destroyed
and left without house or harbor.
From the land of Cyprus
word has come to them.
Be silent, you people of the island
and you merchants of Sidon,
whom the seafarers have enriched.
On the great waters
came the grain of the Shihor;
the harvest of the Nile was the revenue of Tyre,
and she became the marketplace of the nations.
Be ashamed, O Sidon, and you, O fortress of the sea,
for the sea has spoken:
"I have neither been in labor nor given birth;
I have neither reared sons nor brought up daughters."
When word comes to Egypt,
they will be in anguish at the report from Tyre.
Cross over to Tarshish;
wail, you people of the island.
Is this your city of revelry,
the old, old city,
whose feet have taken her
to settle in far-off lands?
Who planned this against Tyre,
the bestower of crowns,
whose merchants are princes,
whose traders are renowned in the earth?
The LORD Almighty planned it,
to bring low the pride of all glory
and to humble all who are renowned on the earth.
Till your land as along the Nile,
O Daughter of Tarshish,
for you no longer have a harbor.
The LORD has stretched out his hand over the sea
and made its kingdoms tremble.
He has given an order concerning Phoenicia
that her fortresses be destroyed.
He said, "No more of your reveling,
O Virgin Daughter of Sidon, now crushed!
"Up, cross over to Cyprus;
even there you will find no rest."
Look at the land of the Babylonians,
this people that is now of no account!
The Assyrians have made it
a place for desert creatures;
they raised up their siege towers,
they stripped its fortresses bare
and turned it into a ruin.
Wail, you ships of Tarshish;
your fortress is destroyed!
At that time Tyre will be forgotten for seventy years,
the span of a king's life. But at the end of these seventy years, it will
happen to Tyre as in the song of the prostitute:
"Take up a harp, walk through the city,
O prostitute forgotten;
play the harp well, sing many a song,
so that you will be remembered."
At the end of seventy years, the LORD will deal with
Tyre. She will return to her hire as a prostitute and will ply her trade with
all the kingdoms on the face of the earth. Yet her profit and her earnings
will be set apart for the LORD; they will not be stored up or hoarded. Her
profits will go to those who live before the LORD, for abundant food and fine
clothes.
Chapter 24
See, the LORD is going to lay waste the
earth
and devastate it;
he will ruin its face
and scatter its inhabitants--
it will be the same
for priest as for people,
for master as for servant,
for mistress as for maid,
for seller as for buyer,
for borrower as for lender,
for debtor as for creditor.
The earth will be completely laid waste
and totally plundered.
The LORD has spoken this word.
The earth dries up and withers,
the world languishes and withers,
the exalted of the earth languish.
The earth is defiled by its people;
they have disobeyed the laws,
violated the statutes
and broken the everlasting covenant.
Therefore a curse consumes the earth;
its people must bear their guilt.
Therefore earth's inhabitants are burned up,
and very few are left.
The new wine dries up and the vine withers;
all the merrymakers groan.
The gaiety of the tambourines is stilled,
the noise of the revelers has stopped,
the joyful harp is silent.
No longer do they drink wine with a song;
the beer is bitter to its drinkers.
The ruined city lies desolate;
the entrance to every house is barred.
In the streets they cry out for wine;
all joy turns to gloom,
all gaiety is banished from the earth.
The city is left in ruins,
its gate is battered to pieces.
So will it be on the earth
and among the nations,
as when an olive tree is beaten,
or as when gleanings are left after the grape harvest.
They raise their voices, they shout for joy;
from the west they acclaim the LORD's majesty.
Therefore in the east give glory to the LORD;
exalt the name of the LORD, the God of Israel,
in the islands of the sea.
From the ends of the earth we hear singing:
"Glory to the Righteous One."
But I said, "I waste away, I waste away!
Woe to me!
The treacherous betray!
With treachery the treacherous betray!"
Terror and pit and snare await you,
O people of the earth.
Whoever flees at the sound of terror
will fall into a pit;
whoever climbs out of the pit
will be caught in a snare.
The floodgates of the heavens are opened,
the foundations of the earth shake.
The earth is broken up,
the earth is split asunder,
the earth is thoroughly shaken.
The earth reels like a drunkard,
it sways like a hut in the wind;
so heavy upon it is the guilt of its rebellion
that it falls--never to rise again.
In that day the LORD will punish
the powers in the heavens above
and the kings on the earth below.
They will be herded together
like prisoners bound in a dungeon;
they will be shut up in prison
and be punished after many days.
The moon will be abashed, the sun ashamed;
for the LORD Almighty will reign
on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem,
and before its elders, gloriously.
Chapter 25
O LORD, you are my God;
I will exalt you and praise your name,
for in perfect faithfulness
you have done marvelous things,
things planned long ago.
You have made the city a heap of rubble,
the fortified town a ruin,
the foreigners' stronghold a city no more;
it will never be rebuilt.
Therefore strong peoples will honor you;
cities of ruthless nations will revere you.
You have been a refuge for the poor,
a refuge for the needy in his distress,
a shelter from the storm
and a shade from the heat.
For the breath of the ruthless
is like a storm driving against a wall
and like the heat of the desert.
You silence the uproar of foreigners;
as heat is reduced by the shadow of a cloud,
so the song of the ruthless is stilled.
On this mountain the LORD Almighty will prepare
a feast of rich food for all peoples,
a banquet of aged wine--
the best of meats and the finest of wines.
On this mountain he will destroy
the shroud that enfolds all peoples,
the sheet that covers all nations;
he will swallow up death forever.
The Sovereign LORD will wipe away the tears
from all faces;
he will remove the disgrace of his people
from all the earth.
The LORD has spoken.
In that day they will say,
"Surely this is our God;
we trusted in him, and he saved us.
This is the LORD, we trusted in him;
let us rejoice and be glad in his salvation."
The hand of the LORD will rest on this mountain;
but Moab will be trampled under him
as straw is trampled down in the manure.
They will spread out their hands in it,
as a swimmer spreads out his hands to swim.
God will bring down their pride
despite the cleverness of their hands.
He will bring down your high fortified walls
and lay them low;
he will bring them down to the ground,
to the very dust.
Chapter 26
In that day this song will
be sung in the land of Judah:
We have a strong city;
God makes salvation
its walls and ramparts.
Open the gates
that the righteous nation may enter,
the nation that keeps faith.
You will keep in perfect peace
him whose mind is steadfast,
because he trusts in you.
Trust in the LORD forever,
for the LORD, the LORD, is the Rock eternal.
He humbles those who dwell on high,
he lays the lofty city low;
he levels it to the ground
and casts it down to the dust.
Feet trample it down--
the feet of the oppressed,
the footsteps of the poor.
The path of the righteous is level;
O upright One, you make the way of the righteous smooth.
Yes, LORD, walking in the way of your laws,
we wait for you;
your name and renown
are the desire of our hearts.
My soul yearns for you in the night;
in the morning my spirit longs for you.
When your judgments come upon the earth,
the people of the world learn righteousness.
Though grace is shown to the wicked,
they do not learn righteousness;
even in a land of uprightness they go on doing evil
and regard not the majesty of the LORD.
O LORD, your hand is lifted high,
but they do not see it.
Let them see your zeal for your people and be put to shame;
let the fire reserved for your enemies consume them.
LORD, you establish peace for us;
all that we have accomplished you have done for us.
O LORD, our God, other lords besides you have ruled over us,
but your name alone do we honor.
They are now dead, they live no more;
those departed spirits do not rise.
You punished them and brought them to ruin;
you wiped out all memory of them.
You have enlarged the nation, O LORD;
you have enlarged the nation.
You have gained glory for yourself;
you have extended all the borders of the land.
LORD, they came to you in their distress;
when you disciplined them,
they could barely whisper a prayer.
As a woman with child and about to give birth
writhes and cries out in her pain,
so were we in your presence, O LORD.
We were with child, we writhed in pain,
but we gave birth to wind.
We have not brought salvation to the earth;
we have not given birth to people of the world.
But your dead will live;
their bodies will rise.
You who dwell in the dust,
wake up and shout for joy.
Your dew is like the dew of the morning;
the earth will give birth to her dead.
Go, my people, enter your rooms
and shut the doors behind you;
hide yourselves for a little while
until his wrath has passed by.
See, the LORD is coming out of his dwelling
to punish the people of the earth for their sins.
The earth will disclose the blood shed upon her;
she will conceal her slain no longer.
Chapter 27
In that day,
the LORD will punish with his sword,
his fierce, great and powerful sword,
Leviathan the gliding serpent,
Leviathan the coiling serpent;
he will slay the monster of the sea.
In that day--
"Sing about a fruitful vineyard:
I, the LORD, watch over it;
I water it continually.
I guard it day and night
so that no one may harm it.
I am not angry.
If only there were briers and thorns confronting me!
I would march against them in battle;
I would set them all on fire.
Or else let them come to me for refuge;
let them make peace with me,
yes, let them make peace with me."
In days to come Jacob will take root,
Israel will bud and blossom
and fill all the world with fruit.
Has the LORD struck her
as he struck down those who struck her?
Has she been killed
as those were killed who killed her?
By warfare and exile you contend with her--
with his fierce blast he drives her out,
as on a day the east wind blows.
By this, then, will Jacob's guilt be atoned for,
and this will be the full fruitage of the removal of his
sin:
When he makes all the altar stones
to be like chalk stones crushed to pieces,
no Asherah poles or incense altars
will be left standing.
The fortified city stands desolate,
an abandoned settlement, forsaken like the desert;
there the calves graze,
there they lie down;
they strip its branches bare.
When its twigs are dry, they are broken off
and women come and make fires with them.
For this is a people without understanding;
so their Maker has no compassion on them,
and their Creator shows them no favor.
In that day the LORD will thresh from the flowing
Euphrates to the Wadi of Egypt, and you, O Israelites, will be gathered up one
by one. And in that day a great trumpet will sound. Those who were perishing in
Assyria and those who were exiled in Egypt will come and worship the LORD on
the holy mountain in Jerusalem.
Chapter 28
Woe to that wreath, the pride of
Ephraim's drunkards,
to the fading flower, his glorious beauty,
set on the head of a fertile valley--
to that city, the pride of those laid low by wine!
See, the Lord has one who is powerful and strong.
Like a hailstorm and a destructive wind,
like a driving rain and a flooding downpour,
he will throw it forcefully to the ground.
That wreath, the pride of Ephraim's drunkards,
will be trampled underfoot.
That fading flower, his glorious beauty,
set on the head of a fertile valley,
will be like a fig ripe before harvest--
as soon as someone sees it and takes it in his hand,
he swallows it.
In that day the LORD Almighty
will be a glorious crown,
a beautiful wreath
for the remnant of his people.
He will be a spirit of justice
to him who sits in judgment,
a source of strength
to those who turn back the battle at the gate.
And these also stagger from wine
and reel from beer:
Priests and prophets stagger from beer
and are befuddled with wine;
they reel from beer,
they stagger when seeing visions,
they stumble when rendering decisions.
All the tables are covered with vomit
and there is not a spot without filth.
"Who is it he is trying to teach?
To whom is he explaining his message?
To children weaned from their milk,
to those just taken from the breast?
For it is:
Do and do, do and do,
rule on rule, rule on rule;
a little here, a little there."
Very well then, with foreign lips and strange tongues
God will speak to this people,
to whom he said,
"This is the resting place, let the weary rest";
and, "This is the place of repose"--
but they would not listen.
So then, the word of the LORD to them will become:
Do and do, do and do,
rule on rule, rule on rule;
a little here, a little there--
so that they will go and fall backward,
be injured and snared and captured.
Therefore hear the word of the LORD, you scoffers
who rule this people in Jerusalem (Washington D.C.).
You boast, "We have entered into a covenant with death,
with the grave we have made an agreement.
When an overwhelming scourge sweeps by,
it cannot touch us,
for we have made a lie our refuge
and falsehood our hiding place."
So this is what the Sovereign LORD says:
"See, I lay a stone in Zion,
a tested stone,
a precious cornerstone for a sure foundation;
the one who trusts will never be dismayed.
I will make justice the measuring line
and righteousness the plumb line;
hail will sweep away your refuge, the lie,
and water will overflow your hiding place.
Your covenant with death will be annulled;
your agreement with the grave will not stand.
When the overwhelming scourge sweeps by,
you will be beaten down by it.
As often as it comes it will carry you away;
morning after morning, by day and by night,
it will sweep through."
The understanding of this message
will bring sheer terror.
The bed is too short to stretch out on,
the blanket too narrow to wrap around you.
The LORD will rise up as he did at Mount Perazim,
he will rouse himself as in the Valley of Gibeon--
to do his work, his strange work,
and perform his task, his alien task.
Now stop your mocking,
or your chains will become heavier;
the Lord, the LORD Almighty, has told me
of the destruction decreed against the whole land.
Listen and hear my voice;
pay attention and hear what I say.
When a farmer plows for planting, does he plow continually?
Does he keep on breaking up and harrowing the soil?
When he has leveled the surface,
does he not sow caraway and scatter cummin?
Does he not plant wheat in its place,
barley in its plot,
and spelt in its field?
His God instructs him
and teaches him the right way.
Caraway is not threshed with a sledge,
nor is a cartwheel rolled over cummin;
caraway is beaten out with a rod,
and cummin with a stick.
Grain must be ground to make bread;
so one does not go on threshing it forever.
Though he drives the wheels of his threshing cart over it,
his horses do not grind it.
All this also comes from the LORD Almighty,
wonderful in counsel and magnificent in wisdom.
Chapter 29
ISA 29:1 Woe to you, Ariel, Ariel,
the city where David settled!
Add year to year
and let your cycle of festivals go on.
ISA 29:2 Yet I will besiege Ariel;
she will mourn and lament,
she will be to me like an altar hearth.
ISA 29:3 I will encamp against you all around;
I will encircle you with towers
and set up my siege works against you.
ISA 29:4 Brought low, you will speak from the ground;
your speech will mumble out of the dust.
Your voice will come ghostlike from the earth;
out of the dust your speech will whisper.
ISA 29:5 But your many enemies will become like fine dust,
the ruthless hordes like blown chaff.
Suddenly, in an instant,
ISA 29:6 the LORD Almighty will come
with thunder and earthquake and great noise,
with windstorm and tempest and flames of a devouring fire.
ISA 29:7 Then the hordes of all the nations that fight against Ariel,
that attack her and her fortress and besiege her,
will be as it is with a dream,
with a vision in the night--
ISA 29:8 as when a hungry man dreams that he is eating,
but he awakens, and his hunger remains;
as when a thirsty man dreams that he is drinking,
but he awakens faint, with his thirst unquenched.
So will it be with the hordes of all the nations
that fight against Mount Zion.
ISA 29:9 Be stunned and amazed,
blind yourselves and be sightless;
be drunk, but not from wine,
stagger, but not from beer.
ISA 29:10 The LORD has brought over you a deep sleep:
He has sealed your eyes (the prophets);
he has covered your heads (the seers).
ISA 29:11 For you this whole vision is nothing but words
sealed in a scroll. And if you give the scroll to someone who can read, and say
to him, "Read this, please," he will answer, "I can't; it is
sealed." 12 Or if you give the scroll to someone who cannot read, and say,
"Read this, please," he will answer, "I don't know how to
read."
ISA 29:13 The Lord says:
"These people come near to me with their mouth
and honor me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
Their worship of me
is made up only of rules taught by men.
ISA 29:14 Therefore once more I will astound these people
with wonder upon wonder;
the wisdom of the wise will perish,
the intelligence of the intelligent will vanish."
ISA 29:15 Woe to those who go to great depths
to hide their plans from the LORD,
who do their work in darkness and think,
"Who sees us? Who will know?"
ISA 29:16 You turn things upside down,
as if the potter were thought to be like the clay!
Shall what is formed say to him who formed it,
"He did not make me"?
Can the pot say of the potter,
"He knows nothing"?
ISA 29:17 In a very short time, will not Lebanon be turned into a
fertile field
and the fertile field seem like a forest?
ISA 29:18 In that day the deaf will hear the words of the scroll,
and out of gloom and darkness
the eyes of the blind will see.
ISA 29:19 Once more the humble will rejoice in the LORD;
the needy will rejoice in the Holy One of Israel.
ISA 29:20 The ruthless will vanish,
the mockers will disappear,
and all who have an eye for evil will be cut down--
ISA 29:21 those who with a word make a man out to be guilty,
who ensnare the defender in court
and with false testimony deprive the innocent of justice.
ISA 29:22 Therefore this is what the LORD, who redeemed
Abraham, says to the house of Jacob:
"No longer will Jacob be ashamed;
no longer will their faces grow pale.
ISA 29:23 When they see among them their children,
the work of my hands,
they will keep my name holy;
they will acknowledge the holiness of the Holy One of Jacob,
and will stand in awe of the God of Israel.
ISA 29:24 Those who are wayward in spirit will gain understanding;
those who complain will accept instruction."
Chapter 30
ISA 30:1 "Woe to the obstinate
children,"
declares the LORD,
"to those who carry out plans that are not mine,
forming an alliance, but not by my Spirit,
heaping sin upon sin;
ISA 30:2 who go down to Egypt
without consulting me;
who look for help to Pharaoh's protection,
to Egypt's shade for refuge.
ISA 30:3 But Pharaoh's protection will be to your shame,
Egypt's shade will bring you disgrace.
ISA 30:4 Though they have officials in Zoan
and their envoys have arrived in Hanes,
ISA 30:5 everyone will be put to shame
because of a people useless to them,
who bring neither help nor advantage,
but only shame and disgrace."
ISA 30:6 An oracle concerning the animals of the Negev:
Through a land of hardship and distress,
of lions and lionesses,
of adders and darting snakes,
the envoys carry their riches on donkeys' backs,
their treasures on the humps of camels,
to that unprofitable nation,
ISA 30:7 to Egypt, whose help is utterly useless.
Therefore I call her
Rahab the Do-Nothing.
ISA 30:8 Go now, write it on a tablet for them,
inscribe it on a scroll,
that for the days to come
it may be an everlasting witness.
ISA 30:9 These are rebellious people, deceitful children,
children unwilling to listen to the LORD's instruction.
ISA 30:10 They say to the seers,
"See no more visions!"
and to the prophets,
"Give us no more visions of what is right!
Tell us pleasant things,
prophesy illusions.
ISA 30:11 Leave this way,
get off this path,
and stop confronting us
with the Holy One of Israel!"
ISA 30:12 Therefore, this is what the Holy One of Israel
says:
"Because you have rejected this message,
relied on oppression
and depended on deceit,
ISA 30:13 this sin will become for you
like a high wall, cracked and bulging,
that collapses suddenly, in an instant.
ISA 30:14 It will break in pieces like pottery,
shattered so mercilessly
that among its pieces not a fragment will be found
for taking coals from a hearth
or scooping water out of a cistern."
ISA 30:15 This is what the Sovereign LORD, the Holy One of
Israel, says:
"In repentance and rest is your salvation,
in quietness and trust is your strength,
but you would have none of it.
ISA 30:16 You said, `No, we will flee on horses.'
Therefore you will flee!
You said, `We will ride off on swift horses.'
Therefore your pursuers will be swift!
ISA 30:17 A thousand will flee
at the threat of one;
at the threat of five
you will all flee away,
till you are left
like a flagstaff on a mountaintop,
like a banner on a hill."
ISA 30:18 Yet the LORD longs to be gracious to you;
he rises to show you compassion.
For the LORD is a God of justice.
Blessed are all who wait for him!
ISA 30:19 O people of Zion, who live in Jerusalem, you will
weep no more. How gracious he will be when you cry for help! As soon as he
hears, he will answer you. 20 Although the Lord gives you the bread of
adversity and the water of affliction, your teachers will be hidden no more;
with your own eyes you will see them. 21 Whether you turn to the right or to
the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, "This is the
way; walk in it." 22 Then you will defile your idols overlaid with silver
and your images covered with gold; you will throw them away like a menstrual
cloth and say to them, "Away with you!"
ISA 30:23 He will also send you rain for the seed you sow in
the ground, and the food that comes from the land will be rich and plentiful.
In that day your cattle will graze in broad meadows. 24 The oxen and donkeys
that work the soil will eat fodder and mash, spread out with fork and shovel.
25 In the day of great slaughter, when the towers fall, streams of water will
flow on every high mountain and every lofty hill. 26 The moon will shine like
the sun, and the sunlight will be seven times brighter, like the light of seven
full days, when the LORD binds up the bruises of his people and heals the
wounds he inflicted.
ISA 30:27 See, the Name of the LORD comes from afar,
with burning anger and dense clouds of smoke;
his lips are full of wrath,
and his tongue is a consuming fire.
ISA 30:28 His breath is like a rushing torrent,
rising up to the neck.
He shakes the nations in the sieve of destruction;
he places in the jaws of the peoples
a bit that leads them astray.
ISA 30:29 And you will sing
as on the night you celebrate a holy festival;
your hearts will rejoice
as when people go up with flutes
to the mountain of the LORD,
to the Rock of Israel.
ISA 30:30 The LORD will cause men to hear his majestic voice
and will make them see his arm coming down
with raging anger and consuming fire,
with cloudburst, thunderstorm and hail.
ISA 30:31 The voice of the LORD will shatter Assyria;
with his scepter he will strike them down.
ISA 30:32 Every stroke the LORD lays on them
with his punishing rod
will be to the music of tambourines and harps,
as he fights them in battle with the blows of his arm.
ISA 30:33 Topheth has long been prepared;
it has been made ready for the king.
Its fire pit has been made deep and wide,
with an abundance of fire and wood;
the breath of the LORD,
like a stream of burning sulfur,
sets it ablaze.
Chapter 31
ISA 31:1 Woe to those who go down to Egypt
for help,
who rely on horses,
who trust in the multitude of their chariots
and in the great strength of their horsemen,
but do not look to the Holy One of Israel,
or seek help from the LORD.
ISA 31:2 Yet he too is wise and can bring disaster;
he does not take back his words.
He will rise up against the house of the wicked,
against those who help evildoers.
ISA 31:3 But the Egyptians are men and not God;
their horses are flesh and not spirit.
When the LORD stretches out his hand,
he who helps will stumble,
he who is helped will fall;
both will perish together.
ISA 31:4 This is what the LORD says to me:
"As a lion growls,
a great lion over his prey--
and though a whole band of shepherds
is called together against him,
he is not frightened by their shouts
or disturbed by their clamor--
so the LORD Almighty will come down
to do battle on Mount Zion and on its heights.
ISA 31:5 Like birds hovering overhead,
the LORD Almighty will shield Jerusalem;
he will shield it and deliver it,
he will `pass over' it and will rescue it."
ISA 31:6 Return to him you have so greatly revolted against,
O Israelites. 7 For in that day every one of you will reject the idols of
silver and gold your sinful hands have made.
ISA 31:8 "Assyria will fall by a sword that is not of man;
a sword, not of mortals, will devour them.
They will flee before the sword
and their young men will be put to forced labor.
ISA 31:9 Their stronghold will fall because of terror;
at sight of the battle standard their commanders will
panic,"
declares the LORD,
whose fire is in Zion,
whose furnace is in Jerusalem.
Chapter 32
ISA 32:1 See, a king will reign in
righteousness
and rulers will rule with justice.
ISA 32:2 Each man will be like a shelter from the wind
and a refuge from the storm,
like streams of water in the desert
and the shadow of a great rock in a thirsty land.
ISA 32:3 Then the eyes of those who see will no longer be closed,
and the ears of those who hear will listen.
ISA 32:4 The mind of the rash will know and understand,
and the stammering tongue will be fluent and clear.
ISA 32:5 No longer will the fool be called noble
nor the scoundrel be highly respected.
ISA 32:6 For the fool speaks folly,
his mind is busy with evil:
He practices ungodliness
and spreads error concerning the LORD;
the hungry he leaves empty
and from the thirsty he withholds water.
ISA 32:7 The scoundrel's methods are wicked,
he makes up evil schemes
to destroy the poor with lies,
even when the plea of the needy is just.
ISA 32:8 But the noble man makes noble plans,
and by noble deeds he stands.
ISA 32:9 You women who are so complacent,
rise up and listen to me;
you daughters who feel secure,
hear what I have to say!
ISA 32:10 In little more than a year
you who feel secure will tremble;
the grape harvest will fail,
and the harvest of fruit will not come.
ISA 32:11 Tremble, you complacent women;
shudder, you daughters who feel secure!
Strip off your clothes,
put sackcloth around your waists.
ISA 32:12 Beat your breasts for the pleasant fields,
for the fruitful vines
ISA 32:13 and for the land of my people,
a land overgrown with thorns and briers--
yes, mourn for all houses of merriment
and for this city of revelry.
ISA 32:14 The fortress will be abandoned,
the noisy city deserted;
citadel and watchtower will become a wasteland forever,
the delight of donkeys, a pasture for flocks,
ISA 32:15 till the Spirit is poured upon us from on high,
and the desert becomes a fertile field,
and the fertile field seems like a forest.
ISA 32:16 Justice will dwell in the desert
and righteousness live in the fertile field.
ISA 32:17 The fruit of righteousness will be peace;
the effect of righteousness will be quietness and confidence
forever.
ISA 32:18 My people will live in peaceful dwelling places,
in secure homes,
in undisturbed places of rest.
ISA 32:19 Though hail flattens the forest
and the city is leveled completely,
ISA 32:20 how blessed you will be,
sowing your seed by every stream,
and letting your cattle and donkeys range free.
Chapter 33
ISA 33:1 Woe to you, O destroyer,
you who have not been destroyed!
Woe to you, O traitor,
you who have not been betrayed!
When you stop destroying,
you will be destroyed;
when you stop betraying,
you will be betrayed.
ISA 33:2 O LORD, be gracious to us;
we long for you.
Be our strength every morning,
our salvation in time of distress.
ISA 33:3 At the thunder of your voice, the peoples flee;
when you rise up, the nations scatter.
ISA 33:4 Your plunder, O nations, is harvested as by young locusts;
like a swarm of locusts men pounce on it.
ISA 33:5 The LORD is exalted, for he dwells on high;
he will fill Zion with justice and righteousness.
ISA 33:6 He will be the sure foundation for your times,
a rich store of salvation and wisdom and knowledge;
the fear of the LORD is the key to this treasure.
ISA 33:7 Look, their brave men cry aloud in the streets;
the envoys of peace weep bitterly.
ISA 33:8 The highways are deserted,
no travelers are on the roads.
The treaty is broken,
its witnesses are despised,
no one is respected.
ISA 33:9 The land mourns and wastes away,
Lebanon is ashamed and withers;
Sharon is like the Arabah,
and Bashan and Carmel drop their leaves.
ISA 33:10 "Now will I arise," says the LORD.
"Now will I be exalted;
now will I be lifted up.
ISA 33:11 You conceive chaff,
you give birth to straw;
your breath is a fire that consumes you.
ISA 33:12 The peoples will be burned as if to lime;
like cut thornbushes they will be set ablaze."
ISA 33:13 You who are far away, hear what I have done;
you who are near, acknowledge my power!
ISA 33:14 The sinners in Zion are terrified;
trembling grips the godless:
"Who of us can dwell with the consuming fire?
Who of us can dwell with everlasting burning?"
ISA 33:15 He who walks righteously
and speaks what is right,
who rejects gain from extortion
and keeps his hand from accepting bribes,
who stops his ears against plots of murder
and shuts his eyes against contemplating evil--
ISA 33:16 this is the man who will dwell on the heights,
whose refuge will be the mountain fortress.
His bread will be supplied,
and water will not fail him.
ISA 33:17 Your eyes will see the king in his beauty
and view a land that stretches afar.
ISA 33:18 In your thoughts you will ponder the former terror:
"Where is that chief officer?
Where is the one who took the revenue?
Where is the officer in charge of the towers?"
ISA 33:19 You will see those arrogant people no more,
those people of an obscure speech,
with their strange, incomprehensible tongue.
ISA 33:20 Look upon Zion, the city of our festivals;
your eyes will see Jerusalem,
a peaceful abode, a tent that will not be moved;
its stakes will never be pulled up,
nor any of its ropes broken.
ISA 33:21 There the LORD will be our Mighty One.
It will be like a place of broad rivers and streams.
No galley with oars will ride them,
no mighty ship will sail them.
ISA 33:22 For the LORD is our judge,
the LORD is our lawgiver,
the LORD is our king;
it is he who will save us.
ISA 33:23 Your rigging hangs loose:
The mast is not held secure,
the sail is not spread.
Then an abundance of spoils will be divided
and even the lame will carry off plunder.
ISA 33:24 No one living in Zion will say, "I am ill";
and the sins of those who dwell there will be forgiven.
Chapter 34
ISA 34:1 Come near, you nations, and listen;
pay attention, you peoples!
Let the earth hear, and all that is in it,
the world, and all that comes out of it!
ISA 34:2 The LORD is angry with all nations;
his wrath is upon all their armies.
He will totally destroy them,
he will give them over to slaughter.
ISA 34:3 Their slain will be thrown out,
their dead bodies will send up a stench;
the mountains will be soaked with their blood.
ISA 34:4 All the stars of the heavens will be dissolved
and the sky rolled up like a scroll;
all the starry host will fall
like withered leaves from the vine,
like shriveled figs from the fig tree.
ISA 34:5 My sword has drunk its fill in the heavens;
see, it descends in judgment on Edom,
the people I have totally destroyed.
ISA 34:6 The sword of the LORD is bathed in blood,
it is covered with fat--
the blood of lambs and goats,
fat from the kidneys of rams.
For the LORD has a sacrifice in Bozrah
and a great slaughter in Edom.
ISA 34:7 And the wild oxen will fall with them,
the bull calves and the great bulls.
Their land will be drenched with blood,
and the dust will be soaked with fat.
ISA 34:8 For the LORD has a day of vengeance,
a year of retribution, to uphold Zion's cause.
ISA 34:9 Edom's streams will be turned into pitch,
her dust into burning sulfur;
her land will become blazing pitch!
ISA 34:10 It will not be quenched night and day;
its smoke will rise forever.
From generation to generation it will lie desolate;
no one will ever pass through it again.
ISA 34:11 The desert owl and screech owl will possess it;
the great owl and the raven will nest there.
God will stretch out over Edom
the measuring line of chaos
and the plumb line of desolation.
ISA 34:12 Her nobles will have nothing there to be called a kingdom,
all her princes will vanish away.
ISA 34:13 Thorns will overrun her citadels,
nettles and brambles her strongholds.
She will become a haunt for jackals,
a home for owls.
ISA 34:14 Desert creatures will meet with hyenas,
and wild goats will bleat to each other;
there the night creatures will also repose
and find for themselves places of rest.
ISA 34:15 The owl will nest there and lay eggs,
she will hatch them, and care for her young under the shadow
of her wings;
there also the falcons will gather,
each with its mate.
ISA 34:16 Look in the scroll of the LORD and read:
None of these will be missing,
not one will lack her mate.
For it is his mouth that has given the order,
and his Spirit will gather them together.
ISA 34:17 He allots their portions;
his hand distributes them by measure.
They will possess it forever
and dwell there from generation to generation.
Chapter 35
ISA 35:1 The desert and the parched land will
be glad;
the wilderness will rejoice and blossom.
Like the crocus, 2 it will burst into bloom;
it will rejoice greatly and shout for joy.
The glory of Lebanon will be given to it,
the splendor of Carmel and Sharon;
they will see the glory of the LORD,
the splendor of our God.
ISA 35:3 Strengthen the feeble hands,
steady the knees that give way;
ISA 35:4 say to those with fearful hearts,
"Be strong, do not fear;
your God will come,
he will come with vengeance;
with divine retribution
he will come to save you."
ISA 35:5 Then will the eyes of the blind be opened
and the ears of the deaf unstopped.
ISA 35:6 Then will the lame leap like a deer,
and the mute tongue shout for joy.
Water will gush forth in the wilderness
and streams in the desert.
ISA 35:7 The burning sand will become a pool,
the thirsty ground bubbling springs.
In the haunts where jackals once lay,
grass and reeds and papyrus will grow.
ISA 35:8 And a highway will be there;
it will be called the Way of Holiness.
The unclean will not journey on it;
it will be for those who walk in that Way;
wicked fools will not go about on it.
ISA 35:9 No lion will be there,
nor will any ferocious beast get up on it;
they will not be found there.
But only the redeemed will walk there,
ISA 35:10 and the ransomed of the LORD will return.
They will enter Zion with singing;
everlasting joy will crown their heads.
Gladness and joy will overtake them,
and sorrow and sighing will flee away.
Chapter 36
ISA 36:1 In the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah's
reign, Sennacherib king of Assyria attacked all the fortified cities of Judah
and captured them. 2 Then the king of Assyria sent his field commander with a
large army from Lachish to King Hezekiah at Jerusalem. When the commander
stopped at the aqueduct of the Upper Pool, on the road to the Washerman's
Field, 3 Eliakim son of Hilkiah the palace administrator, Shebna the secretary,
and Joah son of Asaph the recorder went out to him.
ISA 36:4 The field commander said to them, "Tell
Hezekiah,
" `This is what the great king, the king of Assyria,
says: On what are you basing this confidence of yours? 5 You say you have
strategy and military strength--but you speak only empty words. On whom are you
depending, that you rebel against me? 6 Look now, you are depending on Egypt,
that splintered reed of a staff, which pierces a man's hand and wounds him if
he leans on it! Such is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all who depend on him. 7 And
if you say to me, "We are depending on the LORD our God"--isn't he
the one whose high places and altars Hezekiah removed, saying to Judah and
Jerusalem, "You must worship before this altar"?
ISA 36:8 " `Come now, make a bargain with my master,
the king of Assyria: I will give you two thousand horses--if you can put riders
on them! 9 How then can you repulse one officer of the least of my master's officials,
even though you are depending on Egypt for chariots and horsemen? 10
Furthermore, have I come to attack and destroy this land without the LORD? The
LORD himself told me to march against this country and destroy it.' "
ISA 36:11 Then Eliakim, Shebna and Joah said to the field
commander, "Please speak to your servants in Aramaic, since we understand
it. Don't speak to us in Hebrew in the hearing of the people on the wall."
ISA 36:12 But the commander replied, "Was it only to
your master and you that my master sent me to say these things, and not to the
men sitting on the wall--who, like you, will have to eat their own filth and
drink their own urine?"
ISA 36:13 Then the commander stood and called out in Hebrew,
"Hear the words of the great king, the king of Assyria! 14 This is what
the king says: Do not let Hezekiah deceive you. He cannot deliver you! 15 Do
not let Hezekiah persuade you to trust in the LORD when he says, `The LORD will
surely deliver us; this city will not be given into the hand of the king of
Assyria.'
ISA 36:16 "Do not listen to Hezekiah. This is what the
king of Assyria says: Make peace with me and come out to me. Then every one of
you will eat from his own vine and fig tree and drink water from his own
cistern, 17 until I come and take you to a land like your own--a land of grain
and new wine, a land of bread and vineyards.
ISA 36:18 "Do not let Hezekiah mislead you when he
says, `The LORD will deliver us.' Has the god of any nation ever delivered his
land from the hand of the king of Assyria? 19 Where are the gods of Hamath and
Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim? Have they rescued Samaria from my
hand? 20 Who of all the gods of these countries has been able to save his land
from me? How then can the LORD deliver Jerusalem from my hand?"
ISA 36:21 But the people remained silent and said nothing in
reply, because the king had commanded, "Do not answer him."
ISA 36:22 Then Eliakim son of Hilkiah the palace
administrator, Shebna the secretary, and Joah son of Asaph the recorder went to
Hezekiah, with their clothes torn, and told him what the field commander had
said.
Chapter 37
ISA 37:1 When King Hezekiah heard this, he tore his
clothes and put on sackcloth and went into the temple of the LORD. 2 He sent
Eliakim the palace administrator, Shebna the secretary, and the leading
priests, all wearing sackcloth, to the prophet Isaiah son of Amoz. 3 They told
him, "This is what Hezekiah says: This day is a day of distress and rebuke
and disgrace, as when children come to the point of birth and there is no
strength to deliver them. 4 It may be that the LORD your God will hear the
words of the field commander, whom his master, the king of Assyria, has sent to
ridicule the living God, and that he will rebuke him for the words the LORD
your God has heard. Therefore pray for the remnant that still survives."
ISA 37:5 When King Hezekiah's officials came to Isaiah, 6
Isaiah said to them, "Tell your master, `This is what the LORD says: Do
not be afraid of what you have heard--those words with which the underlings of
the king of Assyria have blasphemed me. 7 Listen! I am going to put a spirit in
him so that when he hears a certain report, he will return to his own country,
and there I will have him cut down with the sword.' "
ISA 37:8 When the field commander heard that the king of
Assyria had left Lachish, he withdrew and found the king fighting against
Libnah.
ISA 37:9 Now Sennacherib received a report that Tirhakah,
the Cushite king of Egypt, was marching out to fight against him. When he heard
it, he sent messengers to Hezekiah with this word: 10 "Say to Hezekiah
king of Judah: Do not let the god you depend on deceive you when he says,
`Jerusalem will not be handed over to the king of Assyria.' 11 Surely you have
heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all the countries, destroying them
completely. And will you be delivered? 12 Did the gods of the nations that were
destroyed by my forefathers deliver them--the gods of Gozan, Haran, Rezeph and
the people of Eden who were in Tel Assar? 13 Where is the king of Hamath, the
king of Arpad, the king of the city of Sepharvaim, or of Hena or Ivvah?"
ISA 37:14 Hezekiah received the letter from the messengers
and read it. Then he went up to the temple of the LORD and spread it out before
the LORD. 15 And Hezekiah prayed to the LORD: 16 "O LORD Almighty, God of
Israel, enthroned between the cherubim, you alone are God over all the kingdoms
of the earth. You have made heaven and earth. 17 Give ear, O LORD, and hear;
open your eyes, O LORD, and see; listen to all the words Sennacherib has sent
to insult the living God.
ISA 37:18 "It is true, O LORD, that the Assyrian kings
have laid waste all these peoples and their lands. 19 They have thrown their
gods into the fire and destroyed them, for they were not gods but only wood and
stone, fashioned by human hands. 20 Now, O LORD our God, deliver us from his
hand, so that all kingdoms on earth may know that you alone, O LORD, are God.
"
ISA 37:21 Then Isaiah son of Amoz sent a message to
Hezekiah: "This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: Because you
have prayed to me concerning Sennacherib king of Assyria, 22 this is the word
the LORD has spoken against him:
"The Virgin Daughter of Zion
despises and mocks you.
The Daughter of Jerusalem
tosses her head as you flee.
ISA 37:23 Who is it you have insulted and blasphemed?
Against whom have you raised your voice
and lifted your eyes in pride?
Against the Holy One of Israel!
ISA 37:24 By your messengers
you have heaped insults on the Lord.
And you have said,
`With my many chariots
I have ascended the heights of the mountains,
the utmost heights of Lebanon.
I have cut down its tallest cedars,
the choicest of its pines.
I have reached its remotest heights,
the finest of its forests.
ISA 37:25 I have dug wells in foreign lands
and drunk the water there.
With the soles of my feet
I have dried up all the streams of Egypt.'
ISA 37:26 "Have you not heard?
Long ago I ordained it.
In days of old I planned it;
now I have brought it to pass,
that you have turned fortified cities
into piles of stone.
ISA 37:27 Their people, drained of power,
are dismayed and put to shame.
They are like plants in the field,
like tender green shoots,
like grass sprouting on the roof,
scorched before it grows up.
ISA 37:28 "But I know where you stay
and when you come and go
and how you rage against me.
ISA 37:29 Because you rage against me
and because your insolence has reached my ears,
I will put my hook in your nose
and my bit in your mouth,
and I will make you return
by the way you came.
ISA 37:30 "This will be the sign for you, O Hezekiah:
"This year you will eat what grows by itself,
and the second year what springs from that.
But in the third year sow and reap,
plant vineyards and eat their fruit.
ISA 37:31 Once more a remnant of the house of Judah
will take root below and bear fruit above.
ISA 37:32 For out of Jerusalem will come a remnant,
and out of Mount Zion a band of survivors.
The zeal of the LORD Almighty
will accomplish this.
ISA 37:33 "Therefore this is what the LORD says
concerning the king of Assyria:
"He will not enter this city
or shoot an arrow here.
He will not come before it with shield
or build a siege ramp against it.
ISA 37:34 By the way that he came he will return;
he will not enter this city,"
declares the LORD.
ISA 37:35 "I will defend this city and save it,
for my sake and for the sake of David my servant!"
ISA 37:36 Then the angel of the LORD went out and put to
death a hundred and eighty-five thousand men in the Assyrian camp. When the
people got up the next morning--there were all the dead bodies! 37 So
Sennacherib king of Assyria broke camp and withdrew. He returned to Nineveh and
stayed there.
ISA 37:38 One day, while he was worshiping in the temple of
his god Nisroch, his sons Adrammelech and Sharezer cut him down with the sword,
and they escaped to the land of Ararat. And Esarhaddon his son succeeded him as
king.
Chapter 38
ISA 38:1 In those days Hezekiah became ill and was
at the point of death. The prophet Isaiah son of Amoz went to him and said,
"This is what the LORD says: Put your house in order, because you are
going to die; you will not recover."
ISA 38:2 Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to
the LORD, 3 "Remember, O LORD, how I have walked before you faithfully and
with wholehearted devotion and have done what is good in your eyes." And
Hezekiah wept bitterly.
ISA 38:4 Then the word of the LORD came to Isaiah: 5
"Go and tell Hezekiah, `This is what the LORD, the God of your father
David, says: I have heard your prayer and seen your tears; I will add fifteen
years to your life. 6 And I will deliver you and this city from the hand of the
king of Assyria. I will defend this city.
ISA 38:7 " `This is the LORD's sign to you that the
LORD will do what he has promised: 8 I will make the shadow cast by the sun go
back the ten steps it has gone down on the stairway of Ahaz.' " So the
sunlight went back the ten steps it had gone down.
ISA 38:9 A writing of Hezekiah king of Judah after his
illness and recovery:
ISA 38:10 I said, "In the prime of my life
must I go through the gates of death
and be robbed of the rest of my years?"
ISA 38:11 I said, "I will not again see the LORD,
the LORD, in the land of the living;
no longer will I look on mankind,
or be with those who now dwell in this world.
ISA 38:12 Like a shepherd's tent my house
has been pulled down and taken from me.
Like a weaver I have rolled up my life,
and he has cut me off from the loom;
day and night you made an end of me.
ISA 38:13 I waited patiently till dawn,
but like a lion he broke all my bones;
day and night you made an end of me.
ISA 38:14 I cried like a swift or thrush,
I moaned like a mourning dove.
My eyes grew weak as I looked to the heavens.
I am troubled; O Lord, come to my aid!"
ISA 38:15 But what can I say?
He has spoken to me, and he himself has done this.
I will walk humbly all my years
because of this anguish of my soul.
ISA 38:16 Lord, by such things men live;
and my spirit finds life in them too.
You restored me to health
and let me live.
ISA 38:17 Surely it was for my benefit
that I suffered such anguish.
In your love you kept me
from the pit of destruction;
you have put all my sins
behind your back.
ISA 38:18 For the grave cannot praise you,
death cannot sing your praise;
those who go down to the pit
cannot hope for your faithfulness.
ISA 38:19 The living, the living--they praise you,
as I am doing today;
fathers tell their children
about your faithfulness.
ISA 38:20 The LORD will save me,
and we will sing with stringed instruments
all the days of our lives
in the temple of the LORD.
ISA 38:21 Isaiah had said, "Prepare a poultice of figs
and apply it to the boil, and he will recover."
ISA 38:22 Hezekiah had asked, "What will be the sign
that I will go up to the temple of the LORD?"
Chapter 39
ISA 39:1 At that time Merodach-Baladan son of
Baladan king of Babylon sent Hezekiah letters and a gift, because he had heard
of his illness and recovery. 2 Hezekiah received the envoys gladly and showed
them what was in his storehouses--the silver, the gold, the spices, the fine
oil, his entire armory and everything found among his treasures. There was
nothing in his palace or in all his kingdom that Hezekiah did not show them.
ISA 39:3 Then Isaiah the prophet went to King Hezekiah and
asked, "What did those men say, and where did they come from?"
"From a distant land," Hezekiah replied.
"They came to me from Babylon."
ISA 39:4 The prophet asked, "What did they see in your
palace?"
"They saw everything in my palace," Hezekiah said.
"There is nothing among my treasures that I did not show them."
ISA 39:5 Then Isaiah said to Hezekiah, "Hear the word
of the LORD Almighty: 6 The time will surely come when everything in your
palace, and all that your fathers have stored up until this day, will be
carried off to Babylon. Nothing will be left, says the LORD. 7 And some of your
descendants, your own flesh and blood who will be born to you, will be taken
away, and they will become eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon."
ISA 39:8 "The word of the LORD you have spoken is
good," Hezekiah replied. For he thought, "There will be peace and
security in my lifetime."
Chapter 40
ISA 40:1 Comfort, comfort my people,
says your God.
ISA 40:2 Speak tenderly to Jerusalem,
and proclaim to her
that her hard service has been completed,
that her sin has been paid for,
that she has received from the LORD's hand
double for all her sins.
ISA 40:3 A voice of one calling:
"In the desert prepare
the way for the LORD;
make straight in the wilderness
a highway for our God.
ISA 40:4 Every valley shall be raised up,
every mountain and hill made low;
the rough ground shall become level,
the rugged places a plain.
ISA 40:5 And the glory of the LORD will be revealed,
and all mankind together will see it.
For the mouth of the LORD has spoken."
ISA 40:6 A voice says, "Cry out."
And I said, "What shall I cry?"
"All men are like grass,
and all their glory is like the flowers of the field.
ISA 40:7 The grass withers and the flowers fall,
because the breath of the LORD blows on them.
Surely the people are grass.
ISA 40:8 The grass withers and the flowers fall,
but the word of our God stands forever."
ISA 40:9 You who bring good tidings to Zion,
go up on a high mountain.
You who bring good tidings to Jerusalem,
lift up your voice with a shout,
lift it up, do not be afraid;
say to the towns of Judah,
"Here is your God!"
ISA 40:10 See, the Sovereign LORD comes with power,
and his arm rules for him.
See, his reward is with him,
and his recompense accompanies him.
ISA 40:11 He tends his flock like a shepherd:
He gathers the lambs in his arms
and carries them close to his heart;
he gently leads those that have young.
ISA 40:12 Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand,
or with the breadth of his hand marked off the heavens?
Who has held the dust of the earth in a basket,
or weighed the mountains on the scales
and the hills in a balance?
ISA 40:13 Who has understood the mind of the LORD,
or instructed him as his counselor?
ISA 40:14 Whom did the LORD consult to enlighten him,
and who taught him the right way?
Who was it that taught him knowledge
or showed him the path of understanding?
ISA 40:15 Surely the nations are like a drop in a bucket;
they are regarded as dust on the scales;
he weighs the islands as though they were fine dust.
ISA 40:16 Lebanon is not sufficient for altar fires,
nor its animals enough for burnt offerings.
ISA 40:17 Before him all the nations are as nothing;
they are regarded by him as worthless
and less than nothing.
ISA 40:18 To whom, then, will you compare God?
What image will you compare him to?
ISA 40:19 As for an idol, a craftsman casts it,
and a goldsmith overlays it with gold
and fashions silver chains for it.
ISA 40:20 A man too poor to present such an offering
selects wood that will not rot.
He looks for a skilled craftsman
to set up an idol that will not topple.
ISA 40:21 Do you not know?
Have you not heard?
Has it not been told you from the beginning?
Have you not understood since the earth was founded?
ISA 40:22 He sits enthroned above the circle of the earth,
and its people are like grasshoppers.
He stretches out the heavens like a canopy,
and spreads them out like a tent to live in.
ISA 40:23 He brings princes to naught
and reduces the rulers of this world to nothing.
ISA 40:24 No sooner are they planted,
no sooner are they sown,
no sooner do they take root in the ground,
than he blows on them and they wither,
and a whirlwind sweeps them away like chaff.
ISA 40:25 "To whom will you compare me?
Or who is my equal?" says the Holy One.
ISA 40:26 Lift your eyes and look to the heavens:
Who created all these?
He who brings out the starry host one by one,
and calls them each by name.
Because of his great power and mighty strength,
not one of them is missing.
ISA 40:27 Why do you say, O Jacob,
and complain, O Israel,
"My way is hidden from the LORD;
my cause is disregarded by my God"?
ISA 40:28 Do you not know?
Have you not heard?
The LORD is the everlasting God,
the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He will not grow tired or weary,
and his understanding no one can fathom.
ISA 40:29 He gives strength to the weary
and increases the power of the weak.
ISA 40:30 Even youths grow tired and weary,
and young men stumble and fall;
ISA 40:31 but those who hope in the LORD
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint.
Chapter 41
ISA 41:1 "Be silent before me, you
islands!
Let the nations renew their strength!
Let them come forward and speak;
let us meet together at the place of judgment.
ISA 41:2 "Who has stirred up one from the east,
calling him in righteousness to his service?
He hands nations over to him
and subdues kings before him.
He turns them to dust with his sword,
to windblown chaff with his bow.
ISA 41:3 He pursues them and moves on unscathed,
by a path his feet have not traveled before.
ISA 41:4 Who has done this and carried it through,
calling forth the generations from the beginning?
I, the LORD--with the first of them
and with the last--I am he."
ISA 41:5 The islands have seen it and fear;
the ends of the earth tremble.
They approach and come forward;
ISA 41:6 each helps the other
and says to his brother, "Be strong!"
ISA 41:7 The craftsman encourages the goldsmith,
and he who smooths with the hammer
spurs on him who strikes the anvil.
He says of the welding, "It is good."
He nails down the idol so it will not topple.
ISA 41:8 "But you, O Israel, my servant,
Jacob, whom I have chosen,
you descendants of Abraham my friend,
ISA 41:9 I took you from the ends of the earth,
from its farthest corners I called you.
I said, `You are my servant';
I have chosen you and have not rejected you.
ISA 41:10 So do not fear, for I am with you;
do not be dismayed, for I am your God.
I will strengthen you and help you;
I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.
ISA 41:11 "All who rage against you
will surely be ashamed and disgraced;
those who oppose you
will be as nothing and perish.
ISA 41:12 Though you search for your enemies,
you will not find them.
Those who wage war against you
will be as nothing at all.
ISA 41:13 For I am the LORD, your God,
who takes hold of your right hand
and says to you, Do not fear;
I will help you.
ISA 41:14 Do not be afraid, O worm Jacob,
O little Israel,
for I myself will help you," declares the LORD,
your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel.
ISA 41:15 "See, I will make you into a threshing sledge,
new and sharp, with many teeth.
You will thresh the mountains and crush them,
and reduce the hills to chaff.
ISA 41:16 You will winnow them, the wind will pick them up,
and a gale will blow them away.
But you will rejoice in the LORD
and glory in the Holy One of Israel.
ISA 41:17 "The poor and needy search for water,
but there is none;
their tongues are parched with thirst.
But I the LORD will answer them;
I, the God of Israel, will not forsake them.
ISA 41:18 I will make rivers flow on barren heights,
and springs within the valleys.
I will turn the desert into pools of water,
and the parched ground into springs.
ISA 41:19 I will put in the desert
the cedar and the acacia, the myrtle and the olive.
I will set pines in the wasteland,
the fir and the cypress together,
ISA 41:20 so that people may see and know,
may consider and understand,
that the hand of the LORD has done this,
that the Holy One of Israel has created it.
ISA 41:21 "Present your case," says the LORD.
"Set forth your arguments," says Jacob's King.
ISA 41:22 "Bring in your idols to tell us
what is going to happen.
Tell us what the former things were,
so that we may consider them
and know their final outcome.
Or declare to us the things to come,
ISA 41:23 tell us what the future holds,
so we may know that you are gods.
Do something, whether good or bad,
so that we will be dismayed and filled with fear.
ISA 41:24 But you are less than nothing
and your works are utterly worthless;
he who chooses you is detestable.
ISA 41:25 "I have stirred up one from the north, and he comes--
one from the rising sun who calls on my name.
He treads on rulers as if they were mortar,
as if he were a potter treading the clay.
ISA 41:26 Who told of this from the beginning, so we could know,
or beforehand, so we could say, `He was right'?
No one told of this,
no one foretold it,
no one heard any words from you.
ISA 41:27 I was the first to tell Zion, `Look, here they are!'
I gave to Jerusalem a messenger of good tidings.
ISA 41:28 I look but there is no one--
no one among them to give counsel,
no one to give answer when I ask them.
ISA 41:29 See, they are all false!
Their deeds amount to nothing;
their images are but wind and confusion.
Chapter 42
ISA 42:1 "Here is my servant, whom I
uphold,
my chosen one in whom I delight;
I will put my Spirit on him
and he will bring justice to the nations.
ISA 42:2 He will not shout or cry out,
or raise his voice in the streets.
ISA 42:3 A bruised reed he will not break,
and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out.
In faithfulness he will bring forth justice;
ISA 42:4 he will not falter or be discouraged
till he establishes justice on earth.
In his law the islands will put their hope."
ISA 42:5 This is what God the LORD says--
he who created the heavens and stretched them out,
who spread out the earth and all that comes out of it,
who gives breath to its people,
and life to those who walk on it:
ISA 42:6 "I, the LORD, have called you in righteousness;
I will take hold of your hand.
I will keep you and will make you
to be a covenant for the people
and a light for the Gentiles,
ISA 42:7 to open eyes that are blind,
to free captives from prison
and to release from the dungeon those who sit in darkness.
ISA 42:8 "I am the LORD; that is my name!
I will not give my glory to another
or my praise to idols.
ISA 42:9 See, the former things have taken place,
and new things I declare;
before they spring into being
I announce them to you."
ISA 42:10 Sing to the LORD a new song,
his praise from the ends of the earth,
you who go down to the sea, and all that is in it,
you islands, and all who live in them.
ISA 42:11 Let the desert and its towns raise their voices;
let the settlements where Kedar lives rejoice.
Let the people of Sela sing for joy;
let them shout from the mountaintops.
ISA 42:12 Let them give glory to the LORD
and proclaim his praise in the islands.
ISA 42:13 The LORD will march out like a mighty man,
like a warrior he will stir up his zeal;
with a shout he will raise the battle cry
and will triumph over his enemies.
ISA 42:14 "For a long time I have kept silent,
I have been quiet and held myself back.
But now, like a woman in childbirth,
I cry out, I gasp and pant.
ISA 42:15 I will lay waste the mountains and hills
and dry up all their vegetation;
I will turn rivers into islands
and dry up the pools.
ISA 42:16 I will lead the blind by ways they have not known,
along unfamiliar paths I will guide them;
I will turn the darkness into light before them
and make the rough places smooth.
These are the things I will do;
I will not forsake them.
ISA 42:17 But those who trust in idols,
who say to images, `You are our gods,'
will be turned back in utter shame.
ISA 42:18 "Hear, you deaf;
look, you blind, and see!
ISA 42:19 Who is blind but my servant,
and deaf like the messenger I send?
Who is blind like the one committed to me,
blind like the servant of the LORD?
ISA 42:20 You have seen many things, but have paid no attention;
your ears are open, but you hear nothing."
ISA 42:21 It pleased the LORD
for the sake of his righteousness
to make his law great and glorious.
ISA 42:22 But this is a people plundered and looted,
all of them trapped in pits
or hidden away in prisons.
They have become plunder,
with no one to rescue them;
they have been made loot,
with no one to say, "Send them back."
ISA 42:23 Which of you will listen to this
or pay close attention in time to come?
ISA 42:24 Who handed Jacob over to become loot,
and Israel to the plunderers?
Was it not the LORD,
against whom we have sinned?
For they would not follow his ways;
they did not obey his law.
ISA 42:25 So he poured out on them his burning anger,
the violence of war.
It enveloped them in flames, yet they did not understand;
it consumed them, but they did not take it to heart.
Chapter 43
ISA 43:1 But now, this is what the LORD
says--
he who created you, O Jacob,
he who formed you, O Israel:
"Fear not, for I have redeemed you;
I have summoned you by name; you are mine.
ISA 43:2 When you pass through the waters,
I will be with you;
and when you pass through the rivers,
they will not sweep over you.
When you walk through the fire,
you will not be burned;
the flames will not set you ablaze.
ISA 43:3 For I am the LORD, your God,
the Holy One of Israel, your Savior;
I give Egypt for your ransom,
Cush and Seba in your stead.
ISA 43:4 Since you are precious and honored in my sight,
and because I love you,
I will give men in exchange for you,
and people in exchange for your life.
ISA 43:5 Do not be afraid, for I am with you;
I will bring your children from the east
and gather you from the west.
ISA 43:6 I will say to the north, `Give them up!'
and to the south, `Do not hold them back.'
Bring my sons from afar
and my daughters from the ends of the earth--
ISA 43:7 everyone who is called by my name,
whom I created for my glory,
whom I formed and made."
ISA 43:8 Lead out those who have eyes but are blind,
who have ears but are deaf.
ISA 43:9 All the nations gather together
and the peoples assemble.
Which of them foretold this
and proclaimed to us the former things?
Let them bring in their witnesses to prove they were right,
so that others may hear and say, "It is true."
ISA 43:10 "You are my witnesses," declares the LORD,
"and my servant whom I have chosen,
so that you may know and believe me
and understand that I am he.
Before me no god was formed,
nor will there be one after me.
ISA 43:11 I, even I, am the LORD,
and apart from me there is no savior.
ISA 43:12 I have revealed and saved and proclaimed--
I, and not some foreign god among you.
You are my witnesses," declares the LORD, "that I am God.
ISA 43:13 Yes, and from ancient days I am he.
No one can deliver out of my hand.
When I act, who can reverse it?"
ISA 43:14 This is what the LORD says--
your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel:
"For your sake I will send to Babylon
and bring down as fugitives all the Babylonians,
in the ships in which they took pride.
ISA 43:15 I am the LORD, your Holy One,
Israel's Creator, your King."
ISA 43:16 This is what the LORD says--
he who made a way through the sea,
a path through the mighty waters,
ISA 43:17 who drew out the chariots and horses,
the army and reinforcements together,
and they lay there, never to rise again,
extinguished, snuffed out like a wick:
ISA 43:18 "Forget the former things;
do not dwell on the past.
ISA 43:19 See, I am doing a new thing!
Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the desert
and streams in the wasteland.
ISA 43:20 The wild animals honor me,
the jackals and the owls,
because I provide water in the desert
and streams in the wasteland,
to give drink to my people, my chosen,
ISA 43:21 the people I formed for myself
that they may proclaim my praise.
ISA 43:22 "Yet you have not called upon me, O Jacob,
you have not wearied yourselves for me, O Israel.
ISA 43:23 You have not brought me sheep for burnt offerings,
nor honored me with your sacrifices.
I have not burdened you with grain offerings
nor wearied you with demands for incense.
ISA 43:24 You have not bought any fragrant calamus for me,
or lavished on me the fat of your sacrifices.
But you have burdened me with your sins
and wearied me with your offenses.
ISA 43:25 "I, even I, am he who blots out
your transgressions, for my own sake,
and remembers your sins no more.
ISA 43:26 Review the past for me,
let us argue the matter together;
state the case for your innocence.
ISA 43:27 Your first father sinned;
your spokesmen rebelled against me.
ISA 43:28 So I will disgrace the dignitaries of your temple,
and I will consign Jacob to destruction
and Israel to scorn.
Chapter 44
ISA 44:1 "But now listen, O Jacob, my
servant,
Israel, whom I have chosen.
ISA 44:2 This is what the LORD says--
he who made you, who formed you in the womb,
and who will help you:
Do not be afraid, O Jacob, my servant,
Jeshurun, whom I have chosen.
ISA 44:3 For I will pour water on the thirsty land,
and streams on the dry ground;
I will pour out my Spirit on your offspring,
and my blessing on your descendants.
ISA 44:4 They will spring up like grass in a meadow,
like poplar trees by flowing streams.
ISA 44:5 One will say, `I belong to the LORD';
another will call himself by the name of Jacob;
still another will write on his hand, `The LORD's,'
and will take the name Israel.
ISA 44:6 "This is what the LORD says--
Israel's King and Redeemer, the LORD Almighty:
I am the first and I am the last;
apart from me there is no God.
ISA 44:7 Who then is like me? Let him proclaim it.
Let him declare and lay out before me
what has happened since I established my ancient people,
and what is yet to come--
yes, let him foretell what will come.
ISA 44:8 Do not tremble, do not be afraid.
Did I not proclaim this and foretell it long ago?
You are my witnesses. Is there any God besides me?
No, there is no other Rock; I know not one."
ISA 44:9 All who make idols are nothing,
and the things they treasure are worthless.
Those who would speak up for them are blind;
they are ignorant, to their own shame.
ISA 44:10 Who shapes a god and casts an idol,
which can profit him nothing?
ISA 44:11 He and his kind will be put to shame;
craftsmen are nothing but men.
Let them all come together and take their stand;
they will be brought down to terror and infamy.
ISA 44:12 The blacksmith takes a tool
and works with it in the coals;
he shapes an idol with hammers,
he forges it with the might of his arm.
He gets hungry and loses his strength;
he drinks no water and grows faint.
ISA 44:13 The carpenter measures with a line
and makes an outline with a marker;
he roughs it out with chisels
and marks it with compasses.
He shapes it in the form of man,
of man in all his glory,
that it may dwell in a shrine.
ISA 44:14 He cut down cedars,
or perhaps took a cypress or oak.
He let it grow among the trees of the forest,
or planted a pine, and the rain made it grow.
ISA 44:15 It is man's fuel for burning;
some of it he takes and warms himself,
he kindles a fire and bakes bread.
But he also fashions a god and worships it;
he makes an idol and bows down to it.
ISA 44:16 Half of the wood he burns in the fire;
over it he prepares his meal,
he roasts his meat and eats his fill.
He also warms himself and says,
"Ah! I am warm; I see the fire."
ISA 44:17 From the rest he makes a god, his idol;
he bows down to it and worships.
He prays to it and says,
"Save me; you are my god."
ISA 44:18 They know nothing, they understand nothing;
their eyes are plastered over so they cannot see,
and their minds closed so they cannot understand.
ISA 44:19 No one stops to think,
no one has the knowledge or understanding to say,
"Half of it I used for fuel;
I even baked bread over its coals,
I roasted meat and I ate.
Shall I make a detestable thing from what is left?
Shall I bow down to a block of wood?"
ISA 44:20 He feeds on ashes, a deluded heart misleads him;
he cannot save himself, or say,
"Is not this thing in my right hand a lie?"
ISA 44:21 "Remember these things, O Jacob,
for you are my servant, O Israel.
I have made you, you are my servant;
O Israel, I will not forget you.
ISA 44:22 I have swept away your offenses like a cloud,
your sins like the morning mist.
Return to me,
for I have redeemed you."
ISA 44:23 Sing for joy, O heavens, for the LORD has done this;
shout aloud, O earth beneath.
Burst into song, you mountains,
you forests and all your trees,
for the LORD has redeemed Jacob,
he displays his glory in Israel.
ISA 44:24 "This is what the LORD says--
your Redeemer, who formed you in the womb:
I am the LORD,
who has made all things,
who alone stretched out the heavens,
who spread out the earth by myself,
ISA 44:25 who foils the signs of false prophets
and makes fools of diviners,
who overthrows the learning of the wise
and turns it into nonsense,
ISA 44:26 who carries out the words of his servants
and fulfills the predictions of his messengers,
who says of Jerusalem, `It shall be inhabited,'
of the towns of Judah, `They shall be built,'
and of their ruins, `I will restore them,'
ISA 44:27 who says to the watery deep, `Be dry,
and I will dry up your streams,'
ISA 44:28 who says of Cyrus, `He is my shepherd
and will accomplish all that I please;
he will say of Jerusalem, "Let it be rebuilt,"
and of the temple, "Let its foundations be laid."
'
Chapter 45
ISA 45:1 "This is what the LORD says to
his anointed,
to Cyrus, whose right hand I take hold of
to subdue nations before him
and to strip kings of their armor,
to open doors before him
so that gates will not be shut:
ISA 45:2 I will go before you
and will level the mountains;
I will break down gates of bronze
and cut through bars of iron.
ISA 45:3 I will give you the treasures of darkness,
riches stored in secret places,
so that you may know that I am the LORD,
the God of Israel, who summons you by name.
ISA 45:4 For the sake of Jacob my servant,
of Israel my chosen,
I summon you by name
and bestow on you a title of honor,
though you do not acknowledge me.
ISA 45:5 I am the LORD, and there is no other;
apart from me there is no God.
I will strengthen you,
though you have not acknowledged me,
ISA 45:6 so that from the rising of the sun
to the place of its setting
men may know there is none besides me.
I am the LORD, and there is no other.
ISA 45:7 I form the light and create darkness,
I bring prosperity and create disaster;
I, the LORD, do all these things.
ISA 45:8 "You heavens above, rain down righteousness;
let the clouds shower it down.
Let the earth open wide,
let salvation spring up,
let righteousness grow with it;
I, the LORD, have created it.
ISA 45:9 "Woe to him who quarrels with his Maker,
to him who is but a potsherd among the potsherds on the
ground.
Does the clay say to the potter,
`What are you making?'
Does your work say,
`He has no hands'?
ISA 45:10 Woe to him who says to his father,
`What have you begotten?'
or to his mother,
`What have you brought to birth?'
ISA 45:11 "This is what the LORD says--
the Holy One of Israel, and its Maker:
Concerning things to come,
do you question me about my children,
or give me orders about the work of my hands?
ISA 45:12 It is I who made the earth
and created mankind upon it.
My own hands stretched out the heavens;
I marshaled their starry hosts.
ISA 45:13 I will raise up Cyrus in my righteousness:
I will make all his ways straight.
He will rebuild my city
and set my exiles free,
but not for a price or reward,
says the LORD Almighty."
ISA 45:14 This is what the LORD says:
"The products of Egypt and the merchandise of Cush,
and those tall Sabeans--
they will come over to you
and will be yours;
they will trudge behind you,
coming over to you in chains.
They will bow down before you
and plead with you, saying,
`Surely God is with you, and there is no other;
there is no other god.' "
ISA 45:15 Truly you are a God who hides himself,
O God and Savior of Israel.
ISA 45:16 All the makers of idols will be put to shame and disgraced;
they will go off into disgrace together.
ISA 45:17 But Israel will be saved by the LORD
with an everlasting salvation;
you will never be put to shame or disgraced,
to ages everlasting.
ISA 45:18 For this is what the LORD says--
he who created the heavens,
he is God;
he who fashioned and made the earth,
he founded it;
he did not create it to be empty,
but formed it to be inhabited--
he says:
"I am the LORD,
and there is no other.
ISA 45:19 I have not spoken in secret,
from somewhere in a land of darkness;
I have not said to Jacob's descendants,
`Seek me in vain.'
I, the LORD, speak the truth;
I declare what is right.
ISA 45:20 "Gather together and come;
assemble, you fugitives from the nations.
Ignorant are those who carry about idols of wood,
who pray to gods that cannot save.
ISA 45:21 Declare what is to be, present it--
let them take counsel together.
Who foretold this long ago,
who declared it from the distant past?
Was it not I, the LORD?
And there is no God apart from me,
a righteous God and a Savior;
there is none but me.
ISA 45:22 "Turn to me and be saved,
all you ends of the earth;
for I am God, and there is no other.
ISA 45:23 By myself I have sworn,
my mouth has uttered in all integrity
a word that will not be revoked:
Before me every knee will bow;
by me every tongue will swear.
ISA 45:24 They will say of me, `In the LORD alone
are righteousness and strength.' "
All who have raged against him
will come to him and be put to shame.
ISA 45:25 But in the LORD all the descendants of Israel
will be found righteous and will exult.
Chapter 46
ISA 46:1 Bel bows down, Nebo stoops low;
their idols are borne by beasts of burden.
The images that are carried about are burdensome,
a burden for the weary.
ISA 46:2 They stoop and bow down together;
unable to rescue the burden,
they themselves go off into captivity.
ISA 46:3 "Listen to me, O house of Jacob,
all you who remain of the house of Israel,
you whom I have upheld since you were conceived,
an have carried since your birth.
ISA 46:4 Even to your old age and gray hairs
I am he, I am he who will sustain you.
I have made you and I will carry you;
I will sustain you and I will rescue you.
ISA 46:5 "To whom will you compare me or count me equal?
To whom will you liken me that we may be compared?
ISA 46:6 Some pour out gold from their bags
and weigh out silver on the scales;
they hire a goldsmith to make it into a god,
and they bow down and worship it.
ISA 46:7 They lift it to their shoulders and carry it;
they set it up in its place, and there it stands.
From that spot it cannot move.
Though one cries out to it, it does not answer;
it cannot save him from his troubles.
ISA 46:8 "Remember this, fix it in mind,
take it to heart, you rebels.
ISA 46:9 Remember the former things, those of long ago;
I am God, and there is no other;
I am God, and there is none like me.
ISA 46:10 I make known the end from the beginning,
from ancient times, what is still to come.
I say: My purpose will stand,
and I will do all that I please.
ISA 46:11 From the east I summon a bird of prey;
from a far-off land, a man to fulfill my purpose.
What I have said, that will I bring about;
what I have planned, that will I do.
ISA 46:12 Listen to me, you stubborn-hearted,
you who are far from righteousness.
ISA 46:13 I am bringing my righteousness near,
it is not far away;
and my salvation will not be delayed.
I will grant salvation to Zion,
my splendor to Israel.
Chapter 47
ISA 47:1 "Go down, sit in the dust,
Virgin Daughter of Babylon;
sit on the ground without a throne,
Daughter of the Babylonians.
No more will you be called
tender or delicate.
ISA 47:2 Take millstones and grind flour;
take off your veil.
Lift up your skirts, bare your legs,
and wade through the streams.
ISA 47:3 Your nakedness will be exposed
and your shame uncovered.
I will take vengeance;
I will spare no one."
ISA 47:4 Our Redeemer--the LORD Almighty is his name--
is the Holy One of Israel.
ISA 47:5 "Sit in silence, go into darkness,
Daughter of the Babylonians;
no more will you be called
queen of kingdoms.
ISA 47:6 I was angry with my people
and desecrated my inheritance;
I gave them into your hand,
and you showed them no mercy.
Even on the aged
you laid a very heavy yoke.
ISA 47:7 You said, `I will continue forever--
the eternal queen!'
But you did not consider these things
or reflect on what might happen.
ISA 47:8 "Now then, listen, you wanton creature,
lounging in your security
and saying to yourself,
`I am, and there is none besides me.
I will never be a widow
or suffer the loss of children.'
ISA 47:9 Both of these will overtake you
in a moment, on a single day:
loss of children and widowhood.
They will come upon you in full measure,
in spite of your many sorceries
and all your potent spells.
ISA 47:10 You have trusted in your wickedness
and have said, `No one sees me.'
Your wisdom and knowledge mislead you
when you say to yourself,
`I am, and there is none besides me.'
ISA 47:11 Disaster will come upon you,
and you will not know how to conjure it away.
A calamity will fall upon you
that you cannot ward off with a ransom;
a catastrophe you cannot foresee
will suddenly come upon you.
ISA 47:12 "Keep on, then, with your magic spells
and with your many sorceries,
which you have labored at since childhood.
Perhaps you will succeed,
perhaps you will cause terror.
ISA 47:13 All the counsel you have received has only worn you out!
Let your astrologers come forward,
those stargazers who make predictions month by month,
let them save you from what is coming upon you.
ISA 47:14 Surely they are like stubble;
the fire will burn them up.
They cannot even save themselves
from the power of the flame.
Here are no coals to warm anyone;
here is no fire to sit by.
ISA 47:15 That is all they can do for you--
these you have labored with
and trafficked with since childhood.
Each of them goes on in his error;
there is not one that can save you.
Chapter 48
ISA 48:1 "Listen to this, O house of
Jacob,
you who are called by the name of Israel
and come from the line of Judah,
you who take oaths in the name of the LORD
and invoke the God of Israel--
but not in truth or righteousness--
ISA 48:2 you who call yourselves citizens of the holy city
and rely on the God of Israel--
the LORD Almighty is his name:
ISA 48:3 I foretold the former things long ago,
my mouth announced them and I made them known;
then suddenly I acted, and they came to pass.
ISA 48:4 For I knew how stubborn you were;
the sinews of your neck were iron,
your forehead was bronze.
ISA 48:5 Therefore I told you these things long ago;
before they happened I announced them to you
so that you could not say,
`My idols did them;
my wooden image and metal god ordained them.'
ISA 48:6 You have heard these things; look at them all.
Will you not admit them?
"From now on I will tell you of new things,
of hidden things unknown to you.
ISA 48:7 They are created now, and not long ago;
you have not heard of them before today.
So you cannot say,
`Yes, I knew of them.'
ISA 48:8 You have neither heard nor understood;
from of old your ear has not been open.
Well do I know how treacherous you are;
you were called a rebel from birth.
ISA 48:9 For my own name's sake I delay my wrath;
for the sake of my praise I hold it back from you,
so as not to cut you off.
ISA 48:10 See, I have refined you, though not as silver;
I have tested you in the furnace of affliction.
ISA 48:11 For my own sake, for my own sake, I do this.
How can I let myself be defamed?
I will not yield my glory to another.
ISA 48:12 "Listen to me, O Jacob,
Israel, whom I have called:
I am he;
I am the first and I am the last.
ISA 48:13 My own hand laid the foundations of the earth,
and my right hand spread out the heavens;
when I summon them,
they all stand up together.
ISA 48:14 "Come together, all of you, and listen:
Which of the idols has foretold these things?
The LORD's chosen ally
will carry out his purpose against Babylon;
his arm will be against the Babylonians.
ISA 48:15 I, even I, have spoken;
yes, I have called him.
I will bring him,
and he will succeed in his mission.
ISA 48:16 "Come near me and listen to this:
"From the first announcement I have not spoken in secret;
at the time it happens, I am there."
And now the Sovereign LORD has sent me,
with his Spirit.
ISA 48:17 This is what the LORD says--
your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel:
"I am the LORD your God,
who teaches you what is best for you,
who directs you in the way you should go.
ISA 48:18 If only you had paid attention to my commands,
your peace would have been like a river,
your righteousness like the waves of the sea.
ISA 48:19 Your descendants would have been like the sand,
your children like its numberless grains;
their name would never be cut off
nor destroyed from before me."
ISA 48:20 Leave Babylon,
flee from the Babylonians!
Announce this with shouts of joy
and proclaim it.
Send it out to the ends of the earth;
say, "The LORD has redeemed his servant Jacob."
ISA 48:21 They did not thirst when he led them through the deserts;
he made water flow for them from the rock;
he split the rock
and water gushed out.
ISA 48:22 "There is no peace," says the LORD, "for the
wicked."
Chapter 49
ISA 49:1 Listen to me, you islands;
hear this, you distant nations:
Before I was born the LORD called me;
from my birth he has made mention of my name.
ISA 49:2 He made my mouth like a sharpened sword,
in the shadow of his hand he hid me;
he made me into a polished arrow
and concealed me in his quiver.
ISA 49:3 He said to me, "You are my servant,
Israel, in whom I will display my splendor."
ISA 49:4 But I said, "I have labored to no purpose;
I have spent my strength in vain and for nothing.
Yet what is due me is in the LORD's hand,
and my reward is with my God."
ISA 49:5 And now the LORD says--
he who formed me in the womb to be his servant
to bring Jacob back to him
and gather Israel to himself,
for I am honored in the eyes of the LORD
and my God has been my strength--
ISA 49:6 he says:
"It is too small a thing for you to be my servant
to restore the tribes of Jacob
and bring back those of Israel I have kept.
I will also make you a light for the Gentiles,
that you may bring my salvation to the ends of the
earth."
ISA 49:7 This is what the LORD says--
the Redeemer and Holy One of Israel--
to him who was despised and abhorred by the nation,
to the servant of rulers:
"Kings will see you and rise up,
princes will see and bow down,
because of the LORD, who is faithful,
the Holy One of Israel, who has chosen you."
ISA 49:8 This is what the LORD says:
"In the time of my favor I will answer you,
and in the day of salvation I will help you;
I will keep you and will make you
to be a covenant for the people,
to restore the land
and to reassign its desolate inheritances,
ISA 49:9 to say to the captives, `Come out,'
and to those in darkness, `Be free!'
"They will feed beside the roads
and find pasture on every barren hill.
ISA 49:10 They will neither hunger nor thirst,
nor will the desert heat or the sun beat upon them.
He who has compassion on them will guide them
and lead them beside springs of water.
ISA 49:11 I will turn all my mountains into roads,
and my highways will be raised up.
ISA 49:12 See, they will come from afar--
some from the north, some from the west,
some from the region of Aswan. "
ISA 49:13 Shout for joy, O heavens;
rejoice, O earth;
burst into song, O mountains!
For the LORD comforts his people
and will have compassion on his afflicted ones.
ISA 49:14 But Zion said, "The LORD has forsaken me,
the Lord has forgotten me."
ISA 49:15 "Can a mother forget the baby at her breast
and have no compassion on the child she has borne?
Though she may forget,
I will not forget you!
ISA 49:16 See, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands;
your walls are ever before me.
ISA 49:17 Your sons hasten back,
and those who laid you waste depart from you.
ISA 49:18 Lift up your eyes and look around;
all your sons gather and come to you.
As surely as I live," declares the LORD,
"you will wear them all as ornaments;
you will put them on, like a bride.
ISA 49:19 "Though you were ruined and made desolate
and your land laid waste,
now you will be too small for your people,
and those who devoured you will be far away.
ISA 49:20 The children born during your bereavement
will yet say in your hearing,
`This place is too small for us;
give us more space to live in.'
ISA 49:21 Then you will say in your heart,
`Who bore me these?
I was bereaved and barren;
I was exiled and rejected.
Who brought these up?
I was left all alone,
but these--where have they come from?' "
ISA 49:22 This is what the Sovereign LORD says:
"See, I will beckon to the Gentiles,
I will lift up my banner to the peoples;
they will bring your sons in their arms
and carry your daughters on their shoulders.
ISA 49:23 Kings will be your foster fathers,
and their queens your nursing mothers.
They will bow down before you with their faces to the ground;
they will lick the dust at your feet.
Then you will know that I am the LORD;
those who hope in me will not be disappointed."
ISA 49:24 Can plunder be taken from warriors,
or captives rescued from the fierce?
ISA 49:25 But this is what the LORD says:
"Yes, captives will be taken from warriors,
and plunder retrieved from the fierce;
I will contend with those who contend with you,
and your children I will save.
ISA 49:26 I will make your oppressors eat their own flesh;
they will be drunk on their own blood, as with wine.
Then all mankind will know
that I, the LORD, am your Savior,
your Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob."
Chapter 50
ISA 50:1 This is what the LORD says:
"Where is your mother's certificate of divorce
with which I sent her away?
Or to which of my creditors
did I sell you?
Because of your sins you were sold;
because of your transgressions your mother was sent away.
ISA 50:2 When I came, why was there no one?
When I called, why was there no one to answer?
Was my arm too short to ransom you?
Do I lack the strength to rescue you?
By a mere rebuke I dry up the sea,
I turn rivers into a desert;
their fish rot for lack of water
and die of thirst.
ISA 50:3 I clothe the sky with darkness
and make sackcloth its covering."
ISA 50:4 The Sovereign LORD has given me an instructed tongue,
to know the word that sustains the weary.
He wakens me morning by morning,
wakens my ear to listen like one being taught.
ISA 50:5 The Sovereign LORD has opened my ears,
and I have not been rebellious;
I have not drawn back.
ISA 50:6 I offered my back to those who beat me,
my cheeks to those who pulled out my beard;
I did not hide my face
from mocking and spitting.
ISA 50:7 Because the Sovereign LORD helps me,
I will not be disgraced.
Therefore have I set my face like flint,
and I know I will not be put to shame.
ISA 50:8 He who vindicates me is near.
Who then will bring charges against me?
Let us face each other!
Who is my accuser?
Let him confront me!
ISA 50:9 It is the Sovereign LORD who helps me.
Who is he that will condemn me?
They will all wear out like a garment;
the moths will eat them up.
ISA 50:10 Who among you fears the LORD
and obeys the word of his servant?
Let him who walks in the dark,
who has no light,
trust in the name of the LORD
and rely on his God.
ISA 50:11 But now, all you who light fires
and provide yourselves with flaming torches,
go, walk in the light of your fires
and of the torches you have set ablaze.
This is what you shall receive from my hand:
You will lie down in torment.
Chapter 51
ISA 51:1 "Listen to me, you who pursue
righteousness
and who seek the LORD:
Look to the rock from which you were cut
and to the quarry from which you were hewn;
ISA 51:2 look to Abraham, your father,
and to Sarah, who gave you birth.
When I called him he was but one,
and I blessed him and made him many.
ISA 51:3 The LORD will surely comfort Zion
and will look with compassion on all her ruins;
he will make her deserts like Eden,
her wastelands like the garden of the LORD.
Joy and gladness will be found in her,
thanksgiving and the sound of singing.
ISA 51:4 "Listen to me, my people;
hear me, my nation:
The law will go out from me;
my justice will become a light to the nations.
ISA 51:5 My righteousness draws near speedily,
my salvation is on the way,
and my arm will bring justice to the nations.
The islands will look to me
and wait in hope for my arm.
ISA 51:6 Lift up your eyes to the heavens,
look at the earth beneath;
the heavens will vanish like smoke,
the earth will wear out like a garment
and its inhabitants die like flies.
But my salvation will last forever,
my righteousness will never fail.
ISA 51:7 "Hear me, you who know what is right,
you people who have my law in your hearts:
Do not fear the reproach of men
or be terrified by their insults.
ISA 51:8 For the moth will eat them up like a garment;
the worm will devour them like wool.
But my righteousness will last forever,
my salvation through all generations."
ISA 51:9 Awake, awake! Clothe yourself with strength,
O arm of the LORD;
awake, as in days gone by,
as in generations of old.
Was it not you who cut Rahab to pieces,
who pierced that monster through?
ISA 51:10 Was it not you who dried up the sea,
the waters of the great deep,
who made a road in the depths of the sea
so that the redeemed might cross over?
ISA 51:11 The ransomed of the LORD will return.
They will enter Zion with singing;
everlasting joy will crown their heads.
Gladness and joy will overtake them,
and sorrow and sighing will flee away.
ISA 51:12 "I, even I, am he who comforts you.
Who are you that you fear mortal men,
the sons of men, who are but grass,
ISA 51:13 that you forget the LORD your Maker,
who stretched out the heavens
and laid the foundations of the earth,
that you live in constant terror every day
because of the wrath of the oppressor,
who is bent on destruction?
For where is the wrath of the oppressor?
ISA 51:14 The cowering prisoners will soon be set free;
they will not die in their dungeon,
nor will they lack bread.
ISA 51:15 For I am the LORD your God,
who churns up the sea so that its waves roar--
the LORD Almighty is his name.
ISA 51:16 I have put my words in your mouth
and covered you with the shadow of my hand--
I who set the heavens in place,
who laid the foundations of the earth,
and who say to Zion, `You are my people.' "
ISA 51:17 Awake, awake!
Rise up, O Jerusalem,
you who have drunk from the hand of the LORD
the cup of his wrath,
you who have drained to its dregs
the goblet that makes men stagger.
ISA 51:18 Of all the sons she bore
there was none to guide her;
of all the sons she reared
there was none to take her by the hand.
ISA 51:19 These double calamities have come upon you--
who can comfort you?--
ruin and destruction, famine and sword--
who can console you?
ISA 51:20 Your sons have fainted;
they lie at the head of every street,
like antelope caught in a net.
They are filled with the wrath of the LORD
and the rebuke of your God.
ISA 51:21 Therefore hear this, you afflicted one,
made drunk, but not with wine.
ISA 51:22 This is what your Sovereign LORD says,
your God, who defends his people:
"See, I have taken out of your hand
the cup that made you stagger;
from that cup, the goblet of my wrath,
you will never drink again.
ISA 51:23 I will put it into the hands of your tormentors,
who said to you,
`Fall prostrate that we may walk over you.'
And you made your back like the ground,
like a street to be walked over."
Chapter 52
ISA 52:1 Awake, awake, O Zion,
clothe yourself with strength.
Put on your garments of splendor,
O Jerusalem, the holy city.
The uncircumcised and defiled
will not enter you again.
ISA 52:2 Shake off your dust;
rise up, sit enthroned, O Jerusalem.
Free yourself from the chains on your neck,
O captive Daughter of Zion.
ISA 52:3 For this is what the LORD says:
"You were sold for nothing,
and without money you will be redeemed."
ISA 52:4 For this is what the Sovereign LORD says:
"At first my people went down to Egypt to live;
lately, Assyria has oppressed them.
ISA 52:5 "And now what do I have here?" declares
the LORD.
"For my people have been taken away for nothing,
and those who rule them mock, "
declares the LORD.
"And all day long
my name is constantly blasphemed.
ISA 52:6 Therefore my people will know my name;
therefore in that day they will know
that it is I who foretold it.
Yes, it is I."
ISA 52:7 How beautiful on the mountains
are the feet of those who bring good news,
who proclaim peace,
who bring good tidings,
who proclaim salvation,
who say to Zion,
"Your God reigns!"
ISA 52:8 Listen! Your watchmen lift up their voices;
together they shout for joy.
When the LORD returns to Zion,
they will see it with their own eyes.
ISA 52:9 Burst into songs of joy together,
you ruins of Jerusalem,
for the LORD has comforted his people,
he has redeemed Jerusalem.
ISA 52:10 The LORD will lay bare his holy arm
in the sight of all the nations,
and all the ends of the earth will see
the salvation of our God.
ISA 52:11 Depart, depart, go out from there!
Touch no unclean thing!
Come out from it and be pure,
you who carry the vessels of the LORD.
ISA 52:12 But you will not leave in haste
or go in flight;
for the LORD will go before you,
the God of Israel will be your rear guard.
ISA 52:13 See, my servant will act wisely;
he will be raised and lifted up and highly exalted.
ISA 52:14 Just as there were many who were appalled at him--
his appearance was so disfigured beyond that of any man
and his form marred beyond human likeness--
ISA 52:15 so will he sprinkle many nations,
and kings will shut their mouths because of him.
For what they were not told, they will see,
and what they have not heard, they will understand.
Chapter 53
ISA 53:1 Who has believed our message
and to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?
ISA 53:2 He grew up before him like a tender shoot,
and like a root out of dry ground.
He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him,
nothing in his appearance that we should desire him.
ISA 53:3 He was despised and rejected by men,
a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering.
Like one from whom men hide their faces
he was despised, and we esteemed him not.
ISA 53:4 Surely he took up our infirmities
and carried our sorrows,
yet we considered him stricken by God,
smitten by him, and afflicted.
ISA 53:5 But he was pierced for our transgressions,
he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was upon him,
and by his wounds we are healed.
ISA 53:6 We all, like sheep, have gone astray,
each of us has turned to his own way;
and the LORD has laid on him
the iniquity of us all.
ISA 53:7 He was oppressed and afflicted,
yet he did not open his mouth;
he was led like a lamb to the slaughter,
and as a sheep before her shearers is silent,
so he did not open his mouth.
ISA 53:8 By oppression and judgment he was taken away.
And who can speak of his descendants?
For he was cut off from the land of the living;
for the transgression of my people he was stricken.
ISA 53:9 He was assigned a grave with the wicked,
and with the rich in his death,
though he had done no violence,
nor was any deceit in his mouth.
ISA 53:10 Yet it was the LORD's will to crush him and cause him to
suffer,
and though the LORD makes his life a guilt offering,
he will see his offspring and prolong his days,
and the will of the LORD will prosper in his hand.
ISA 53:11 After the suffering of his soul,
he will see the light of life and be satisfied;
by his knowledge my righteous servant will justify many,
and he will bear their iniquities.
ISA 53:12 Therefore I will give him a portion among the great,
and he will divide the spoils with the strong,
because he poured out his life unto death,
and was numbered with the transgressors.
For he bore the sin of many,
and made intercession for the transgressors.
Chapter 54
ISA 54:1 "Sing, O barren woman,
you who never bore a child;
burst into song, shout for joy,
you who were never in labor;
because more are the children of the desolate woman
than of her who has a husband,"
says the LORD.
ISA 54:2 "Enlarge the place of your tent,
stretch your tent curtains wide,
do not hold back;
lengthen your cords,
strengthen your stakes.
ISA 54:3 For you will spread out to the right and to the left;
your descendants will dispossess nations
and settle in their desolate cities.
ISA 54:4 "Do not be afraid; you will not suffer shame.
Do not fear disgrace; you will not be humiliated.
You will forget the shame of your youth
and remember no more the reproach of your widowhood.
ISA 54:5 For your Maker is your husband--
the LORD Almighty is his name--
the Holy One of Israel is your Redeemer;
he is called the God of all the earth.
ISA 54:6 The LORD will call you back
as if you were a wife deserted and distressed in spirit--
a wife who married young,
only to be rejected," says your God.
ISA 54:7 "For a brief moment I abandoned you,
but with deep compassion I will bring you back.
ISA 54:8 In a surge of anger
I hid my face from you for a moment,
but with everlasting kindness
I will have compassion on you,"
says the LORD your Redeemer.
ISA 54:9 "To me this is like the days of Noah,
when I swore that the waters of Noah would never again cover
the earth.
So now I have sworn not to be angry with you,
never to rebuke you again.
ISA 54:10 Though the mountains be shaken
and the hills be removed,
yet my unfailing love for you will not be shaken
nor my covenant of peace be removed,"
says the LORD, who has compassion on you.
ISA 54:11 "O afflicted city, lashed by storms and not comforted,
I will build you with stones of turquoise,
your foundations with sapphires.
ISA 54:12 I will make your battlements of rubies,
your gates of sparkling jewels,
and all your walls of precious stones.
ISA 54:13 All your sons will be taught by the LORD,
and great will be your children's peace.
ISA 54:14 In righteousness you will be established:
Tyranny will be far from you;
you will have nothing to fear.
Terror will be far removed;
it will not come near you.
ISA 54:15 If anyone does attack you, it will not be my doing;
whoever attacks you will surrender to you.
ISA 54:16 "See, it is I who created the blacksmith
who fans the coals into flame
and forges a weapon fit for its work.
And it is I who have created the destroyer to work havoc;
ISA 54:17 no weapon forged against you will prevail,
and you will refute every tongue that accuses you.
This is the heritage of the servants of the LORD,
and this is their vindication from me,"
declares the LORD.
Chapter 55
ISA 55:1 "Come, all you who are thirsty,
come to the waters;
and you who have no money,
come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk
without money and without cost.
ISA 55:2 Why spend money on what is not bread,
and your labor on what does not satisfy?
Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good,
and your soul will delight in the richest of fare.
ISA 55:3 Give ear and come to me;
hear me, that your soul may live.
I will make an everlasting covenant with you,
my faithful love promised to David.
ISA 55:4 See, I have made him a witness to the peoples,
a leader and commander of the peoples.
ISA 55:5 Surely you will summon nations you know not,
and nations that do not know you will hasten to you,
because of the LORD your God,
the Holy One of Israel,
for he has endowed you with splendor."
ISA 55:6 Seek the LORD while he may be found;
call on him while he is near.
ISA 55:7 Let the wicked forsake his way
and the evil man his thoughts.
Let him turn to the LORD, and he will have mercy on him,
and to our God, for he will freely pardon.
ISA 55:8 "For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
neither are your ways my ways,"
declares the LORD.
ISA 55:9 "As the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are my ways higher than your ways
and my thoughts than your thoughts.
ISA 55:10 As the rain and the snow
come down from heaven,
and do not return to it
without watering the earth
and making it bud and flourish,
so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the
eater,
ISA 55:11 so is my word that goes out from my mouth:
It will not return to me empty,
but will accomplish what I desire
and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.
ISA 55:12 You will go out in joy
and be led forth in peace;
the mountains and hills
will burst into song before you,
and all the trees of the field
will clap their hands.
ISA 55:13 Instead of the thornbush will grow the pine tree,
and instead of briers the myrtle will grow.
This will be for the LORD's renown,
for an everlasting sign,
which will not be destroyed."
Chapter 56
ISA 56:1 This is what the LORD says:
"Maintain justice
and do what is right,
for my salvation is close at hand
and my righteousness will soon be revealed.
ISA 56:2 Blessed is the man who does this,
the man who holds it fast,
who keeps the Sabbath without desecrating it,
and keeps his hand from doing any evil."
ISA 56:3 Let no foreigner who has bound himself to the LORD say,
"The LORD will surely exclude me from his people."
And let not any eunuch complain,
"I am only a dry tree."
ISA 56:4 For this is what the LORD says:
"To the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths,
who choose what pleases me
and hold fast to my covenant--
ISA 56:5 to them I will give within my temple and its walls
a memorial and a name
better than sons and daughters;
I will give them an everlasting name
that will not be cut off.
ISA 56:6 And foreigners who bind themselves to the LORD
to serve him,
to love the name of the LORD,
and to worship him,
all who keep the Sabbath without desecrating it
and who hold fast to my covenant--
ISA 56:7 these I will bring to my holy mountain
and give them joy in my house of prayer.
Their burnt offerings and sacrifices
will be accepted on my altar;
for my house will be called
a house of prayer for all nations."
ISA 56:8 The Sovereign LORD declares--
he who gathers the exiles of Israel:
"I will gather still others to them
besides those already gathered."
ISA 56:9 Come, all you beasts of the field,
come and devour, all you beasts of the forest!
ISA 56:10 Israel's watchmen are blind,
they all lack knowledge;
they are all mute dogs,
they cannot bark;
they lie around and dream,
they love to sleep.
ISA 56:11 They are dogs with mighty appetites;
they never have enough.
They are shepherds who lack understanding;
they all turn to their own way,
each seeks his own gain.
ISA 56:12 "Come," each one cries, "let me get wine!
Let us drink our fill of beer!
And tomorrow will be like today,
or even far better."
Chapter 57
ISA 57:1 The righteous perish,
and no one ponders it in his heart;
devout men are taken away,
and no one understands
that the righteous are taken away
to be spared from evil.
ISA 57:2 Those who walk uprightly
enter into peace;
they find rest as they lie in death.
ISA 57:3 "But you--come here, you sons of a sorceress,
you offspring of adulterers and prostitutes!
ISA 57:4 Whom are you mocking?
At whom do you sneer
and stick out your tongue?
Are you not a brood of rebels,
the offspring of liars?
ISA 57:5 You burn with lust among the oaks
and under every spreading tree;
you sacrifice your children in the ravines
and under the overhanging crags.
ISA 57:6 The idols among the smooth stones of the ravines are your
portion;
they, they are your lot.
Yes, to them you have poured out drink offerings
and offered grain offerings.
In the light of these things, should I relent?
ISA 57:7 You have made your bed on a high and lofty hill;
there you went up to offer your sacrifices.
ISA 57:8 Behind your doors and your doorposts
you have put your pagan symbols.
Forsaking me, you uncovered your bed,
you climbed into it and opened it wide;
you made a pact with those whose beds you love,
and you looked on their nakedness.
ISA 57:9 You went to Molech with olive oil
and increased your perfumes.
You sent your ambassadors far away;
you descended to the grave itself!
ISA 57:10 You were wearied by all your ways,
but you would not say, `It is hopeless.'
You found renewal of your strength,
and so you did not faint.
ISA 57:11 "Whom have you so dreaded and feared
that you have been false to me,
and have neither remembered me
nor pondered this in your hearts?
Is it not because I have long been silent
that you do not fear me?
ISA 57:12 I will expose your righteousness and your works,
and they will not benefit you.
ISA 57:13 When you cry out for help,
let your collection of idols save you!
The wind will carry all of them off,
a mere breath will blow them away.
But the man who makes me his refuge
will inherit the land
and possess my holy mountain."
ISA 57:14 And it will be said:
"Build up, build up, prepare the road!
Remove the obstacles out of the way of my people."
ISA 57:15 For this is what the high and lofty One says--
he who lives forever, whose name is holy:
"I live in a high and holy place,
but also with him who is contrite and lowly in spirit,
to revive the spirit of the lowly
and to revive the heart of the contrite.
ISA 57:16 I will not accuse forever,
nor will I always be angry,
for then the spirit of man would grow faint before me--
the breath of man that I have created.
ISA 57:17 I was enraged by his sinful greed;
I punished him, and hid my face in anger,
yet he kept on in his willful ways.
ISA 57:18 I have seen his ways, but I will heal him;
I will guide him and restore comfort to him,
ISA 57:19 creating praise on the lips of the mourners in
Israel.
Peace, peace, to those far and near,"
says the LORD. "And I will heal them."
ISA 57:20 But the wicked are like the tossing sea,
which cannot rest,
whose waves cast up mire and mud.
ISA 57:21 "There is no peace," says my God, "for the
wicked."
Chapter 58
ISA 58:1 "Shout it aloud, do not hold
back.
Raise your voice like a trumpet.
Declare to my people their rebellion
and to the house of Jacob their sins.
ISA 58:2 For day after day they seek me out;
they seem eager to know my ways,
as if they were a nation that does what is right
and has not forsaken the commands of its God.
They ask me for just decisions
and seem eager for God to come near them.
ISA 58:3 `Why have we fasted,' they say,
`and you have not seen it?
Why have we humbled ourselves,
and you have not noticed?'
"Yet on the day of your fasting, you do as you please
and exploit all your workers.
ISA 58:4 Your fasting ends in quarreling and strife,
and in striking each other with wicked fists.
You cannot fast as you do today
and expect your voice to be heard on high.
ISA 58:5 Is this the kind of fast I have chosen,
only a day for a man to humble himself?
Is it only for bowing one's head like a reed
and for lying on sackcloth and ashes?
Is that what you call a fast,
a day acceptable to the LORD?
ISA 58:6 "Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen:
to loose the chains of injustice
and untie the cords of the yoke,
to set the oppressed free
and break every yoke?
ISA 58:7 Is it not to share your food with the hungry
and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter--
when you see the naked, to clothe him,
and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?
ISA 58:8 Then your light will break forth like the dawn,
and your healing will quickly appear;
then your righteousness will go before you,
and the glory of the LORD will be your rear guard.
ISA 58:9 Then you will call, and the LORD will answer;
you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I.
"If you do away with the yoke of oppression,
with the pointing finger and malicious talk,
ISA 58:10 and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry
and satisfy the needs of the oppressed,
then your light will rise in the darkness,
and your night will become like the noonday.
ISA 58:11 The LORD will guide you always;
he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land
and will strengthen your frame.
You will be like a well-watered garden,
like a spring whose waters never fail.
ISA 58:12 Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins
and will raise up the age-old foundations;
you will be called Repairer of Broken Walls,
Restorer of Streets with Dwellings.
ISA 58:13 "If you keep your feet from breaking the Sabbath
and from doing as you please on my holy day,
if you call the Sabbath a delight
and the LORD's holy day honorable,
and if you honor it by not going your own way
and not doing as you please or speaking idle words,
ISA 58:14 then you will find your joy in the LORD,
and I will cause you to ride on the heights of the land
and to feast on the inheritance of your father Jacob."
The mouth of the LORD has spoken.
Chapter 59
ISA 59:1 Surely the arm of the LORD is not
too short to save,
nor his ear too dull to hear.
ISA 59:2 But your iniquities have separated
you from your God;
your sins have hidden his face from you,
so that he will not hear.
ISA 59:3 For your hands are stained with blood,
your fingers with guilt.
Your lips have spoken lies,
and your tongue mutters wicked things.
ISA 59:4 No one calls for justice;
no one pleads his case with integrity.
They rely on empty arguments and speak lies;
they conceive trouble and give birth to evil.
ISA 59:5 They hatch the eggs of vipers
and spin a spider's web.
Whoever eats their eggs will die,
and when one is broken, an adder is hatched.
ISA 59:6 Their cobwebs are useless for clothing;
they cannot cover themselves with what they make.
Their deeds are evil deeds,
and acts of violence are in their hands.
ISA 59:7 Their feet rush into sin;
they are swift to shed innocent blood.
Their thoughts are evil thoughts;
ruin and destruction mark their ways.
ISA 59:8 The way of peace they do not know;
there is no justice in their paths.
They have turned them into crooked roads;
no one who walks in them will know peace.
ISA 59:9 So justice is far from us,
and righteousness does not reach us.
We look for light, but all is darkness;
for brightness, but we walk in deep shadows.
ISA 59:10 Like the blind we grope along the wall,
feeling our way like men without eyes.
At midday we stumble as if it were twilight;
among the strong, we are like the dead.
ISA 59:11 We all growl like bears;
we moan mournfully like doves.
We look for justice, but find none;
for deliverance, but it is far away.
ISA 59:12 For our offenses are many in your sight,
and our sins testify against us.
Our offenses are ever with us,
and we acknowledge our iniquities:
ISA 59:13 rebellion and treachery against the LORD,
turning our backs on our God,
fomenting oppression and revolt,
uttering lies our hearts have conceived.
ISA 59:14 So justice is driven back,
and righteousness stands at a distance;
truth has stumbled in the streets,
honesty cannot enter.
ISA 59:15 Truth is nowhere to be found,
and whoever shuns evil becomes a prey.
The LORD looked and was displeased
that there was no justice.
ISA 59:16 He saw that there was no one,
he was appalled that there was no one to intervene;
so his own arm worked salvation for him,
and his own righteousness sustained him.
ISA 59:17 He put on righteousness as his breastplate,
and the helmet of salvation on his head;
he put on the garments of vengeance
and wrapped himself in zeal as in a cloak.
ISA 59:18 According to what they have done,
so will he repay
wrath to his enemies
and retribution to his foes;
he will repay the islands their due.
ISA 59:19 From the west, men will fear the name of the LORD,
and from the rising of the sun, they will revere his glory.
For he will come like a pent-up flood
that the breath of the LORD drives along.
ISA 59:20 "The Redeemer will come to Zion,
to those in Jacob who repent of their sins,"
declares the LORD.
ISA 59:21 "As for me, this is my covenant with
them," says the LORD. "My Spirit, who is on you, and my words that I
have put in your mouth will not depart from your mouth, or from the mouths of
your children, or from the mouths of their descendants from this time on and
forever," says the LORD.
Chapter 60
ISA 60:1 "Arise, shine, for your light
has come,
and the glory of the LORD rises upon you.
ISA 60:2 See, darkness covers the earth
and thick darkness is over the peoples,
but the LORD rises upon you
and his glory appears over you.
ISA 60:3 Nations will come to your light,
and kings to the brightness of your dawn.
ISA 60:4 "Lift up your eyes and look about you:
All assemble and come to you;
your sons come from afar,
and your daughters are carried on the arm.
ISA 60:5 Then you will look and be radiant,
your heart will throb and swell with joy;
the wealth on the seas will be brought to you,
to you the riches of the nations will come.
ISA 60:6 Herds of camels will cover your land,
young camels of Midian and Ephah.
And all from Sheba will come,
bearing gold and incense
and proclaiming the praise of the LORD.
ISA 60:7 All Kedar's flocks will be gathered to you,
the rams of Nebaioth will serve you;
they will be accepted as offerings on my altar,
and I will adorn my glorious temple.
ISA 60:8 "Who are these that fly along like clouds,
like doves to their nests?
ISA 60:9 Surely the islands look to me;
in the lead are the ships of Tarshish,
bringing your sons from afar,
with their silver and gold,
to the honor of the LORD your God,
the Holy One of Israel,
for he has endowed you with splendor.
ISA 60:10 "Foreigners will rebuild your walls,
and their kings will serve you.
Though in anger I struck you,
in favor I will show you compassion.
ISA 60:11 Your gates will always stand open,
they will never be shut, day or night,
so that men may bring you the wealth of the nations--
their kings led in triumphal procession.
ISA 60:12 For the nation or kingdom that will not serve you will perish;
it will be utterly ruined.
ISA 60:13 "The glory of Lebanon will come to you,
the pine, the fir and the cypress together,
to adorn the place of my sanctuary;
and I will glorify the place of my feet.
ISA 60:14 The sons of your oppressors will come bowing before you;
all who despise you will bow down at your feet
and will call you the City of the LORD,
Zion of the Holy One of Israel.
ISA 60:15 "Although you have been forsaken and hated,
with no one traveling through,
I will make you the everlasting pride
and the joy of all generations.
ISA 60:16 You will drink the milk of nations
and be nursed at royal breasts.
Then you will know that I, the LORD, am your Savior,
your Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob.
ISA 60:17 Instead of bronze I will bring you gold,
and silver in place of iron.
Instead of wood I will bring you bronze,
and iron in place of stones.
I will make peace your governor
and righteousness your ruler.
ISA 60:18 No longer will violence be heard in your land,
nor ruin or destruction within your borders,
but you will call your walls Salvation
and your gates Praise.
ISA 60:19 The sun will no more be your light by day,
nor will the brightness of the moon shine on you,
for the LORD will be your everlasting light,
and your God will be your glory.
ISA 60:20 Your sun will never set again,
and your moon will wane no more;
the LORD will be your everlasting light,
and your days of sorrow will end.
ISA 60:21 Then will all your people be righteous
and they will possess the land forever.
They are the shoot I have planted,
the work of my hands,
for the display of my splendor.
ISA 60:22 The least of you will become a thousand,
the smallest a mighty nation.
I am the LORD;
in its time I will do this swiftly."
Chapter 61
ISA 61:1 The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is
on me,
because the LORD has anointed me
to preach good news to the poor.
He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,
to proclaim freedom for the captives
and release from darkness for the prisoners,
ISA 61:2 to proclaim the year of the LORD's favor
and the day of vengeance of our God,
to comfort all who mourn,
ISA 61:3 and provide for those who grieve in Zion--
to bestow on them a crown of beauty
instead of ashes,
the oil of gladness
instead of mourning,
and a garment of praise
instead of a spirit of despair.
They will be called oaks of righteousness,
a planting of the LORD
for the display of his splendor.
ISA 61:4 They will rebuild the ancient ruins
and restore the places long devastated;
they will renew the ruined cities
that have been devastated for generations.
ISA 61:5 Aliens will shepherd your flocks;
foreigners will work your fields and vineyards.
ISA 61:6 And you will be called priests of the LORD,
you will be named ministers of our God.
You will feed on the wealth of nations,
and in their riches you will boast.
ISA 61:7 Instead of their shame
my people will receive a double portion,
and instead of disgrace
they will rejoice in their inheritance;
and so they will inherit a double portion in their land,
and everlasting joy will be theirs.
ISA 61:8 "For I, the LORD, love justice;
I hate robbery and iniquity.
In my faithfulness I will reward them
and make an everlasting covenant with them.
ISA 61:9 Their descendants will be known among the nations
and their offspring among the peoples.
All who see them will acknowledge
that they are a people the LORD has blessed."
ISA 61:10 I delight greatly in the LORD;
my soul rejoices in my God.
For he has clothed me with garments of salvation
and arrayed me in a robe of righteousness,
as a bridegroom adorns his head like a priest,
and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.
ISA 61:11 For as the soil makes the sprout come up
and a garden causes seeds to grow,
so the Sovereign LORD will make righteousness and praise
spring up before all nations.
Chapter 62
ISA 62:1 For Zion's sake I will not keep
silent,
for Jerusalem's sake I will not remain quiet,
till her righteousness shines out like the dawn,
her salvation like a blazing torch.
ISA 62:2 The nations will see your righteousness,
and all kings your glory;
you will be called by a new name
that the mouth of the LORD will bestow.
ISA 62:3 You will be a crown of splendor in the LORD's hand,
a royal diadem in the hand of your God.
ISA 62:4 No longer will they call you Deserted,
or name your land Desolate.
But you will be called Hephzibah,
and your land Beulah;
for the LORD will take delight in you,
and your land will be married.
ISA 62:5 As a young man marries a maiden,
so will your sons marry you;
as a bridegroom rejoices over his bride,
so will your God rejoice over you.
ISA 62:6 I have posted watchmen on your walls, O Jerusalem;
they will never be silent day or night.
You who call on the LORD,
give yourselves no rest,
ISA 62:7 and give him no rest till he establishes Jerusalem
and makes her the praise of the earth.
ISA 62:8 The LORD has sworn by his right hand
and by his mighty arm:
"Never again will I give your grain
as food for your enemies,
and never again will foreigners drink the new wine
for which you have toiled;
ISA 62:9 but those who harvest it will eat it
and praise the LORD,
and those who gather the grapes will drink it
in the courts of my sanctuary."
ISA 62:10 Pass through, pass through the gates!
Prepare the way for the people.
Build up, build up the highway!
Remove the stones.
Raise a banner for the nations.
ISA 62:11 The LORD has made proclamation
to the ends of the earth:
"Say to the Daughter of Zion,
`See, your Savior comes!
See, his reward is with him,
and his recompense accompanies him.' "
ISA 62:12 They will be called the Holy People,
the Redeemed of the LORD;
and you will be called Sought After,
the City No Longer Deserted.
Chapter 63
ISA 63:1 Who is this coming from Edom,
from Bozrah, with his garments stained crimson?
Who is this, robed in splendor,
striding forward in the greatness of his strength?
"It is I, speaking in righteousness,
mighty to save."
ISA 63:2 Why are your garments red,
like those of one treading the winepress?
ISA 63:3 "I have trodden the winepress alone;
from the nations no one was with me.
I trampled them in my anger
and trod them down in my wrath;
their blood spattered my garments,
and I stained all my clothing.
ISA 63:4 For the day of vengeance was in my heart,
and the year of my redemption has come.
ISA 63:5 I looked, but there was no one to help,
I was appalled that no one gave support;
so my own arm worked salvation for me,
and my own wrath sustained me.
ISA 63:6 I trampled the nations in my anger;
in my wrath I made them drunk
and poured their blood on the ground."
ISA 63:7 I will tell of the kindnesses of the LORD,
the deeds for which he is to be praised,
according to all the LORD has done for us--
yes, the many good things he has done
for the house of Israel,
according to his compassion and many kindnesses.
ISA 63:8 He said, "Surely they are my people,
sons who will not be false to me";
and so he became their Savior.
ISA 63:9 In all their distress he too was distressed,
and the angel of his presence saved them.
In his love and mercy he redeemed them;
he lifted them up and carried them
all the days of old.
ISA 63:10 Yet they rebelled
and grieved his Holy Spirit.
So he turned and became their enemy
and he himself fought against them.
ISA 63:11 Then his people recalled the days of old,
the days of Moses and his people--
where is he who brought them through the sea,
with the shepherd of his flock?
Where is he who set
his Holy Spirit among them,
ISA 63:12 who sent his glorious arm of power
to be at Moses' right hand,
who divided the waters before them,
to gain for himself everlasting renown,
ISA 63:13 who led them through the depths?
Like a horse in open country,
they did not stumble;
ISA 63:14 like cattle that go down to the plain,
they were given rest by the Spirit of the LORD.
This is how you guided your people
to make for yourself a glorious name.
ISA 63:15 Look down from heaven and see
from your lofty throne, holy and glorious.
Where are your zeal and your might?
Your tenderness and compassion are withheld from us.
ISA 63:16 But you are our Father,
though Abraham does not know us
or Israel acknowledge us;
you, O LORD, are our Father,
our Redeemer from of old is your name.
ISA 63:17 Why, O LORD, do you make us wander from your ways
and harden our hearts so we do not revere you?
Return for the sake of your servants,
the tribes that are your inheritance.
ISA 63:18 For a little while your people possessed your holy place,
but now our enemies have trampled down your sanctuary.
ISA 63:19 We are yours from of old;
but you have not ruled over them,
they have not been called by your name.
Chapter 64
ISA 64:1 Oh, that you would rend the heavens
and come down,
that the mountains would tremble before you!
ISA 64:2 As when fire sets twigs ablaze
and causes water to boil,
come down to make your name known to your enemies
and cause the nations to quake before you!
ISA 64:3 For when you did awesome things that we did not expect,
you came down, and the mountains trembled before you.
ISA 64:4 Since ancient times no one has heard,
no ear has perceived,
no eye has seen any God besides you,
who acts on behalf of those who wait for him.
ISA 64:5 You come to the help of those who gladly do right,
who remember your ways.
But when we continued to sin against them,
you were angry.
How then can we be saved?
ISA 64:6 All of us have become like one who is unclean,
and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags;
we all shrivel up like a leaf,
and like the wind our sins sweep us away.
ISA 64:7 No one calls on your name
or strives to lay hold of you;
for you have hidden your face from us
and made us waste away because of our sins.
ISA 64:8 Yet, O LORD, you are our Father.
We are the clay, you are the potter;
we are all the work of your hand.
ISA 64:9 Do not be angry beyond measure, O LORD;
do not remember our sins forever.
Oh, look upon us, we pray,
for we are all your people.
ISA 64:10 Your sacred cities have become a desert;
even Zion is a desert, Jerusalem a desolation.
ISA 64:11 Our holy and glorious temple, where our fathers praised you,
has been burned with fire,
and all that we treasured lies in ruins.
ISA 64:12 After all this, O LORD, will you hold yourself back?
Will you keep silent and punish us beyond measure?
Chapter 65
ISA 65:1 "I revealed myself to those who
did not ask for me;
I was found by those who did not seek me.
To a nation that did not call on my name,
I said, `Here am I, here am I.'
ISA 65:2 All day long I have held out my hands
to an obstinate people,
who walk in ways not good,
pursuing their own imaginations--
ISA 65:3 a people who continually provoke me
to my very face,
offering sacrifices in gardens
and burning incense on altars of brick;
ISA 65:4 who sit among the graves
and spend their nights keeping secret vigil;
who eat the flesh of pigs,
and whose pots hold broth of unclean meat;
ISA 65:5 who say, `Keep away; don't come near me,
for I am too sacred for you!'
Such people are smoke in my nostrils,
a fire that keeps burning all day.
ISA 65:6 "See, it stands written before me:
I will not keep silent but will pay back in full;
I will pay it back into their laps--
ISA 65:7 both your sins and the sins of your fathers,"
says the LORD.
"Because they burned sacrifices on the mountains
and defied me on the hills,
I will measure into their laps
the full payment for their former deeds."
ISA 65:8 This is what the LORD says:
"As when juice is still found in a cluster of grapes
and men say, `Don't destroy it,
there is yet some good in it,'
so will I do in behalf of my servants;
I will not destroy them all.
ISA 65:9 I will bring forth descendants from Jacob,
and from Judah those who will possess my mountains;
my chosen people will inherit them,
and there will my servants live.
ISA 65:10 Sharon will become a pasture for flocks,
and the Valley of Achor a resting place for herds,
for my people who seek me.
ISA 65:11 "But as for you who forsake the LORD
and forget my holy mountain,
who spread a table for Fortune
and fill bowls of mixed wine for Destiny,
ISA 65:12 I will destine you for the sword,
and you will all bend down for the slaughter;
for I called but you did not answer,
I spoke but you did not listen.
You did evil in my sight
and chose what displeases me."
ISA 65:13 Therefore this is what the Sovereign LORD says:
"My servants will eat,
but you will go hungry;
my servants will drink,
but you will go thirsty;
my servants will rejoice,
but you will be put to shame.
ISA 65:14 My servants will sing
out of the joy of their hearts,
but you will cry out
from anguish of heart
and wail in brokenness of spirit.
ISA 65:15 You will leave your name
to my chosen ones as a curse;
the Sovereign LORD will put you to death,
but to his servants he will give another name.
ISA 65:16 Whoever invokes a blessing in the land
will do so by the God of truth;
he who takes an oath in the land
will swear by the God of truth.
For the past troubles will be forgotten
and hidden from my eyes.
ISA 65:17 "Behold, I will create
new heavens and a new earth.
The former things will not be remembered,
nor will they come to mind.
ISA 65:18 But be glad and rejoice forever
in what I will create,
for I will create Jerusalem to be a delight
and its people a joy.
ISA 65:19 I will rejoice over Jerusalem
and take delight in my people;
the sound of weeping and of crying
will be heard in it no more.
ISA 65:20 "Never again will there be in it
an infant who lives but a few days,
or an old man who does not live out his years;
he who dies at a hundred
will be thought a mere youth;
he who fails to reach a hundred
will be considered accursed.
ISA 65:21 They will build houses and dwell in them;
they will plant vineyards and eat their fruit.
ISA 65:22 No longer will they build houses and others live in them,
or plant and others eat.
For as the days of a tree,
so will be the days of my people;
my chosen ones will long enjoy
the works of their hands.
ISA 65:23 They will not toil in vain
or bear children doomed to misfortune;
for they will be a people blessed by the LORD,
they and their descendants with them.
ISA 65:24 Before they call I will answer;
while they are still speaking I will hear.
ISA 65:25 The wolf and the lamb will feed together,
and the lion will eat straw like the ox,
but dust will be the serpent's food.
They will neither harm nor destroy
on all my holy mountain,"
says the LORD.
Chapter 66
ISA
66:1 This is what the LORD says:
"Heaven is my throne,
and the earth is my footstool.
Where is the house you will build for me?
Where will my resting place be?
ISA 66:2 Has not my hand made all these things,
and so they came into being?"
declares the LORD.
"This is the one I esteem:
he who is humble and contrite in spirit,
and trembles at my word.
ISA 66:3 But whoever sacrifices a bull
is like one who kills a man,
and whoever offers a lamb,
like one who breaks a dog's neck;
whoever makes a grain offering
is like one who presents pig's blood,
and whoever burns memorial incense,
like one who worships an idol.
They have chosen their own ways,
and their souls delight in their abominations;
ISA 66:4 so I also will choose harsh treatment for them
and will bring upon them what they dread.
For when I called, no one answered,
when I spoke, no one listened.
They did evil in my sight
and chose what displeases me."
ISA 66:5 Hear the word of the LORD,
you who tremble at his word:
"Your brothers who hate you,
and exclude you because of my name, have said,
`Let the LORD be glorified,
that we may see your joy!'
Yet they will be put to shame.
ISA 66:6 Hear that uproar from the city,
hear that noise from the temple!
It is the sound of the LORD
repaying his enemies all they deserve.
ISA 66:7 "Before she goes into labor,
she gives birth;
before the pains come upon her,
she delivers a son.
ISA 66:8 Who has ever heard of such a thing?
Who has ever seen such things?
Can a country be born in a day
or a nation be brought forth in a moment?
Yet no sooner is Zion in labor
than she gives birth to her children.
ISA 66:9 Do I bring to the moment of birth
and not give delivery?" says the LORD.
"Do I close up the womb
when I bring to delivery?" says your God.
ISA 66:10 "Rejoice with Jerusalem and be glad for her,
all you who love her;
rejoice greatly with her,
all you who mourn over her.
ISA 66:11 For you will nurse and be satisfied
at her comforting breasts;
you will drink deeply
and delight in her overflowing abundance."
ISA 66:12 For this is what the LORD says:
"I will extend peace to her like a river,
and the wealth of nations like a flooding stream;
you will nurse and be carried on her arm
and dandled on her knees.
ISA 66:13 As a mother comforts her child,
so will I comfort you;
and you will be comforted over Jerusalem."
ISA 66:14 When you see this, your heart will rejoice
and you will flourish like grass;
the hand of the LORD will be made known to his servants,
but his fury will be shown to his foes.
ISA 66:15 See, the LORD is coming with fire,
and his chariots are like a whirlwind;
he will bring down his anger with fury,
and his rebuke with flames of fire.
ISA 66:16 For with fire and with his sword
the LORD will execute judgment upon all men,
and many will be those slain by the LORD.
ISA 66:17 "Those who consecrate and purify themselves
to go into the gardens, following the one in the midst of those who eat the
flesh of pigs and rats and other abominable things--they will meet their end
together," declares the LORD.
ISA 66:18 "And I, because of their actions and their
imaginations, am about to come and gather all nations and tongues, and they
will come and see my glory.
ISA 66:19 "I will set a sign among them, and I will
send some of those who survive to the nations--to Tarshish, to the Libyans and
Lydians (famous as archers), to Tubal and Greece, and to the distant islands
that have not heard of my fame or seen my glory. They will proclaim my glory
among the nations. 20 And they will bring all your brothers, from all the
nations, to my holy mountain in Jerusalem as an offering to the LORD--on
horses, in chariots and wagons, and on mules and camels," says the LORD.
"They will bring them, as the Israelites bring their grain offerings, to
the temple of the LORD in ceremonially clean vessels. 21 And I will select some
of them also to be priests and Levites," says the LORD.
ISA 66:22 "As the new heavens and the new earth that I
make will endure before me," declares the LORD, "so will your name
and descendants endure. 23 From one New Moon to another and from one Sabbath to
another, all mankind will come and bow down before me," says the LORD. 24
"And they will go out and look upon the dead bodies of those who rebelled
against me; their worm will not die, nor will their fire be quenched, and they
will be loathsome to all mankind."
Everybody likes good clean drinking water,
you don’t want to drink water from a well that somebody has pissed in so don’t
piss in someone else’s well.
Exploiting others for financial gain (greed)
is pissing in the well.
Our elected officials that have sold U.S. out
to lobbyists (lewdness) is urinating in the well.
Ignoring morals and ethics while being
legally abusive (injustice/deceit) is urinating in someone else’s well.
Jumping in bed with someone else’s wife or
husband (adultery) is urinating in someone else’s well.
Preachers abusing boys and girls, Rabbis’
stealing money, Imen advocating the killing of “infidels” as a passage to
heaven scars many innocent people and could be looked-upon as pissing in the
wind (not real bright).
Helping to install and/or propping up despots
in other countries so we can have access to their raw minerals’ or petroleum
products (arrogance and folly) is urinating in someone else’s well. Supporting
despots and potentates to further our security (murder) is urinating in our own
well because the dirt-bags will eventually be replaced with someone not of
“our” liking.
Unfortunately the sheeple and the lemmings
and the pew-potatoes have rolled over and let the Elephants & the Asses produce
over 30 million laws, pay out over $9 trillion in interest and rack-up over $14
trillion in debt (theft, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander,
arrogance and folly), which has allowed the Elephants & Asses to urinate in
a whole lot of wells.
Because we are not perfect everyone is going
to be a hypocrite from time to time but wallowing in hypocrisy is urinating in
your own well.
Pissing in the well is an action of
chicken-shit organizations and people.