Jesus also, that he might sanctify the people with his own blood, suffered outside the gate. Therefore, let us go forth to him outside the camp, bearing his reproach. For we have no continuing city here, but we seek one to come.
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Isaiah
Isaiah 1
¶1. The vision of Isaiah ben-Amoz, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah.
2. Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth, for Jehovah has spoken! I have nurtured and brought up children, but they have rebelled against me.
3. The ox knows his owner, and the donkey, his master’s crib. Israel does not know; my people do not understand.
4. Ah, sinful nation! People laden with iniquity! Seed of evildoers! Corrupt children! They have forsaken Jehovah; they have despised the Holy One of Israel. They are completely estranged.
5. Why would you be struck any more? You will rebel again. The whole head is sick, and the whole heart is faint.
6. From the sole of the foot, even to the head, there is no soundness in it. Bruises, and stripes, and raw wounds have not been treated,[1] nor bandaged, nor mollified with oil.
7. Your country is a waste; your cities are burned up by fire; your land is devoured by strangers in your sight; yea, it is a waste overthrown by strangers.
8. And the daughter of Zion is left like a hut in a vineyard, like a shack in a field of cucumbers, like a besieged city.
9. Had not the Lord of Hosts left of us a small remnant, we would be like Sodom; we would be like Gomorrah.
10. Hear the word of Jehovah, O rulers of Sodom! Give ear to the law of our God, O people of Gomorrah!
11. What is the multitude of your sacrifices to me? says the Lord. I am glutted with burnt offerings of rams and the fat of fatlings, and I take no pleasure in the blood of bullocks, and young rams, and he-goats.
12. Who has required you to trample my courts when you come to appear before me?
13. Stop bringing worthless offerings! Incense is an abomination to me. New moon, and Sabbaths, and the calling of a convocation, I cannot bear. The sacred Assembly is nothing to me.
14. Your new moons and your appointed feasts, my soul hates! They are a burden to me. I have worn myself out bearing them.
15. And when you stretch out your hands, I will hide my eyes from you. Though you make many prayers, I will not listen. Your hands are full of blood!
16. Wash yourselves! Make yourselves clean! Remove the evil of your doings from before my eyes! Stop doing evil!
17. Learn to do good! Seek justice; rebuke the oppressor; judge the orphan; plead for the widow!
18. Come, I pray you, let us reason together, says Jehovah. Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow; though they be red as crimson, they shall be as wool.
19. If you be willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land,
20.but if you refuse and you are rebellious, you will be consumed by the sword, for the mouth of Jehovah has spoken.
21. Oh, how the faithful city is turned to whoredom! She was filled with justice; righteousness lodged in her, but now, murderers.
22. Your silver has become dross; your wine is diluted with water.
23. Your princes are apostates and companions of thieves, all of them loving bribery and pursuing gifts. They will not be judges for an orphan, and a widow’s case will not come before them.
¶24. Therefore says the Lord, the Lord of Hosts, the Mighty One of Israel: “Ah! I will be relieved of my adversaries and avenge myself of my enemies.
25.And I will cause my hand to come upon you again, and I will smelt away your dross as with lye, and I will remove all your alloy.
26.And I will restore your judges as at the first, and your counselors as at the beginning. After that, you will be called, “The City of Righteousness”, a faithful town.
27. Zion will be redeemed by judgment, and those of her who repent, by righteousness,
28.but all the sinful rebels will be crushed, and those who forsake Jehovah will be consumed.
29. For you will be ashamed of the terebinths which you desired, and you will be abashed because of the gardens which you chose.
30. For you will be like a terebinth whose leaf withers and falls, and like a garden that has no water,
31.and the strong man will be like tow, and his work, like a spark, and they both will burn together, and nothing will quench them.
Isaiah 2
¶1. The word which Isaiah the son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem.
2. It shall come to pass in the last days that the mountain of the house of Jehovah will be established as head of the mountains, and will be exalted above the hills, and all the nations will stream to it.
3. And many nations will go, and they will say, “Come, and let us go up to the mountain of Jehovah, to the house of the God of Jacob! And He will teach us His ways, and we will walk in His paths.” For from Zion will the law go forth, and the word of Jehovah from Jerusalem.
4. And He will judge between the nations, and He will reprove many nations, and they will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not lift up sword against nation; neither will they learn war any more.
5. O house of Jacob! Come, and let us walk in the light of Jehovah!
6. For you have forsaken your people, the house of Jacob, because they are full of evil from the east and are soothsayers like the Philistines, and they are content with children of foreigners,
7.and their land is filled with silver and gold, and there is no end to their treasures. Their land is also filled with horses, and there is no end to their chariots.
8. And their land is filled with idols; to the work of their own hands, to that which their own fingers have made, they bow.
9. And the common man humbles himself, and the great man is abased before them; therefore, do not forgive them.
10. Go into the rock, or hide yourself in the ground, in terror at Jehovah’s presence and from the splendor of His majesty. (compare verse 17)
11. The haughty looks of the great man will be humbled, and the pride of common men will be abased, and Jehovah alone will be exalted on that day.
12. For the day of the Lord of Hosts is upon everyone who is proud and haughty, and upon everyone who lifts himself up, and he will be abased,
13.and upon all the cedars of Lebanon that are lofty and lifted up, and upon all the oaks of Bashan,
14.and upon all the mountains that are exalted, and upon all the hills that are lifted up,
15.and upon every high tower, and upon every fortified wall,
16.and upon all the ships of Tarshish, and upon all the valuable crafts[2].
17. And the haughtiness of man will be brought down, and the loftiness of men will be brought low. And Jehovah alone will be exalted on that day. (compare verse 11)
18.And He will utterly do away with the idols.
19. And they will go into crevices in the rocks and holes in the ground, in terror at Jehovah’s presence and away from the splendor of His majesty when He rises to shake the earth.
20. In that day, a man will throw his idols of silver and his idols of gold that they made for him to worship to the mole-rats and the bats,
21.entering into caves in the rocks and into the clefts of cliffs in terror at Jehovah’s presence, and away from the splendor of His majesty when He rises to shake the earth.
22. Cease from man, whose breath is in his nostrils! For wherein is he to be accounted of?
Isaiah 3
¶1. Lo! Behold, the Lord, the Lord of Hosts, is taking away from Jerusalem and from Judah every kind of support: the entire supply of bread, and the entire supply of water;
2.mighty man, and man of war; judge, and prophet, and diviner, and elder;
3.captain of fifty, and eminent man, and counselor, and wise man; artisans, and skillful orator.
4. And I will make children their princes, and unstable men shall rule over them.
5. And the people shall be oppressed, each one by another, and each one by his neighbor. The young man shall behave arrogantly toward his elder, and the base man, toward the honorable man.
6. For a man will grab hold of his brother in the house of his father, and say, “You have clothes! You will be our leader, and this ruin will be under your hand!”
7. He will swear in that day, saying, “I am not a healer, and there is neither bread nor clothes in my house. You will not make me the people’s leader!”
8. For Jerusalem has stumbled, and Judah is fallen. Yea, their tongue and their deeds incite rebellion against Jehovah in the presence of His glory.
9. The look on their faces testifies against them, and they proclaim their sin like Sodom. They do not hide! Woe to their soul, for they have dealt destruction to themselves.
10. Tell[3] the righteous man that it shall be well with him, for they shall eat the fruit of their doings.
11. Woe to the wicked man! It shall be ill with him, for the recompense of his hands shall be done to him.
12. O my people! Their oppressors act like children, and women rule over them. O my people! Those who lead you have caused you to err and have swallowed up the way of your paths!
13. Jehovah is standing up to plead His cause; yea, He is standing to judge the peoples.
14. Jehovah will enter into judgment with the elders of His people, and their princes. You! You have devoured the vineyard! The plunder of the poor is in your houses!
15. What do you mean by crushing my people and grinding down the faces of the poor, says the Lord God of Hosts!
¶16. Moreover, Jehovah says, because you are haughty, O daughters of Zion, and walk about with stretched-out neck and wanton eyes, walking and mincing as you go, and with their feet, they jingle their anklets.
17. But my Lord will strike with a scab the scalp of the daughters of Zion, and Jehovah will expose their private parts.
18. In that day, my Lord will take away finery: the anklets, and the headbands, and the crescent-shaped ornaments,
19.the pendants, and the bracelets, and the veils,
20.the tiaras, and the armlets, and the sashes, and vials of perfume,[4] and the charms,
21.the rings and the nose-rings,
22.the festal robes, and the mantles, and the cloaks, and the purses,
23.and the mirrors, and the fine linen, and the headdresses, and the shawls,
24.and it will be that instead of a sweet aroma, there shall be rottenness; and instead of a girdle, a rope; and instead of well-set hair, baldness; and instead of a fancy robe, a wrap of sackcloth; branding instead of beauty.
25. Your men shall fall by the sword, and your mighty men in battle,
26.and her gates shall mourn and lament, and she will sit on the ground, purged.
Isaiah 4
¶1. And seven women will take hold of one man in that day, saying, “We will eat our own bread and wear our own clothes, only let us be called by your name! O take away our reproach!
¶2. In that day will the Branch of Jehovah be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit of the land will be the pride and glory of the survivors in Israel.
3. And it shall come to pass that he who is left in Zion and he who remains in Jerusalem will be called holy, everyone who is written among the living in Jerusalem,
4.when the Lord has washed away the filth of the daughters of Zion and cleansed the blood-guilt of Jerusalem from her midst by a spirit of judgment and by a spirit of destruction.
5. And Jehovah will create over the whole site of Mount Zion and over her Assemblies a cloud by day and the smoke and brightness of a flaming fire by night, for over all the glory will be a canopy.
6. And it will be a pavilion for shade from the heat by day, and a refuge and shelter from storm and rain.
Isaiah 5
¶1. I will now sing for my Beloved my Beloved’s song concerning His vineyard: My Beloved had a vineyard on a fertile hill.
2.And he dug all around it, and cleared it of stones, and planted it with a choice vine. And he built a tower in the midst of it, and he also hewed out a wine-vat in it. And then, he waited for it to yield grapes. But it produced wild grapes!”
3. And so, now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah, judge, I pray you, between me and my vineyard.
4. What more could have been done for my vineyard that I did not do in it? Why, when I looked for it to yield grapes, did it produce wild grapes?
5. So, let me tell you now what I am going to do to my vineyard. I will remove its hedge, and it shall be destroyed; I will break down its wall, and it shall be trampled,
6.and I will make it a waste. It shall not be pruned, and it shall not be hoed, and briars and thorns shall come up. And I will forbid the clouds above to rain upon it.
7. For the vineyard of the Lord of Hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah, His very delightful plant. And He looked for justice, but behold, murder! For righteousness, but behold, a cry!
8. Woe to those who join house to house; they add field to field until there is no place, that you are made to dwell alone in the midst of the land!
9. In my ears, the Lord of Hosts said, “I will damn myself if many great and fine houses are not given to destruction, without inhabitant.[5]
10. Yea, a ten-acre vineyard shall yield but one bath, and a homer of seed shall yield but an ephah!
11. Woe to those who rise early in the morning to follow strong drink, continuing until the evening; wine inflames them!
12. And lyre, and lute, and timbrel, and pipe, and wine are in their feasts, but the work of Jehovah, they do not regard, nor do they consider the work of His hands.
13. For this, my people are exiled, being without knowledge. Yea, His honored men are hungry, and His people are parched with thirst.
14. Therefore, Sheol has enlarged herself; she has opened her mouth wide, without measure, and her nobility, and her multitude, and her tumult, and he who triumphs will descend into her.
15. And the mean man shall be humbled, and the great man shall be abased; yea, the eyes of haughty men shall be abased.
16. And the Lord of Hosts will be exalted in judgment, and the Holy God will be sanctified in righteousness.
17. Then lambs shall feed as in their pasture, and sojourners shall eat fatlings in waste places.
18. Woe to those who drag wickedness with cords of vanity, and sin as with cart-ropes,
19.who say, “Let Him hurry! Let His work be done quickly, that we might see it,” and “Let the council of the Holy One of Israel draw near and come, that we might know it!”
20. Woe to those who call evil good, and good, evil; who put forth darkness for light, and light for darkness; who put forth bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!
21. Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes, and understanding in their own sight!
22. Woe to men who are mighty when it comes to drinking wine, and men who are valiant when it comes to mixing up a strong drink,
23.those who acquit a wicked man because of a bribe and take away the just cause of righteous men from them!
24. Therefore, as a tongue of fire devours stubble and as dry grass sinks down in a flame, their root will be like rot, and their blossom will go up like dust, for they have rejected the law of the Lord of Hosts and despised the decree of the Holy One of Israel.
25. Therefore, the wrath of Jehovah was kindled against His people, and He stretched forth His hand against them and struck them, and the mountains quaked, and their carcasses were like refuse in the middle of the streets. For all this, His anger is not turned away, but His hand is still stretched out.
26. And He will raise a signal to nations far away, and He will hiss for them to come from the ends of the earth. And behold, quickly, swiftly, they will come.
27. Not one among them is weary; not one stumbles. They do not grow drowsy, and they do not sleep, nor is their waistband loosed, nor is the strap of their sandal broken.
28. Their arrows are sharpened, and all their bows drawn; their horses’ hooves are like flint, and their wheels are like the whirlwind.
29. Their roaring is like a lion; yea, they roar like young lions. They growl and seize prey, and they safely carry it away, and there is no rescuing it.
30. And they will growl over it on that day like the roaring of the sea. And He looked at the land, and behold, darkness and distress, and by its clouds was the light darkened.
Isaiah 6
¶1. In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lifted up, and the skirts of his robe filled the temple.
2. Seraphim were standing up above Him with six wings; each had six wings. With two, he was covering his face, and with two, he was covering his feet, and with two, he was flying about.
3. And one called out to another, and said, “Holy! Holy! Holy is the Lord of Hosts! The fullness of the earth is His glory!”
4. And the foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of the one who called out, and the house was filled with smoke.
5. And I said, “Woe is me! I am undone, for I am a man of unclean lips and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips, yet my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of Hosts!”
6. Then one of the seraphim flew to me, and with his hand he took from the altar a live coal with tongs,
7.and he touched my mouth and said, “Behold! This has touched your lips and has removed your iniquity, and your sin is atoned for.”
8. And I heard the voice of my Lord saying, “Whom shall I send? Who will go for us?” And I said, “Here I am. Send me!”
9. And he said, “Go! And say to this people, ‘You will certainly hear, but you will by no means understand. And you will certainly see, but you will by no means perceive.’
10.Make the heart of this people fat, and make their ears dull, and make their eyes blind, lest they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart and repent, and He heal them! ”
11. Then I said, “How long, my Lord?” And he said, “Until cities lie waste, without inhabitant, and houses without people, and the ground is made an utter desolation,
12.and Jehovah has sent the people far away, and the emptiness be great in the midst of the land.
13.But there will again be a tenth in it, and it will return, but it will be for burning, like the terebinth and like the oak whose stump remains when it is felled. The holy seed is its stump.”
Isaiah 7
¶1. And it came to pass in the days of Ahaz ben-Jotham, son of Uzziah, King of Judah, that Rezin, King of Syria, and Pekah ben-Remaliah, King of Israel, went up to Jerusalem for battle against it, but were not able to make war against it.
2. And it was told to the house of David, saying, “Syria is in league with Ephraim.” And their heart trembled, and the heart of their people, as trees of the forest are shaken before the wind.
3. And Jehovah said to Isaiah, “Go out, now, to meet Ahaz, you and your son Shear-jashub, at the end of the conduit of the upper pool on Washer’s Field Road.
4.And you say to him, ‘Be alert and still. Do not be afraid, nor let your heart faint because of these two stubs of smoking firebrands, because of the furious anger of Rezin and Syria and of the son of Remaliah.
5.Inasmuch as Syria, Ephraim, and the son of Remaliah have taken evil counsel against you, saying,
6.“Let us go up against Judah and make them sick with fear, and divide it among ourselves, and make the son of Tabeal king in its midst,”
7.thus says the Lord God: it shall not stand, and it shall not come to pass!
8.For the head of Syria is Damascus, and the head of Damascus is Rezin, and within sixty-five years, Ephraim shall be destroyed from being a people.
9.And the head of Ephraim is Samaria, and the head of Samaria is the son of Remaliah. If you do not believe, surely, you will not be established.’”
¶10. And again Jehovah spoke to Ahaz, saying,
11.“Ask for a sign from Jehovah your God, in the depth of Sheol or in the height of heaven!”
12. But Ahaz said, “I will not ask, nor will I put Jehovah to the test.”
13. Then He said, “Hear, now, O house of David! Is it such a small thing for you to wear out men that you must also wear out my God?
14.Therefore, my Lord Himself will give you a sign. Behold, the pregnant virgin! Yea, she is bearing a son, and she will call his name Immanuel.[6]
15.Curds and honey shall he eat, that he might learn to refuse the evil and choose the good.
16.But before the young man knows to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land that you loathe shall be forsaken of its two kings.
17.Jehovah shall bring upon you, and upon your people, and upon the house of your father days that have not been since the day Ephraim separated from Judah – the king of Assyria!
¶18. “And it shall come to pass in that day that Jehovah will whistle for the fly that is at the extremity of the streams of Egypt and for the bee that is in the land of Assyria,
19.and they shall come, and they shall rest, all of them, in the steep ravines, and in the clefts of rocks, and on all the thorn-bushes, and all the watering places.
20.In that day, the Lord will shave with the hired razor, with those beyond the river, with the king of Assyria, the head and the hair of the feet, and the beard also will it take away.
21.And it shall be in that day that a man will keep a young cow and two sheep,
22.and it shall be that because of the abundance of milk they give, he shall eat curds, for curds and honey shall everyone eat who remains in the midst of the land.
23.And it shall be in that day that every place where there are a thousand vines worth a thousand pieces of silver shall become briars and thorns.
24.With bow and arrows shall one come there because all the land shall be briars and thorns.
25.And as for all the mountains that are hoed with a hoe, you shall not come there for fear of briars and thorns, but it shall be for pasturing of oxen and the treading of flocks.”
Isaiah 8
¶1. And Jehovah said to me, “Take a large tablet and write on it with a man’s stylus, ‘Maher-shalal-hash-baz.’”[7]
2. And so, I recruited for myself faithful witnesses, Uriah the priest and Zechariah ben-Jeberechiah,
3.and I went in to the prophetess, and she conceived and bore a son. And Jehovah said to me, “Call his name Maher-shalal-hash-baz.
4.For before the lad knows to cry out, ‘my father’ or ‘my mother’, the wealth of Damascus and the spoil of Samaria shall be carried away before the king of Assyria.”
¶5. And once more, Jehovah spoke again to me, saying,
6.“Because this people have refused the waters of Shiloah that flow gently, but flow along with Rezin and the son of Remaliah,
7.therefore, behold, my Lord will cause to come up against them the mighty and abundant waters of the river, the king of Assyria and all his glory, and it will rise up over all its channels and overflow all its banks,
8.and it will sweep on into Judah. It will overflow and pass through, reaching to the neck, and there will be an outspreading of his wings, a filling of the breadth of your land, O Immanuel!
¶9. “Join together, O nations, and be shattered, and give ear, all you distant places of earth! Gird yourselves and be shattered! Gird yourselves and be shattered!
10.Take counsel together, and it will come to nothing! Speak the word, and it will not stand because of Immanuel!”
¶11. For thus Jehovah spoke to me with a mighty hand and warned me against walking in the way of this people, saying,
12.“You shall not say ‘a confederacy’ to all them to whom this people says, ‘A confederacy’; neither shall you fear their fear, nor tremble.
13.You shall sanctify the Lord of Hosts, and Him shall you fear, and at Him shall you tremble.”
14. And he will be a sanctuary, but a stumbling-stone and a rock of offense for both houses of Israel, a trap and a snare for the inhabitants of Jerusalem.
15. And many among them will stumble, and fall, and be broken, and be snared, and taken.
16. Bind up the testimony! Seal the law among those who are taught by me!
17. And I will wait for Jehovah, who is hiding His face from the house of Jacob, and I will put my hope in Him.
18. Behold! I and the children whom Jehovah has given me are for signs and for wonders in Israel!
19. And when they say to you, “Consult the mediums and those with familiar spirits, who squeal and growl” – should not a people inquire of their God? Should they consult the dead on behalf of the living?
20. To the law and to the testimony! If they do not speak according to this word, it is because there is no light in them.
21. And he will pass through it hard-pressed and hungry, and it shall come to pass that when he is hungry, he will become enraged, and he will curse his king and his God, but then he will look upward.
22. And he will look to the land, and behold, strife and darkness, gloomy anguish. And then, he will be cast into darkness.
Isaiah 9
¶1. But the gloom will not be such as was her affliction the first time, when He cursed the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali and afterward honored the Way of the Sea, beyond the Jordan, the territory of the Gentiles.
2. The people who walk in darkness have seen a great light; upon those who dwell in a land of the shadow of death, light has shined.
3. You multiplied the heathen; you did not increase joy. They rejoiced before you as in the joy of harvest, as men rejoice when dividing up spoil,
4.but you will break the yoke of his burden and the staff of his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor, as in the day of Midian.
5. Yea, every boot shakes the earth and every mantel is soaked with blood, but it will be for burning, fuel for a fire.
6. For a child is born for us. To us, a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulder. And He will call his name, “Wonder”, “Counselor”, “Mighty God”, “Everlasting Father”, “Prince of Peace”.
7. Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and uphold it with justice and with righteousness from that time and forever. The zeal of the Lord of Hosts will do this.
¶8. The Lord has sent forth a word against Jacob, and it fell upon Israel.
9. And all His people shall know, Ephraim and the inhabitant of Samaria who say with a proud and arrogant heart,
10.“The bricks are fallen, but we will build with hewn stone; the sycamores have been cut down, but we will replace them with cedars!”
11. But Jehovah shall raise up Rezin’s adversaries against him, and join his enemies together.
12. Syria before and Philistines behind, and they shall consume Israel with an open mouth. For all this, His anger is not turned away, but His hand is still stretched out.
13. For the people will not return to Him who is smiting them; yea, they will not seek the Lord of Hosts.
14. And so, the Lord has cut off from Israel head and tail, branch and reed, in one day.
15. The elder with haughty face, he is the head, and the prophet who teaches falsehood, he is the tail.
16. The leaders of this people make them err, and those who are led by them are ruined.
17. Therefore, the Lord will not rejoice over the young men, nor will He have compassion on His orphans and His widows. For every one of His people is profane and does evil, and every mouth speaks without sense. For all this, His anger is not turned away, but His hand is still stretched out.
18. For wickedness has burned like fire; it consumes briar and thorn; yea, it ignites thickets of the forest, and they mount up in a column of smoke.
19. Through the wrath of the Lord of Hosts shall the land be scorched, and the people will be like fuel for the fire; no one will spare his brother.
20. Yea, he will snatch away on the right hand, and they will be hungry, and he will devour on the left, and they will not be satisfied. They will eat, each one, the flesh of his own arm.
21. Manasseh with Ephraim, and Ephraim with Manasseh; together are they against Judah. For all this, His anger is not turned away, but His hand is still stretched out.
Isaiah 10
¶1. Woe to those who decree iniquitous decrees and scribes who prescribe oppression,
2.to turn aside the needy from judgment and take justice away from the poor of my people so that widows might become their spoil and they might plunder the orphan.
3. But what will you do in the day of visitation, when devastation comes from afar? To whom will you flee for help? And where will you leave your riches?
4. Without me, he shall bow down beneath the prisoner and shall fall beneath slain men. In spite of all this, His anger is not turned away, but His hand is still stretched out.
¶5. Woe! O Assyria, the rod of my anger! Yea, the staff in their hand is my indignation.
6. I will send him against a profane nation, even against the people of my fury. I will command him to take spoil and to take plunder, and appoint him for trampling them like mud in the streets.
7. And yet, he does not plan to do so; nor does his heart think to do so, but it is in his heart to destroy and to cut off nations, not a few.
8. For he said, “Are not all my princes kings?
9.Is not Calno as Carchemish? Or Hamath as Arpad? Or Samaria as Damascus?
10.Just as my hand has taken the idols of kingdoms, and their images, how much more those of Jerusalem and Samaria?
11.As I have done to Samaria and her idols, will I not do the same to Jerusalem and her idols?”
12. And it shall be that when the Lord completes all his work in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem, that I will visit the fruit of the exalted heart of the King of Assyria, and the majesty of his lofty looks.
13. For he said, “By the power of my hand have I done it and by my wisdom, for I have understanding! I have removed the boundaries of nations and have plundered their stores, and like a mighty man, I brought down the inhabitants.
14.My hand has found, as in a nest, the wealth of nations, and as one gathers eggs abandoned, I have gathered up all the earth, and there is no wing moving or a mouth opened and chirping.”
15. Does the ax exalt itself against the one who cuts with it? Or does the saw magnify itself against the one who uses it? As if a rod could use him who lifts it, or as if a staff could lift up one who is not wood.
16. Therefore, the Lord, the Lord of Hosts will send leanness among his fat ones, and instead of his glory, He will kindle a burning like kindling a fire.
17. And the light of Israel shall be a fire, and His holy one, a flame, and it shall burn and consume his thorn and his briar in one day,
18.and the glory of his forest and his open field. He shall make an end of both soul and flesh, and he will be like a sick man wasting away.
19. And the rest of the trees of his forest shall be so few that a child may write them down.
¶20. And it shall come to pass in that day that the remnant of Israel and those of the house of Jacob who escape will no longer rely upon the one who struck them, but will faithfully rely upon Jehovah, the Holy One of Israel.
21. A remnant shall return, the remnant of Jacob, to the God of the Mighty One.
22. For though your people Israel be like the sand of the sea, a remnant of them shall return. Destruction is decreed, overflowing with righteousness,
23.for my Lord, the Lord of Hosts, will make the decreed destruction in the midst of all the land.
24. Therefore, thus says my Lord, the Lord of Hosts, do not be afraid of the Assyrian, O my people, who dwell in Zion, when he strikes with the rod and lifts up his staff against you, in the manner of the Egyptians.
25. For just a little while longer, and the indignation will cease, and then my anger will turn to their destruction,
26.and the Lord of Hosts shall stir up a scourging for him like the slaughter of Midian at the Rock of Oreb, and as His rod was over the sea when He lifted it up in the manner of Egypt.
27. And it shall come to pass in that day that He will remove his burden from your shoulder and his yoke from your neck! And the yoke shall be destroyed because of the anointing oil.
28. He has come to Aijath; he has crossed over to Migron; at Michmash, he set his baggage.
29. They crossed over the ford, saying, “Geba will be our lodging-place.” There was a trembling in Ramah; Gibeah of Saul has fled.
30. Cry aloud with your voice, O daughter of Gallim! Give heed, O Laishah! O poor Anathoth!
31. Madmenah has fled; the inhabitants of Gebim sought refuge.
32. On that day, he will stand at Nob; he will shake his fist at the mountain of the daughter of Zion, the hill of Jerusalem.
33. Behold, the Lord, the Lord of Hosts, shall lop off a bough with a terrifying noise, and the exalted ones on high shall be hewn down; yea, the lofty ones shall be brought low.
34. And the thickets of the forest shall be hacked down by an instrument of iron, and Lebanon will fall by a mighty one.
Isaiah 11
¶1. And a Shoot shall come forth from the stump of Jesse, and a Branch from his roots shall bear fruit.
2. The Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord,
3.and He shall make him discerning in the fear of the Lord. He will not judge by what his eyes see, nor will he make decisions by what his ears hear.
4. And in righteousness will he judge the poor and reprove with equity on behalf of the oppressed of the earth. And he will smite the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips will he slay the wicked.
5. And righteousness will be a girdle for his loins, and faithfulness, his waist belt.
6. And the wolf will dwell with the lamb; and the leopard will lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling will be together; and a little boy will lead them.
7. And the cow and the bear will graze, and their young will lie down together. And a lion will eat straw like an ox.
8. And the nursing infant will play over the hole of an asp, and the weaned child will put his hand in a viper’s den.
9. They will neither do harm nor destroy in all my holy mountain, for the earth will be filled with the knowledge of Jehovah, as the waters cover the sea.
10. And on that day, there will be a Root of Jesse who will stand as a sign to the nations. Gentiles will inquire of him, and his rest will be glorious.
11. And it shall come to pass on that day that the Lord will extend his hand a second time to redeem the remnant of his people that is left, from Assyria, and from Egypt, and from Pathros, and from Ethiopia, and from Elam, and from Shinar, and from Hamath, and from the coastlands of the sea.
12. And he will lift up a signal for the Gentiles, and he will gather the banished men of Israel, and he will assemble the dispersed women of Judah from the four corners of the earth.
13. And the envy of Ephraim will depart, and the enemies of Judah will be cut off. And Ephraim will not envy Judah, and Judah will not vex Ephraim.
14. And they will fly westward against the slope of the Philistines. Together, they will plunder the children of the east, taking possession of Edom and Moab, and the children of Ammon will be their subjects.
15. And Jehovah will completely destroy the tongue of the sea of Egypt, and He will wave His hand over the river[8] with His mighty wind and strike it into seven streams, enabling men to cross over in sandals.
16. And there will be a highway for the remnant of His people from Assyria who remain, as there was for Israel on the day they came up out of the land of Egypt.
Isaiah 12
¶1. And in that day you will say, “I will praise you, O Lord! Though you were angry with me, your anger has turned away, and you are comforting me.
2.Behold, God is my salvation! I will trust, and I will not be afraid, for the Lord, Jehovah, is my strength and my song, and He has become my salvation!”
3. And with joy will you draw water from the wells of salvation.
4. And in that day, you will say, “Give thanks to Jehovah! Call upon His Name! Make His deeds known among His people, for His Name is exalted!
5.Sing Jehovah’s praise! For He created Majesty, who is being made known in all the earth!”
6. Cry out and shout for joy, O inhabitant of Zion, for the Holy One of Israel is exalted in your midst.
Isaiah 13
¶1. The burden concerning Babylon, which Isaiah the son of Amoz saw:
2. Lift up a signal on a bare mountain; lift up your voice to them! Wave your hand, that they may enter the noble gates.
3. I have commanded my consecrated ones. Yea, I have summoned my mighty ones to accomplish my wrath, my proudly exulting ones.
4. The sound of a tumult in the mountains like that of many people, the sound of an uproar of kingdoms, of nations being gathered! The Lord of Hosts is mustering an army for battle!
5. They come from the far reaches of the earth, from the end of heaven – Jehovah and the instruments of His indignation – that He might destroy the whole land!
6. Howl! For the day of the Lord is near! It will come as destruction from the Almighty.
7. Because of this, all hands will become feeble, and every man’s heart will melt,
8.and they will be terrified. Pangs and agony will grip them; they will be in anguish like a woman giving birth. Each man will look in astonishment at his fellow, all their faces flushed.
9. Behold, the day of the Lord is coming – cruel, with fury and fierce anger – to make the earth a desolation, and He will annihilate its sinners out of it.
10. For the stars of heaven and their constellations will not emit their light, the sun will be dark when it comes forth, and the moon will not cause its light to shine.
11. And I will punish the world for evil, and the wicked for their iniquity, and I will make the vainglory of the arrogant to cease, and I will abase the pride of fearsome men.
12. I will make a man more rare than fine gold, and men more rare than gold of Ophir.
13. Therefore, I will shake the heavens, and the earth will move out of its place in the wrath of the Lord of Hosts and in the day of His fierce anger.
14. And it shall come to pass that, like a hunted gazelle or like a flock that no one gathers, every man will turn to his own people, and every man will flee to his own land.
15. Everyone who is found will be pierced through, and everyone who is caught will fall by the sword.
16. And their little ones will be dashed to pieces before their eyes. Their houses will be plundered and their wives ravished.
17. Behold, I will stir up the Medes against them, who do not regard silver, and as for gold, they do not delight in it.
18. Archers will also cut the young men to pieces, and they will have no mercy on the fruit of the womb. Their eye will not pity children.
19. And Babylon, the glory of kingdoms, the beauty and the pride of the Chaldeans, shall be as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah.
20. She will not continue forever, neither will she abide from generation to generation. And no Arab will pitch a tent there, neither will shepherds make their flock lie down there.
21. But wild beasts will lie down there; yea, their houses will be filled with wolves, and owls will abide there, and he-goats will caper there.
22. Hyenas will cry out in its forsaken places,[9] and wolves, in its luxurious palaces. Her time is near to come, and her days will not be prolonged.
Isaiah 14
¶1. For Jehovah will have mercy on Jacob, and He will yet choose Israel and make them to rest in their land, and the foreigner will join himself to them and be united with the house of Jacob.
2. And the nations will take them and bring them to their place, and the house of Israel will possess them in Jehovah’s land as slaves, male and female; so, they will take them captive whose captives they were, and they will rule over those who oppressed them.
¶3. And it shall come to pass on the day that Jehovah gives you rest from your pain, and from your trembling, and from the hard service which you were made to render,
4.that you will lift up this proverb against the King of Babylon, and you will say, “How the oppressor has ceased! The arrogant city has ceased!”
5. Jehovah has broken the staff of the wicked people, the scepter of the rulers,
6.striking down peoples in overflowing rage with an unceasing blow, taking dominion over the nations in His anger, punishing them without sparing.
7. The whole earth is at rest and is quiet; they burst forth with shouts of joy.
8. The cypress exults over you as well, the cedars of Lebanon say, “Since you were laid down, no feller has come up against us!”
9. Sheol below is excited because of you, to meet you when you come. It arouses the shades for you, all chief men of earth; it makes all the kings of the nations rise from their thrones.
10. They all will answer and say to you, “You have become weak as we! You are like us!”
11. Your splendor is brought down to Sheol with the sound of your harps; beneath you, the maggot is spread, and the worm is your covering.”
12. Oh, how you have fallen from heaven, O light-bringer, son of the dawn! How you are cut down to the earth, O weakener of the nations!
13. You have said in your heart, “I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God, and I will sit on the Mountain of Assembly, on the far north side.
14.I will ascend above the heights of the clouds. I will be like the Most High.”
15. Oh, but you shall be brought down to Sheol, to the recesses of the Pit.
16. Those who see you will gaze at you. They will ponder over you, asking, “Is this the one who caused the earth to tremble and kingdoms to shake,
17.who made the world like a desert and overthrew his cities? He did not open the house of his prisoners.”
18. All the kings of the Gentiles – all of them! – lie down in glory, each in his own house,
19.but you! You are cast out of your grave like an abominable branch, clothed with the slain who were pierced with a sword and go down to the stones of the Pit; you are like a trampled corpse.
20. You will not be united with them in burial because you have destroyed your land and slain your people. The seed of evildoers will never be called!
21. Prepare a slaughtering-place for his sons because of the iniquity of their fathers. They will not arise, nor possess the land, nor fill the face of the world with cities.
22. But I will rise up against them, says the Lord of Hosts. And I will cut off from Babylon name, and remnant, and offspring, and posterity, says the Lord.
23. And I will make her a possession for the porcupine and watery swamps, and I will sweep her with the besom of destruction, says the Lord of Hosts.
¶24. The Lord of Hosts has sworn, saying, “By my life – as I think, so shall it be, and as I have purposed, so shall it come to pass! –
25.I will shatter the Assyrian in my land, and on my mountains will I trample him, and his yoke will be removed from them, and his burden will be removed from his shoulder.
26.This is the purpose that is purposed for all the earth, and this is the hand that is stretched out against all the nations,
27.for the Lord of Hosts has purposed it. And who shall annul it? And it is His hand stretched out, and who shall turn it back?”
¶28. In the year that King Ahaz died, this burden came:
29.“Do not exult, all you of Philistia! Yea, the rod of him who struck you is broken, but out from the serpent’s root shall come an adder, and his offspring shall be a fiery, flying serpent.
30.And the firstborn sons of the poor and needy will feed; they will lie down in safety. But I will kill your root with famine, and those who are left of you will he slay.
31.Howl, O gate! Cry out, O city! Melt away, all you of Philistia! For a smoke has come from the north! And there is not a straggler in its ranks.
32.Yea, what answer will He give to messengers of the Gentiles? That Jehovah has founded Zion, and within it, the poor of its people will find refuge.”
Isaiah 15
¶1. The burden of Moab. Because in a night, Ar of Moab is laid waste and destroyed, because in a night, Kir of Moab is laid waste and destroyed,
2.he has gone up to Bajith and Dibon, the high places, to weep for Nebo, and he wails for Medeba of Moab. Upon all his heads is baldness; every beard is shorn.
3. In his streets, they put on sackcloth; on its rooftops and in its broad places, all his people wail, dissolving in tears.
4. Heshbon also cries out, with Elealeh; their voice is heard to Jahaz. Therefore, the armed men of Moab cry out; his soul trembles within him.
5. My heart cries out for Moab, whose fugitives flee to Zoar, Eglath-shelishiah. Yea, he will go up the Ascent of Luhith with weeping. Yea, in the Way of Horonaim, they shall raise a cry of destruction.
6. The Waters of Nimrim shall become a desolation. Yea, the grass is dried up; the vegetation fails; there is nothing green.
7. Therefore, the abundance he accumulated and their store, they will carry away, across the Brook Arabim.
8. For the cry of distress will go round the border of Moab, its wailing reaches Eglaim, and its wailing reaches Beer-Elim.
9. Yea, the waters of Dimon will be filled with blood, for I will bring more upon Dimon – a lion for the fugitives of Moab and for the remnant of the country.
Isaiah 16
¶1. Send the Lamb, Ruler of the earth, from Sela to the desert, to the mountain of the daughter of Jerusalem.
2. And it shall come to pass that like a bird fleeing, driven from a nest, so are the daughters of Moab at the fords of Arnon.
3. Bring forth counsel; execute judgment; make your shadow like the night at noonday. Shelter the outcasts. Do not betray the fugitive.
4. Let my outcasts sojourn with you, O Moab! Be a shelter for him from the destroyer! For the oppressor shall cease; destruction will come to an end; he who tramples down is completely consumed from the earth.
5. The throne will be established by mercy, and he will sit upon it in truth, judging within the tent of David, and executing judgment with swift righteousness.
6. We have heard of the pride of Moab – extreme pride – of his arrogance, and his pride, and his excessive rage. His boastings will accomplish nothing.
7. Therefore, Moab shall wail. All that belong to Moab shall wail. You shall moan, utterly stricken, for the men[10] of Kir-Hareseth.
8. Because of the fields, Heshbon shall languish. As for the vine of Sibmah, the rulers of the nations will strike down her branches. They reached Jazer; they wandered about in the wilderness. Her shoots spread abroad; they crossed the sea.
9. Therefore, I will bewail with the weeping of Jazer the vine of Sibmah. I will drench you with my tears, O Heshbon and Elealeh, because the shouting over your summer fruit and over your summer harvest has ceased.
10. And gladness and joy have been gathered from the fruitful field, and in the vineyards, no song is sung; nor is a joyful shout made. No one treads wine in the vats; I have caused the treader’s shout to cease.
11. Therefore, my bowels will lament like a lyre for Moab, and my inward parts for Kir-Hares.
12. And it shall come to pass when he appears that Moab will weary himself on the high place and come to his sanctuary to pray, but he will not prevail.
13. This is the word that Jehovah spoke in the past to Moab,
14.but now, Jehovah has spoken, saying, “In three years, according to the years of a hired worker, the glory of Moab will be despised, with all the great multitude, and the remnant will be very small, not mighty.”
Isaiah 17
¶1. The burden of Damascus: Behold, Damascus is taken away from being a city, and will become a heap of rubble.
2. The cities of Aroer are forsaken, they will be for flocks, and they will lie down, and nothing will make them afraid.
3. And the fortress will cease from Ephraim, and the kingdom of Damascus and the remnant of Syria will be as the glory of the sons of Israel, says the Lord of Hosts.
¶4. And on that day will the glory of Jacob be brought low, and the fatness of his flesh will be made lean.
5. And it shall come to pass that, as a reaper gathers standing grain and his arm reaps heads of grain, and then one gleans the heads in the Valley of Rephaim,
6.so there will be gleanings left in it, as when an olive tree is beaten – two or three berries on the highest bough and four or five on its fruit-bearing branches, says Jehovah, God of Israel.
¶7. On that day, man will gaze upon his Maker, and his eyes will see the Holy One of Israel.
8. And they will have no regard for the altars, the work of their hands; they will not look to what their fingers have made, neither the sacred trees nor sun-images.
¶9. In that day, his strong cities will be like the abandoned wood, even the high branch which they abandoned because of the sons of Israel, and it will become a desolation.
10. Because you have forgotten the God of your salvation, and have not remembered the rock of your refuge, therefore, you will plant pleasant plants, but with a strange slip will you set it.
11. In a day will you fence in your plant, and in the morning, you will cause your seed to sprout, but in a day of sickness and incurable pain, the harvest will be a heap.
12. Ah, the thunder of many peoples! They thunder like the thundering of the seas! Oh, the roar of nations! They roar like the roaring of mighty waters.
13. Nations will roar like the roar of many waters! Though he curse at Him, yet he will take flight for a distant place, but he will be chased like chaff on the hills before the wind, and like whirling dust before a tempest.
14. In the evening, behold, terror! Before morning, he is no more! This will be the portion of those looting us and the lot of those plundering us.
Isaiah 18
¶1. Ah, the land of whirring wings that is beyond the rivers of Ethiopia,
2.that sends ambassadors by the river, even in vessels made of reeds across the face of the sea! Go, swift messengers, to a nation tall and smooth, to a people feared near and far, a mighty nation that tramples down, whose land rivers divide.
3. All you inhabitants of the world! You who live on earth! When the signal is raised on the mountains, look! And when the shofar is blown, listen!
4. For thus said Jehovah to me: “I will be quiet and watch from my dwelling-place, like dry heat upon herbs, like a cloud of dew in the heat of harvest.”
5. For before the harvest, when the bud is gone and the flower has become a ripening grape, He will lop off the branches with pruning-hooks and chop off the spreading tendrils.
6. They will all be left to the birds of the mountains and beasts of the earth. The birds will summer upon them, and the beasts of the earth will winter upon them.
7. At that time shall a gift be brought to the Lord of Hosts from a people tall and smooth, a people feared near and far, a mighty nation that tramples down, whose land rivers divide, to the place of the name of the Lord of Hosts, Mount Zion.
Isaiah 19
¶1. The burden of Egypt. Behold, Jehovah is riding on a swift, dark cloud, and He is coming to Egypt. And the idols of Egypt shall tremble before Him, and the heart of Egypt shall melt in its midst.
2. And I will incite Egyptian against Egyptian. And they shall fight each against his brother and each against his fellow, city against city, kingdom against kingdom.
3. And the spirit of Egypt within him shall be emptied, and I shall confound his counsel. And they shall seek to the idols, and to the charmers, and to the mediums, and to those with familiar spirits.
4. And I will give Egypt over into the hand of harsh lords, and a fierce king will reign over them, says the Lord, the Lord of Hosts.
5. And the waters shall dry up from the sea, and the river shall be parched and dry up.
6. And the canals shall stink; they shall be brought low; the streams of Egypt shall dry up. Reed and rush shall wither.
7. Along the Nile, to the mouth of the Nile, shall be bare places, and everything sown by the Nile shall wither. It shall be driven away and be no more.
8. The fishermen also shall lament, and all who cast a hook into the Nile shall mourn, and they who spread a net upon the waters shall languish.
9. And the workers of combed flax and the weavers of white shall be ashamed.
10. And its foundations shall be crushed; all who work for wages shall be grieved in soul.
11. Surely the princes of Zoan are fools; Pharaoh’s wise counsellors give brutish counsel! How can you say to Pharaoh, “I am a descendent of wise men, a descendent of ancient kings?”
12. Where are they, then, your wise men? Let them also declare to you, I pray, and let them understand what the Lord of Hosts has determined against Egypt.
13. The princes of Zoan have become foolish. The princes of Noph are deceived. They, the cornerstone of its tribes, have caused Egypt to go astray.
14. Jehovah has mingled a spirit of perversities in its midst, and they have caused Egypt to stagger in all that it does, as a drunken man staggers in his vomit.
15. And there shall be no work for an Egyptian that the head or tail, branch or bulrush may do.
16. In that day, Egypt shall be like women, and shall tremble and be afraid because of the shaking of the hand of the Lord of Hosts when He shakes it over him.
17. And the land of Judah shall be a terror to the Egyptians. Everyone who remembers it shall be afraid for himself because of the counsel of the Lord of Hosts which He has determined against it.
18. On that day, there will be five cities in the land of Egypt that speak the language of Canaan and swear by the Lord of Hosts. One will be called “City of the Sun”[11].
19. On that day, there will be an altar to Jehovah in the midst of the land of Egypt, and a monument to Jehovah at its border.
20. And it will be for a sign and a testimony to the Lord of Hosts in the land of Egypt. When they cry out to Jehovah because of oppressors, He will send them a savior, and he will contend for and deliver them.
21. And Jehovah will reveal Himself to the Egyptians, and the Egyptians will know Jehovah in that day, and they will bring sacrifices and offerings, and make vows to Jehovah and perform them.
22. And Jehovah will strike Egypt, but strike to heal, for they will turn to Jehovah, and He will be entreated of them and will heal them.
23. On that day, there will be a highway from Egypt to Assyria, and the Assyrians will come into Egypt, and the Egyptians, into Assyria, and the Egyptians will serve God with the Assyrians.
24. On that day, Israel will be a third with Egypt and Assyria, a blessing in the midst of the earth,
25.for the Lord of Hosts will bless them, saying, “Blessed be Egypt, my people, and Assyria, the work of my hands, and Israel, my heritage.”
Isaiah 20
¶1. In the year that Tartan came to Ashdod, when Sargon, the King of Assyria, sent him, he fought against Ashdod and took it.
2. At that time the Lord spoke by the hand of Isaiah ben-Amoz, saying, “Go, and loose the sackcloth from your loins and take your sandals off your feet.” And he did so, walking naked and barefoot.
¶3. And the Lord said, “As my servant Isaiah has walked naked and barefoot three years for a sign and a portent against Egypt and Ethiopia,
4.so shall the King of Assyria lead away the captives of Egypt and the exiles of Ethiopia, young and old, naked and barefoot, even with buttocks uncovered. This will be the humiliating punishment of Egypt.
5.And they shall be dismayed and ashamed of Ethiopia, their hope, and of Egypt, their boasting.
6.And the inhabitant of this coastland will say in that day, ‘Behold, this was our hope, to whom we fled for help, to be delivered from the King of Assyria. And now, how shall we escape?’”
Isaiah 21
¶1. The burden of the wilderness of the sea. As destroying winds from the south pass through from the wilderness, he will come from a fearsome land.
2. A dire vision was declared to me: “The traitor betrays, and the spoiler spoils. Go up, O Elam! Besiege, O Media! I have made all her groaning to cease.”
3. For this, my loins were filled with anguish; pangs took hold of me like the pangs of a woman in travail. I was doubled over at hearing it; I was dismayed at the sight.
4. My heart skipped; horror overwhelmed me. The twilight I desired turned into trembling for me.
5. Arrange the table; lay out the rug; eat and drink! Rise up, you princes! Anoint the shield!
6. For thus did my Lord say to me: “Go! Set the watchman, that he may report what he sees.”
7. And he saw a chariot with a pair of steeds, a chariot with asses, a chariot with camels, and he listened attentively, very attentively.
8. Then he cried out, “A lion! On the watchtower, my lord, I stand continually by day, and am stationed at my post whole nights.”
9. Then, behold this! A chariot with a man and a pair of steeds came. And he answered and said, “Fallen! Babylon is fallen! And all the images of her gods has He shattered to the ground.”
10. O my threshed one, and O son of my threshing floor, that which I have heard from the Lord of Hosts, the God of Israel, have I declared to you!
¶11. The burden of Dumah. He is calling to me from Seir, “Watchman, what of the night? Watchman, what of the night?”
12. The watchman said, “The morning comes, and then the night. If you would inquire, inquire! Return! Come!”
¶13. The burden of Arabia. You lodge in the forest of Arabia, O caravans of Dedanim.
14. When you meet him who is thirsty, bring water, O inhabitants of the land of Tema! Greet the fugitive with his bread!
15. For they fled from swords, from the drawn sword, and from the bent bow, and from the press of battle.
16. For thus said my Lord to me, “Within a year, as the years of a hired man,[12] all the glory of Kedar will come to an end.
17. And the remnant of the number of bowmen, the mighty men of the sons of Kedar, shall be few, for Jehovah, the God of Israel, has spoken.
Isaiah 22
¶1. The burden of the valley of vision. What’s wrong with you now, that all of you have gone up to the housetops?
2. You were full of shouts, a bustling town! O jubilant city, your slain were neither slain by a sword nor died in battle.
3. All your rulers have fled together from the bow; they are taken prisoner. All who were found in you were taken prisoner together, though they fled far away.
4. Therefore, I said, “Look away from me! I am weeping bitterly. Do not try to comfort me over the devastation of the daughter of my people.
5.For it is my Lord’s day of tumult, and trampling, and confusion, the Lord of Hosts in the valley of vision, tearing down a wall and crying out to the mountain.”
6. And Elam bore the quiver with chariotry and horsemen, and Kir uncovered the shield.
7. And it will come to pass that your choicest valleys will be full of chariotry, with the horsemen setting themselves in array at the gate.
8. And He will remove the covering of Judah, and in that day, you will look to the armor of the house of the forest.
9. But you will see breaches in the city of David, that they are many, and you will collect waters of the lower pool.
10. And you will count the houses of Jerusalem, and pull down the houses to fortify the wall,
11.and you will make a reservoir between the two walls for waters of the old pool. But you have not looked to its maker, and you did not consider the One who fashioned it long ago.
12. And in that day, my Lord, the Lord of Hosts, called for weeping, and for mourning, and for baldness,[13] and for the girding on of sackcloth.
13. But behold, joy and gladness, killing oxen, and slaughtering sheep, eating flesh and drinking wine, saying, “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we will die!”
14. And in my hearing, it was revealed by the Lord of Hosts, “I will damn myself if atonement for this iniquity will be made for you until you die, says my Lord, the Lord of Hosts.”
15. Thus says my Lord, the Lord of Hosts, “Go! Get you to this steward, to Shebna, who is over the household, and say,
16.‘What do you have here? And whom do you have here that you have hewn a tomb for yourself in this place, O man hewing out his tomb on the height, cutting out a dwelling place for himself in the cliff?’
17.Behold, Jehovah will hurl you into captivity, O you mighty man; yea, He will take hold of you!
18.He will whirl you round and round, spinning like a ball, into a large country. There you shall die, and there, your glorious chariots will be the shame of your lords’ house.
19.And I will thrust you out of your office, and from your station, He will tear you down.”
20. And it shall come to pass in that day that I will call for my servant Eliakim ben-Hilkiah,
21.and I will clothe him with your tunic, and with your sash will I make him strong, and I will commit your authority into his hand, and he will be a father to the inhabitants of Jerusalem and to the house of Judah.
22.And the key of the house of David will I lay upon his shoulder. He will open, and no one will shut; and he will shut, and no one will open.
23.I will fasten him like a peg in a sure place, and a glorious throne over his father’s house shall be his.
24.And they shall hang on him all the glory of his father’s house, the progeny and the products—every little vessel, from all the bowls to all the pitchers.
25.In that day, says the Lord of Hosts, the peg that was fastened in a sure place shall be removed, and be cut down, and fall. Then, the burden that was on him shall be cut off, for the Lord has spoken.
Isaiah 23
¶1. The burden of Tyre. Wail, O ships of Tarshish, for it is laid waste, without house, without entrance. From the land of Kittim, it will be revealed to him.
2. Be still, O inhabitants of the coastland! The merchants of Sidon who traverse the sea have filled you up.
3. And by great waters, the seed of Shihor, the harvest of the Nile, was her revenue; and she became the merchant of nations.
4. Be ashamed, O Sidon, for the sea has spoken, the fortress of the sea, saying: “I have not gone into labor, nor have I given birth, nor have I reared young men. I have reared young women.”
5. As at the report of Egypt, so will they be in anguish at the report of Tyre.
6. Pass over to Tarshish. Wail, you inhabitants of the coast!
7. Is this your jubilant city, whose origin is from ancient times? Her feet shall carry her far away to sojourn.
8. Who has made this plan against Tyre, the bestower of crowns, whose merchants are princes and whose traffickers are the honored of the earth?
9. The Lord of Hosts has planned it, to debase the majesty of all beauty, to bring to naught all the honored of earth.
10. Pass over your land like the Nile, O daughter of Tarshish! There is no restraint anymore.
11. He has stretched out His hand over the sea; Jehovah has made kingdoms quake; He has given commandment concerning Canaan, to destroy her strongholds.
12. And He said, “You shall never again rejoice, O oppressed virgin daughter of Sidon!” Arise, O Kittim, and cross over! Even there will He allow you no rest.
13. Behold the land of the Chaldeans! This people was not until Asshur founded it for desert-dwellers. They erected his siege-towers; they stripped her palaces. He has laid her waste.
14. Howl, O ships of Tarshish! For your strength is devastated.
15. And it shall come to pass in that day that Tyre shall be forgotten seventy years, during the days of one king. At the end of seventy years, Tyre’s song will be like the song of a harlot.
16. Take a lyre; go about the city, O forgotten harlot! Play sweet music; multiply songs so that you will be remembered.
17. And it shall come to pass at the end of seventy years that Jehovah will visit Tyre, and she will return to her wages and play the harlot to all the kingdoms of the land, over the face of the earth.
18. Yet, her merchandise and her wages shall be consecrated to Jehovah. It shall neither be laid up nor stored, but it will be given to those who dwell in the presence of Jehovah. Her merchandise will provide food in abundance and fine clothing.
Isaiah 24
¶1. Behold, Jehovah will make the land empty and lay it waste, and He will wrinkle its face and scatter its inhabitants.
2. And it shall be that, as the people, so will be the priest; as the slave, so will be his master; as the maidservant, so will be her mistress; as the buyer, so will be the seller; as the lender, so will be the borrower; as the creditor, so will be the debtor to him.
3. The land will be utterly emptied and utterly plundered, for Jehovah has spoken this word!
4. The land will weep and wilt; the world will be weak and wilt; the haughty people of the land will languish.
5. And the land is defiled under its inhabitants, for they have transgressed the laws; they have changed the ordinance; they have broken the everlasting covenant.
6. Therefore, a curse will devour the land, and its inhabitants will bear their punishment. Therefore, the inhabitants of land will be scorched, but a few men will be left.
7. The new wine will mourn; the vine will languish; all the merry-hearted will sigh.
8. The merrymaking of the timbrels will cease; the noise of revelers will end; the merrymaking of the lyre will cease.
9. They will not drink wine with a song; strong drink will be bitter to those who drink it.
10. The city of confusion will be broken down; every house will be shut up, that none may enter.
11. There will be a cry in the streets for the wine; all gladness will grow dark; the joy of the land will be gone.
12. Desolation will be left in the city, and the gate will be battered to ruins.
13. For thus it shall be, in the midst of the land among the peoples, like the beating of an olive tree, like the gleaning when the harvest is complete.
14. They will lift up their voice; they will cry out with joy because of the majesty of Jehovah; they will cry aloud from the sea.
15. Therefore, glorify Jehovah in the lights in coastlands of the sea, even the name of Jehovah, God of Israel.
16. From the end of the earth will we hear songs to the glory of the Righteous One. Then I said, “My leanness! My leanness! Woe is me! The traitors have dealt treacherously! Yea, the traitors have dealt very treacherously!”
17. Terror, and a pit, and a trap are upon you, O inhabitant of the earth.
18. And it shall come to pass that he who flees from the sound of the terror shall fall into the pit, and he who climbs out of the midst of the pit shall be caught in the trap, for windows on high are opened, and the foundations of the earth quake.
19. The earth is utterly broken apart. Earth is split apart; earth shakes violently.
20. Earth staggers to and fro like a drunk man, and it sways like a hut, for its transgression weighs upon it, and it shall fall and not rise again.
¶21. And it shall come to pass in that day that Jehovah will punish the army of the exalted one by the Exalted One, and punish the kings of the earth on the earth.
22. And they shall be gathered together as a prisoner in the Pit, and they shall be shut up in a prison, and after many days, they will be visited.
23. Then the light of the moon will be ashamed, and the heat of the sun will be ashamed when the Lord of Hosts reigns on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem, and in the presence of His elders, His glory.
Isaiah 25
¶1. O Jehovah, you are my God! I will exalt you. I will praise your name, for you created Wonder – plans from ancient time – the faithful Amen.
2. You have made of a city, a heap; of a fortified city, a ruin; of a city, a citadel of foreigners forever. (It shall not be rebuilt.)
3. Therefore, a mighty people will glorify you, a city of terrifying nations, they will fear you.
4. For you are a stronghold for the poor, a stronghold for the needy in his distress, a refuge from the storm, a shade from heat when the breath of terrifying nations comes like a storm against a wall.
5. Like parching heat in a dry place is the roar of strangers; you will subdue the parching heat with the shadow of a cloud. The song of terrifying nations is brought low.
6. And on this mountain, the Lord of Hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich things, a feast of well-aged wines, of rich things with marrow, and well-aged, refined wines.
7. And on this mountain will He swallow up the face of the covering that covers all peoples, and the veil that is spread over all the nations.
8. He will swallow up death forever! And the Lord Jehovah will wipe away tears from all faces, and He will take away the reproach of His people from the whole earth, for Jehovah has spoken.
¶9. And it will be said on that day, “Behold, this is our God! We have waited for Him, and He has saved us. This is Jehovah! We have waited for Him! Let us rejoice and be glad in His salvation!”
10. For the hand of Jehovah will rest on this mountain. And Moab will be trampled under him as a straw-heap is trampled down in waters of a dung-pit,
11.and he will spread out his hands in its midst the way a swimmer stretches forth his hands to swim, but He will bring low his pride along with the skill of his hands.
12. And the fortified stronghold of your walls He will cast down, lay low, and strike down to the earth, even to dust.
Isaiah 26
¶1. In that day, this song will be sung in the land of Judah: “We have a strong city. He will make salvation our walls and ramparts.
2.Open the gates, that the righteous nation, the one that keeps faith, may enter in!
3.You will keep him in perfect peace whose mind is fixed on you, because he trusts in you.
4.Trust in Jehovah forever, for with J’ah – Jehovah – is the Rock of ages!
5.For He brings them down who dwell on high, the lofty city. He lays it low; He lays it low to the ground. He beats it to dust.
6.The foot shall trample it down, the feet of a humble man, the steps of lowly people.
7.The way of a righteous man is uprightness; O upright One, you weigh out the path of a righteous man.
8.Truly, in the way of your judgments, O Jehovah, have we longed for you. The desire of our soul is to your name and to your memorial.”
9. With my soul, I have desired you in the night. Truly, my spirit within me diligently seeks you, for when your judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world learn righteousness.
10. Though favor be shown to the wicked man, he will never learn righteousness. In a land of upright souls, he will do wrong, and he will never see the majesty of Jehovah.
11. O Jehovah, your hand is exalted; they do not see at all. But they will be ashamed at the people’s zeal. Surely, fire will consume your enemies.
12. O Jehovah, ordain peace for us, for even all our works have you wrought for us.
13. O Jehovah our God, lords other than you ruled over us. Only in you will we call on your name.
14. They are dead; they shall not come to life. They are shades; they shall not rise, for you have visited and destroyed them, and you have done away with all memory of them.
15. You increased the nation, O Jehovah; you increased the nation. You are glorified. You have enlarged all the borders of the land.
16. O Jehovah, in distress they have sought you. They have poured out a whispered prayer, for your chastisement has been upon them.
17. As a woman at the point of giving birth writhes and cries out in her travail, so have we been in your sight, O Lord.
18. We have conceived; we have travailed; we have, as it were, given birth to wind. We have brought no deliverance to the land, neither have the inhabitants of the world fallen.
19. Your dead men shall live; with my dead body shall they arise! Awake and sing, you who dwell in dust! For the dew of herbs is your dew, and earth will bring forth her shades.
20. Come, my people, enter into your chambers, and shut your doors behind you. Hide, so to speak, for a little while until the indignation is overpast.
21. For behold! Jehovah is coming out of His place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity. And the earth will disclose its blood and will no longer conceal its slain.
Isaiah 27
¶1. On that day, with His fierce, and mighty, and powerful sword, the Lord will punish Leviathan the fleeing serpent, even Leviathan the crooked serpent, and He will slay the dragon that is in the sea.
2. In that day, sing[14] to her: “O vineyard of red wine!”[15]
3. I, Jehovah, will watch over her every moment; I will water her. Lest one harm her, I will keep her night and day.
4. Fury means nothing to me; whoever would set up briers and thorns in battle, I would march through it. I would burn it all up.
5. Or let him take hold of my protection and make peace with me. O let him make peace with me!
6. The days will come when Jacob will take root; Israel will blossom and send out shoots, and they will supply the whole world with produce.
7. Has He stricken him as He struck the one who struck him, or slaughtered him according to the slaughter of his slayer?
8. In due measure, when He sent her away, He contended with her. He removed her with His harsh wind in the day of the east wind.
9. So will it be that by this, He will make atonement for the iniquity of Jacob, and by this will all the fruit of his sin be put away: when He makes all the stones of the altar like stones of crushed chalk. Sacred pillars and sun pillars will not be raised.
10. But the fortified city will be alone, an exiled habitation, and forsaken like the wilderness. There, the calf will feed, and there lie down, and he will consume her branches.
11. When her branches are dry, they are broken. Women come and use them to light fires. Because it is not an understanding people, He will not have pity on them; He who made them and formed them will show them no favor.
12. It shall come to pass on that day that Jehovah will thresh from the flowing stream of the River to the Brook of Egypt, and you shall be gathered one by one, O sons of Israel.
13. And it shall come to pass on that day that a great shofar will be sounded, and those who were perishing in the land of Assyria and those who were banished in the land of Egypt will come and worship before Jehovah on the holy mountain at Jerusalem.
Isaiah 28
¶1. Woe to the proud crown, the drunkards of Ephraim! Yea, the blossom is fading, the loveliness of his finery that is on the head of the valley of rich men overcome with wine.
2. Behold, my Lord has a strong and mighty one! Like a hailstorm, a destructive tempest, like a mighty, overwhelming rainstorm will He with power give rest to the earth.
3. The proud crown, the drunkards of Ephraim, shall be trodden underfoot.
4. Yea, the blossom is fading, the loveliness of his finery that is on the head of the valley of rich men, like her first-ripe fig that one sees before summer. As soon as he sees it in his hand, he will swallow it down.
5. In that day, the Lord of Hosts will be a beautiful crown and a lovely diadem for the remnant of His people,
6.and a spirit of justice for the one who sits in judgment, and strength for those who turn back the battle at the gate.
7. But these also, priest and prophet, err because of wine and stagger with strong drink. They err because of strong drink; they are swallowed up by the wine. They stagger from strong drink; they err in vision; they sway when giving judgment.
8. Yea, all tables are covered with filthy vomit; there is no clean place.
9. Whom shall He teach knowledge? And whom shall He make to understand doctrine? Those weaned from milk; those taken from breasts.
10. For da-da will be upon da-da, da-da upon da-da, blah-blah upon blah-blah, blah-blah upon blah-blah, here a little, there a little.
11.He will speak to this people with stammering lips and another tongue,
12.to whom He said, “This is the rest with which you will cause the weary one to rest,” and, “This is the refreshing.” Yet, they would not listen.
13. And so, the word of the Lord shall be to them da-da upon da-da, da-da upon da-da, blah-blah upon blah-blah, blah-blah upon blah-blah, here a little, there a little, that they may go, and topple over backwards, and be broken, and snared, and taken.
¶14. Therefore, hear the word of the Lord, O scornful men, rulers of this people who are in Jerusalem:
15.“Because you say, ‘We have made a covenant with death, and with Sheol, we have made a pact. When the overwhelming scourge passes over, it will not come upon us, for we have made a lie our refuge, and taken shelter in falsehood,’
16.therefore, thus says the Lord Jehovah: Behold, I am laying a stone in Zion, a tried stone, the precious cornerstone of a sure foundation! He who believes will not be ashamed.[16]
17. I have appointed justice for a measuring line and righteousness for a level, and hail will sweep away the refuge of lies, and the hiding place shall waters overwhelm.
18. And your covenant with death will be annulled,[17] and your agreement with Sheol will not stand. An overwhelming scourge will certainly pass through, and you will be a trampling-place for it!
19. As often as it passes through, it will take you away. For morning by morning will it pass through, by day and by night, and it will be sheer terror to understand the report.
20. For the bed is too short to stretch out on, and the covering is narrow when one gathers himself up.
21. For as at Mount Perazim shall Jehovah rise up; He will be stirred up as at the valley in Gibeon to do His work, His strange work, and to perform His service, His unusual service.
22. And now, do not act like a mocker, lest your bonds be strengthened for destruction. For I have heard from my Lord, the Lord of Hosts, what has been decreed against this whole country.
23. Give ear, and hear my voice! Pay attention, and hear what I say!
24. Does the plowman plow every day to sow seed? He breaks open and then harrows his ground.
25. When he levels its surface, does he not broadcast black cummin, and scatter cummin? And he broadcasts wheat, and barley is put in its plot, with spelt along its edges.
26. For his God teaches him the correct way; He instructs him.
27. For black cumin is not threshed with a threshing instrument, nor is a cart’s wheel rolled over cummin, but black cummin is beaten out with a stick, and cummin with a staff.
28. Grain for bread would be pulverized; therefore, he does not thresh it for too long when he drives the wheel of his cart, so that his horse does not crush it.
29. This also comes from the Lord of Hosts. He has provided wondrous counsel; He has given great wisdom.
Isaiah 29
¶1. Ah, Ariel! Ariel![18] – city against which David encamped! Add year to year, and let the feasts come round!
2. But I will bring distress upon Ariel, and there will be mourning and moaning, and she will be to me as the ariel.[19]
3. And I, like David, will encamp against you[20] and lay siege against you with palisades, and I will raise siegeworks against you.
4. And when you are abased, you will speak from the ground, and your talk will be humbled in the dirt; your voice will be like one who has a familiar spirit from out of the ground,[21] and your speech will squeak from the dirt.
5. But the multitude of your intruders will become like fine dust, and the multitude of ruthless men like chaff drifting away. And it will happen in an instant – suddenly!
6. You will be visited by[22] the Lord of Hosts with thunder, and an earthquake, and a loud noise of wind, and a tempest, and the flame of a devouring fire,
7.and the multitude of all the nations that wage war against Ariel, even all who fight against her and her stronghold, and who distress her, will be like a dream, a vision in the night.
8. And they will be as when a hungry man dreams and behold, he is eating, but then he awakes and is hungry, or as when a thirsty man dreams, and behold, he is drinking, but when he awakes, behold, he is faint, and he longs for water. So will the multitude of all the nations be that wage war against Mount Zion.
9. Wait, and be astonished! Delight yourselves, and be delighted! They are drunk, but not with wine; they stagger, but not with strong drink.
10. But Jehovah has poured out upon you a spirit of deep sleep and has closed your eyes, the prophets, and has covered your heads, the seers,
11. and the vision of all this is to you like words in a sealed book, which men give to one who is literate, saying, “Please read this,” and he says, “I cannot, for it is sealed.”
12. And then the book is given to one who is illiterate, saying, “Please read this,” and he says, “I can’t read.”
13. Then my Lord said, “Because this people draw near to me with their mouth and honor me with their lips, but their heart is far from me, and their fear of me is a commandment of men, learned by rote,
14.therefore, behold me! He will again cause this people to wonder, working a wondrous thing. And the wisdom of their wise men will perish, and the discernment of their discerning men will hide itself.”
15. Woe to those who dig deep to conceal counsel from Jehovah, that their works may be in darkness, and they think, “Who sees us?” and “Who will find us out?”
16. Ah, your contrariness! Should the potter be considered the equal of his clay? For the work says of its Maker, “He did not make me.” And the thing formed says of Him who formed it, “He does not understand.”
17. Will it not be a very little while, and Lebanon will turn to a garden, and the garden will be seen as a forest?
18. And in that day, the deaf will hear words of a scroll, and out of dimness and out of darkness, the eyes of the blind will see.
19. And the meek will increase their joy in Jehovah, and the poor among men will rejoice in the Holy One of Israel.
20.For the terrifying man will have come to nothing, and the scorner will have come to an end, and all will have been cut off who look for wickedness,
21.who make a man a sinner because of a word, and lay a trap for the judge in the gate, and by false pretense defraud the righteous man.
¶22.Therefore, thus says Jehovah, the One who ransomed Abraham, to the house of Jacob: Jacob will no longer be ashamed, nor will his face turn pale,
23.for when he sees his children, the work of my hands, in his midst, they will sanctify my name, and they will sanctify the Holy One of Jacob, and will stand in awe of the God of Israel,
24.and those who erred in spirit will come to understanding, and those who grumbled will take in instruction.”
Isaiah 30
¶1. Woe to the rebellious children, says Jehovah, who give counsel, but not from me, and weave a covering, but not of my Spirit, that they may add sin upon sin,
2. who journey to go down to Egypt, and do not ask my counsel, to seek protection in the protection of Pharaoh and take refuge in Egypt’s shadow.
3. But the protection of Pharaoh will be your shame, and the refuge of the shadow of Egypt, a disgrace.
4. Yea, his rulers are in Zoan, and his messengers reach Hanes.
5. They all are made a stench by a people who cannot profit them. There is no help, and there is no profit. Yea, they shall be ashamed and be an object of reproach.
¶6. A burden of beasts of the Negev, in a land of distress and anguish, beyond lioness and lion, viper and flying fiery serpent. They will carry their riches on the back of asses and their treasures on the humps of camels to a people that cannot profit them.
7. Yea, Egypt will be useless, and they will help to no avail. For this reason have I called her, “the Proud One”: they are at ease.
8. Go now; write it on a tablet before them, and inscribe it in a book so that it may be for a time to come, forever and ever.
9. For this is a rebellious people, lying children, children unwilling to hear the law of Jehovah,
10.who say to those who see, “You do not see,” and to the seers, “You do not see right things for us. Say nice things to us! See deceptive visions!
11.Turn from the Way! Turn aside from the Path! Get the Holy One of Israel out of our faces!”
12. Therefore, thus says the Holy One of Israel: Because you have despised this word and trusted in oppression and perverseness, and lean upon it,
13.this iniquity shall be for you like a breach ready to fall, swelling out in a high wall, which all of a sudden reaches its breaking point.
14. Yea, he will break it as a potter’s vessel is broken. He will show no compassion, so that not a piece of shard from it will be found to take up fire from a fireplace or to dip water from a cistern.
¶15. For thus said my Lord, Jehovah, the Holy One of Israel: In repenting and rest will you be saved; in quietness and trusting will be your strength! But you would not.
16. And you said, “No! But we will flee on horseback.” Therefore, you shall flee. And “We will ride swiftly.” Therefore, they shall be swift in pursuing you.
17. A thousand shall flee at the rebuke of one; at the rebuke of five shall you flee until you be left like a flag-staff on top of a mountain, and like a standard on a hill.
18. Therefore, Jehovah will wait to show you favor, and then He will rise up to show you mercy, for Jehovah is a God of justice. Blessed are all who wait for Him.
¶19. O people in Zion, dwelling in Jerusalem, you will never weep again! He will be very gracious to you at the sound of your cry. When He hears it, He will answer you.
20. Though the Lord has given you the bread of distress and the water of affliction, your Teacher will no longer hide himself, but your eyes will see your Teacher.[23]
21. And your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, “This is the way; walk in it,” when you go to the right or when you go to the left.
22. And you will defile the idols overlaid with your silver and your golden cast images; you will trash them like a menstruous cloth. You will say to it, “Be gone! ”
23. And He will give rain for your seed that you sow in the ground, and grain, the produce of the ground, and it will be rich and full. And in that day, your cattle will feed in large pastures,
24.and the oxen and young asses that work the ground will eat seasoned provender that has been winnowed with a winnowing shovel and fork.
25. And on the day of great slaughter, when the towers fall, channels for streams of water will be on every lofty mountain and on every high hill.
26. And the light of the moon will be like the light of the sun, and the light of the sun will be sevenfold, like the light of seven days, when Jehovah binds up the brokenness of His people and heals the deep wound from His blow.
27. Behold, the Name of the Lord will come from far away, burning with his anger and a heavy burden. His lips will be full of indignation, and his tongue will be like a devouring fire,
28.and his breath will be like a flooding torrent reaching up to the neck, to sift nations in a sieve for worthlessness[24], with the bridle on the jaws of nations that caused them to err.[25]
29. He shall be your song, like that on a night when a holy feast is kept, and gladness of heart, like the gladness of one walking with a flute to go to the mountain of Jehovah, to the Rock of Israel.
30. And Jehovah will cause His glorious voice to be heard, and in furious anger will He cause the lowering of His arm to be seen with a consuming, cloven flame of fire, and a downpour, and hailstones.
31. Yea, at the voice of Jehovah will Assyria be dismayed. He will strike with a rod,
32.and it shall come to pass that every stroke of the appointed rod which Jehovah lays upon him will be with tambourines and with lyres, and with battles for a wave offering will he fight against her.
33. For Topheth was prepared long ago; yea, it is made ready for the King. He has made it deep; He has enlarged its fiery pyre; yea, He has provided much wood. The breath of Jehovah, like a river of brimstone, has ignited it.
Isaiah 31
¶1. Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help. They depend on horses, and they trust in chariots because they are many and in horsemen because they are so numerous, but they do not look to the Holy One of Israel, nor seek Jehovah
2.even though He is wise, and can bring disaster, and does not take back His words. He will certainly rise against the house of evildoers and against him who helps the workers of iniquity.
3. The Egyptians are men, and not God, and their horses are flesh, and not spirit. When Jehovah stretches out His hand, the helper stumbles and the one who is helped falls. And together, they all shall perish.
4. For thus did Jehovah say to me: “As the lion or the young lion roars over his prey when a band of herdsmen is summoned against him, and he is not dismayed at their voices nor cowed by their clamor, so will the Lord of Hosts come down to do battle upon Mount Zion, even upon her hill.”
5. Like birds flying, so will the Lord of Hosts defend Jerusalem; He will defend and deliver her. He will pass over her and spare her.
6. Return to Him from whom the children of Israel have gone deep in apostasy!
7. For in that day, every man among you will despise his idols of silver and his idols of gold, which sin your hands made for yourselves.
8. And the Assyrian will not fall by the sword of a great man, nor will the sword of a common man consume him. But he will flee from before His sword, and his young men will be made forced laborers.
9. His rock will pass away in terror, and his princes will be dismayed at the sign, says the Lord, whose fire is in Zion and whose furnace is in Jerusalem.
Isaiah 32
¶1. Behold, a King will reign in righteousness, and princes will rule justly.
2. And a man will be like a shelter from the wind, and a covert from the storm, like streams of water in parched ground, like the shadow of a great rock in a weary land.
3. The eyes of those who see will not look away, and the ears of those who hear will give heed.
4. And the heart of the hasty will understand and know, and the tongue of stammerers will speak readily and clearly.
5. The fool will no longer be called noble, and the rogue will no longer be thought of as respectable.
6. For a fool speaks foolishness, and his heart conceives iniquity, to practice ungodliness and to speak error concerning Jehovah causing the hungry soul to be empty and depriving the thirsty man of drink.
7. As for the rogue, his tools are evil. He devises wicked schemes in order to ruin those who are meek with lying speech, even when the needy man speaks aright.
8. But the noble man gives noble counsels, and he stands up for noble things.
¶9. Get up, you smug women! Hear my voice, you complacent daughters! Give ear to my decree!
10. In a little more than a year, you complacent women will tremble, because the vintage will fail; the harvest will not come in.
11. Shudder, you smug women! Tremble, you complacent women! Strip down and make yourself naked, and gird sackcloth on your loins.
12. Lament upon the breasts for the pleasant fields and for the fruitful vines.
13. Upon the land of my people, thorns and briars will come up, yea, upon all houses of merriment in the jubilant city.
14. For the citadel will be abandoned; the crowded city will be deserted. Hill and watchtower will become open fields forever, the delight of wild asses, a pasture for flocks,
15.until the Spirit is poured out on us from on high. Then the wilderness will become a fruitful field, and the fruitful field will be deemed a forest,
16.and justice will dwell in the wilderness, and righteousness will dwell in the fruitful field.
17. The effect of righteousness is peace, and the result of righteousness, eternal quietness and security.
18. And my people will dwell in a peaceful meadow, and in secure dwellings, and in tranquil resting places.
19. And they will be separate[26] when the forest falls down and the city is brought low in the humiliation.
20. Blessed are you who sow beside all waters, sending forth the foot of the ox and the donkey.
Isaiah 33
¶1. Woe to the spoiler, and you were not spoiled, and the treacherous man, and they did not deal treacherously with him! When you finish your spoiling, you will be spoiled. When you cease dealing treacherously, they will deal treacherously with you.
2. O Jehovah, be gracious to us. For you have we waited. Be their help every morning, yea, our salvation in time of distress.
3. Because of a roaring voice, peoples have fled. Because of your majesty, nations are scattered.
4. And your spoil will be gathered like the gathering of the destroying locust, like rushing locusts rushing upon it.
5. Jehovah is supremely high; yea, He dwells on high. He has filled Zion with justice and righteousness.
6. He will be the stability of your times, wealth, deliverances, wisdom, and knowledge. The fear of the Lord is his treasure.
¶7. Behold! Their valiant ones shall cry aloud outside her. Messengers of peace shall weep bitterly.
8. Highways are desolate. He has put an end to the traveler on the road. He has broken covenant. He has despised cities. He does not regard man.
9. He mourns; the land languishes. He makes Lebanon ashamed; it withers. Sharon is like the Arabah, and Bashan and Carmel shake off their foliage.
10. Now I will rise up, says Jehovah; now I will be exalted; now I will be lifted up.
11. You conceive chaff; you bring forth stubble: your spirit. A fire shall devour you,
12.and the nations shall be burnings for lime. Thorns cut off, they shall burn in the fire.
13. You who are far away, hear what I have done! And acknowledge my might, you who are near!
14. The sinners in Zion are afraid. Trembling has seized the ungodly. Who will sojourn in the consuming fire for us? Who will sojourn in the eternal burning mass for us?
15. He who does righteous deeds and speaks right things; he who despises the unjust gain of oppressions; he who turns his hand away from taking a bribe; he who stops his ear from hearing of bloodshed and closes his eyes from beholding wickedness;
16.he will dwell in the highest places. Fortresses of rocks will be his refuge. His bread will be given, and his waters made sure.
17. Your eyes will see the King in his beauty; they will behold a land far away.
18. Your heart will ponder on terror. Where is the one who takes count? Where is the one who weighs? Where is the one who counts the towers?
19. You will not see a barbarous people, a people with a language so obscure that it cannot be comprehended, a stammering tongue that is not understood.
20. Look on Zion, the city of our meetings! Your eyes will see Jerusalem, an untroubled habitation, an unmoved tent whose stakes will never be pulled up, nor will any of its cords be broken.
21. But there, His Majesty, Jehovah, will be for us a place of rivers, very wide streams upon which no boat with oars has gone, nor majestic ship has traversed.
22. For Jehovah is our Judge; Jehovah is our Lawgiver; Jehovah is our King. He will save us.
23. Your ropes are loosed; they do not hold fast their mast; they do not stretch out the sail. Then the abundant spoil was divided. Lame men partook of the plunder.
24. And no inhabitant will say, “I am sick.” The people who live in her will be forgiven of their sin.
Isaiah 34
¶1. Come near, O Gentiles, to hear! And pay attention, O nations! Let the earth and what fills it hear, the world and all that comes from it!
2. For the indignation of Jehovah is upon all the nations, and fury against all their armies. He has devoted them to destruction. He has given them to the slaughter.
3. Their dead will be cast out; the stench of their corpses will rise; and the mountains will be drenched with their blood.
4. And all the host of heaven shall come apart, and the heavens shall be rolled up like a scroll, and all their host shall fall down, the way leaves fall from a vine or like figs falling from a tree.
5. Yea, my sword in the heavens shall be saturated. Behold! Upon Edom shall it descend, even upon the people I have devoted to judgment.
6. The sword of Jehovah will be sated with blood; it will gorge itself on the fat and blood of lambs and goats, on the fat of rams’ kidneys. For in Bozrah, there shall be a sacrifice to Jehovah, even a great slaughter in the land of Edom.
7. And aurochs will fall down with them, and bullocks with mighty men, and their land shall be saturated with blood, and their ground glutted with fat.
8. (For the day of Jehovah’s vengeance, the year of recompense for Zion’s struggle, will come.)
9. Her streams will be turned to pitch, and her dust, to brimstone, and her land shall become burning pitch.
10. She shall not be quenched, night or day, forever. Her smoke shall go up through all generations. She shall be desolate forever and ever, no one passing through her.
11. And the pelican and porcupine shall possess her, and the owl and raven shall dwell in her. And He shall stretch out over her a line of formlessness and plummets of emptiness.
12. Her nobles and royalty will not be there. They will call, but all her princes will be no more.
13. Briars and nettles will grow in her citadels, and thorns in her fortresses. And she will be the habitation of wolves, an abode for the offspring of owls.
14. And wild beasts will meet hyenas, and the goat will call out to his fellow. Yea, there will the night-crier settle and find for herself a resting-place.
15. There will the arrow-snake nest, and lay, and hatch, and gather in her shadow. And there will vultures be gathered, each with her mate.
16. Search the book of the Lord, and read! Not one of these shall be lacking. Not one shall lack her mate. For my mouth, it has commanded, and His Spirit, it has assembled them.
17. And He has cast a lot for them, and His hand has divided it to them by a line forever. They will possess it; from generation to generation will they dwell in it.
Isaiah 35
¶1. The wilderness and the dry place will rejoice, and the desert will shout for joy and bloom like a rose.
2. It will bloom abundantly and shout. Yea, and sing 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 majesty of our God.
3. Strengthen the weak hands, and steady the feeble knees!
4. Say to those with an anxious heart, “Be strong; do not be afraid. Behold, your God will come with vengeance; God’s Reward, himself, will come and save you!”
5. Then the eyes of the blind will be opened, and the ears of the deaf will be unstopped.
6. Then shall the lame man leap like a stag, and the tongue of the dumb man will sing, for waters will break forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert.
7. And the parched ground will become a pool, and the thirsty land, springs of water. In the habitat of wolves, its grassy resting-place, will be reeds and rushes.
8. And a highway will be there, and a way, and it will be called, “The Way of Holiness”. No unclean man will travel over it, but it belongs to him who walks the Way, and fools will not wander about on it.
9. No lion will be there; indeed, no ferocious beasts will go up on it. Such will not be found there. But the redeemed will travel on it.
10. And the redeemed of Jehovah will return and enter into Zion with singing and eternal joy on their heads. They will obtain gladness and joy, and sorrow and sighing will flee away. this verse is identical with 51:11
Isaiah 36
¶1. And it came to pass in the fourteenth year of king Hezekiah, Sennacherib, king of Assyria, came up against all the fortified cities of Judah and seized them.
2. And the king of Assyria sent Rab-Shakeh from Lachish with a massive army to Jerusalem to king Hezekiah and stood by the conduit of the upper pool on Washer’s Field Road.
3. Then Eliakim ben-Hilkiah, who was over the house, came out to him, with Shebna the scribe, and Joah ben-Asaph, the recorder.
4. Then Rab-Shakeh said to them, “Speak to Hezekiah, if you will! Thus says the great king, the king of Assyria, ‘What is this hope in which you trust?’
5.You say,[27] ‘It is only empty speech! I have counsel and might for battle!’ On whom do you trust now, that you have rebelled against me?
6.Behold, you rely upon the staff of this broken reed, upon Egypt, on which if a man lean, it will go into his hand and pierce it. So is Pharaoh, king of Egypt, to all who are trusting in him.
7.But when you say to me, ‘We trust in Jehovah our God!’ Is it not He whose high places and whose altars Hezekiah took away, and said to Judah and Jerusalem, ‘Before this altar shall you worship’?
8.So now, if you will, make a pledge with my lord, the king of Assyria, and I will give you two thousand horses, if you are able on your part to put riders on them.
9.So, how can you repulse the face of one captain of the least of my lord’s servants, and put your trust in Egypt for chariotry and horsemen?
10.And have I now come up without Jehovah against this land to destroy it? Jehovah said to me, ‘Go up against this land and destroy it!’”
11. Then Eliakim and Shebna, and Joah said to Rab-Shakeh, “Speak to your servants, I pray, in Aramaic because we understand it, and do not speak to us in Judean within the hearing of the people that are on the wall.”
12. But Rab-Shakeh said, “Has my lord sent me to your lord and to you to speak these words? Is it not to the men sitting on the wall to eat their own dung and drink their own urine, with you?”
13. Then Rab-Shakeh stood, and cried out with a loud voice in Judean, and said, “Hear the words of the great king, king of Assyria!
14.Thus says the king, ‘Do not let Hezekiah beguile you because he is not able to deliver you.
15.And do not let Hezekiah make you trust in Jehovah, saying, “Jehovah will certainly deliver us, and this city will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.”
16.Do not give heed to Hezekiah, for thus says the king of Assyria, “Make a treaty of peace with me, and come out to me. Then every man will eat from his vine, and each from his fig tree, and each will drink water from his well
17.until I come and take you away to a land like your own land. A land of grain and new wine, a land of food and vineyards.”
18.Take heed, lest Hezekiah persuade you, saying, “Jehovah will deliver us!” Have any of the gods of the nations delivered their 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 delivered Samaria out of my hand?
20.Which among all the gods of these lands have delivered their land out of my hand, that Jehovah will deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?’”
21. But they kept silent and did not answer him a word because the king’s order said, “Do not answer him!”
22. Then Eliakim ben-Hilkiah, who was over the house, and Shebna the scribe, and Joah ben-Asaph the recorder, came to Hezekiah with their garments torn and reported to him the words of Rab-Shakeh.
Isaiah 37
¶1. And it came to pass when King Hezekiah heard it, he tore his garments and covered himself with sackcloth, and he went into the house of the Lord.
2. Then he sent Eliakim, who was over the house, and Shebna the scribe, and the elders of the priests, who also covered themselves with sackcloth, to Isaiah ben-Amoz, the prophet,
3.that they might say to him, “Thus says Hezekiah: This day is a day of distress, and reproof, and blasphemy; children have come to the point of birth, but there is no strength to deliver.
4.Perhaps Jehovah your God will hear the words of Rab-Shakeh, whom his lord, the king of Assyria, sent to reproach the living God, and will rebuke the words that Jehovah your God has heard. Therefore, lift up a prayer for the remnant that is left.”
5. And so, the servants of King Hezekiah went to Isaiah.
6. Then Isaiah said to them, “Thus say to your master, thus says Jehovah: ‘Do not be afraid of the words that you heard, with which those boys from the king of Assyria blasphemed me.
7.Behold! I am sending a spirit against him, and he will hear a report and will return to his land, and I will make him fall by the sword in his own land.’”
8. Then Rab-Shakeh returned, and he found the king of Assyria fighting against Libnah, for he had heard that he had pulled out from Lachish.
9. And he heard a report concerning Tirhakah, king of Cush, saying, “He has come forth to do battle with you.” And having heard it, he sent messengers to Hezekiah, saying,
10.“Thus shall you speak to Hezekiah, king of Judah: Do not let your God, in whom you trust, deceive you, saying, ‘Jerusalem will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.’
11.Behold, you have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all the lands by completely destroying them; yet, you will be delivered?
12.Did the gods of the nations whom my fathers destroyed deliver them: Gozan, and Haran, and Rezeph, and the sons of Eden who were in Telassar?
13.Where is the king of Hamath, and the king of Arpad, and the king of the city of Sepharvaim, Hena and Ivvah?”
14. And Hezekiah took the letter from the hand of the messengers and read it, and he went up to the house of the Lord. And Hezekiah spread it out before Jehovah.
15. And Hezekiah prayed to Jehovah, saying,
16.“O Lord of Hosts, God of Israel, who dwells between the cherubim. You alone are God of all the kingdoms of the earth. You made the heavens and the earth.
17.O Jehovah, incline your ear, and hear! O Jehovah, open your eyes, and see! Oh, hear all the words of Sennacherib which he sent to defy the living God!
18.O Jehovah, the kings of Assyria have indeed made desolate all the countries and their land,
19.and they have cast their gods into the fire, for they were not gods but the work of man’s hands, wood and stone, therefore, they could destroy them.
20.But, O Jehovah our God, deliver us now from his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you alone, O Jehovah, are God.”
21. Then Isaiah ben-Amoz sent to Hezekiah, saying, “Thus says Jehovah, God of Israel: That which you have prayed to me against Sennacherib, king of Assyria, I have heard.
22.This is the word that Jehovah has spoken concerning him, ‘The virgin daughter of Zion despises you and mocks you. The daughter of Jerusalem wags her head at you.
23.Whom have you reproached and blasphemed? And against whom have you raised your voice? Yea, you have lifted your eyes haughtily against the Holy One of Israel!
24.By the hand of your servants, you have reproached the Lord, and you have said, “By a multitude of my chariotry, I have ascended to the height of the mountains, the slopes of Lebanon, and its tall cedars have I cut down, its choicest cypresses. Yea, I have reached its greatest height, its garden-like forest.
25.I dug wells and drank waters, and I have dried up with the sole of my feet all the streams of Egypt.”
26.Did you not hear that long ago I determined it? From days of old, I planned it. Now, have I brought it to pass that you should make fortified cities desolate, heaps of ruins.
27.Moreover, their inhabitants are feeble-handed. They were dismayed and disconcerted. They were as herbage of the field and as green grass, as grass on the rooftops, and blasted grain before it matures.[28]
28.But I know your sitting down, and your going out, and your coming in, and your rage at me.
29.Because your rage at me and your arrogance have come up into my ears, I will put my hook in your nose and my bit in your mouth, and I will turn you back by the way by which you came.’
30.And this will be the sign to you: this year, you will eat what grows of itself, and in the second year, volunteer grain, and in the third year, you will sow and reap, and plant vineyards, and eat their fruit.
31.And the remnant of the house of Judah that escape will again take root downward and produce fruit upward.
32.For out of Jerusalem shall come forth a remnant, even those who have escaped from Mount Zion. The zeal of the Lord of Hosts will do this.
33.Therefore, Jehovah has said thus to the king of Assyria: He will not enter into this city, nor will he shoot an arrow there, nor will he come before it with a shield, nor will he cast a mound against it.
34.He will return by the way he came, and he will not enter into this city, says the Lord!
35.For I will defend this city to save it for my sake, and for the sake of my servant David.”
¶36. Then an angel from the Lord went out and struck down one hundred and eighty-five thousand in the Assyrian camp. And they arose early in the morning, and behold, all of them were dead corpses.
37. So, Sennacherib, king of Assyria, departed, and went, and returned, and dwelt in Nineveh.
38. And it came to pass, as he was bowing down in the house of Nisroch his god, that Adramelech and Sharezer, his sons, struck him down with the sword, and they escaped to the land of Ararat. Then Esar-haddon, his son, became king in his stead.
Isaiah 38
¶1. In those days, Hezekiah became sick unto death, and Isaiah ben-Amoz the prophet came to him and said to him, “Thus says Jehovah: Put your house in order, for you will die and not live.”
2. Then Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to Jehovah,
3.and said, “I pray you, O Jehovah, remember, I pray you, how I have walked before you in truth and with a perfect heart, and I have done what is good in your eyes.” And Hezekiah wept bitterly.
4. And the word of the Lord came to Isaiah, saying,
5.“Go and say to Hezekiah, ‘Thus says Jehovah, the God of David, your father: I have heard your prayer; I have seen your tears. Behold, I will add to your days fifteen years,
6.and from the hand of the king of Assyria will I deliver you and this city, and I will defend this city.
7.This will be the sign for you from Jehovah, that Jehovah will do this thing that He has spoken,
8.Behold, I will make the shadow of the degrees which have gone down on the steps of Ahaz by the sun go backwards ten degrees.’” Then the sun went back ten degrees according to the degrees that it had gone down.
¶9. The writing of Hezekiah, king of Judah, when he was ill, but he revived from his illness:
10.“I said in the midst of my days, I must enter the gates of Sheol. I am deprived of the remainder of my years.
11.I said that I will not see J’ah (O J’ah!) in the land of the living. I will no longer look upon man among those who inhabit vanity.
12.My dwelling-place has been pulled up and removed from me like a shepherd’s tent. I, like a weaver, have rolled up my life. He has severed me from the thrum. From day to night, you make an end of me.
13.I am still until morning. Like a lion, thus he shatters all my bones. From day to night, you make an end of me.
14.Like a crane or a swallow, I whimper. I moan like a dove. My eyes have grown weary with looking upward. O Lord, I am distressed! Be my surety!
15.What can I say, that He would speak to me and do it? I will go softly all my years on account of the bitterness of my soul.
16.O Lord, men spend their lives in these things, and my spirit has lived through all of them. But you have restored my health and given me life.
17.Behold! For my welfare, it was very bitter to me, but you have loved my soul out of the pit of uselessness, for you have cast all my sins behind your back.
18. For Sheol does not offer you thanks, death does not praise you, and those who descend to the Pit do not hope for your truth.
19. A living man, one who is alive, he will praise you, as I do this day. A father will make your faithfulness known to his sons.
20.Jehovah saved me, and so, we will play my songs all the days of our lives in the house of the Lord.”
¶21. (For Isaiah had said, “Let them take a cake of figs and rub it on the boil, and he will live.”
22.And Hezekiah said, “What is the sign that I will go up to the house of the Lord?”)
Isaiah 39
¶1. At that time, Merodach-baladan ben-Baladan, king of Babylon, sent letters and a gift to Hezekiah, for he heard that he had been sick, but had recovered.
2. And Hezekiah received them gladly. Then he showed them his treasure-house, the silver and the gold, and the spices, and the fragrant oil; and all the house of his weapons; and all that was found in his storehouses. There was nothing in his house or in all his dominion that Hezekiah did not show them.
3. Then Isaiah the prophet came to king Hezekiah and said to him, “What did these men say? And from where did they come to you?” And Hezekiah said, “They came to me from a distant land, from Babylon.”
4. And he said, “What have they seen in your house?” Then Hezekiah said, “They have seen everything that is in my house. There was nothing in my storehouses that I did not show them.”
5. And Isaiah said to Hezekiah, “Hear the word of the Lord of Hosts:
6.Behold! The days are coming that everything that is in your house, and that which your fathers have stored up to this day will be carried away to Babylon. Nothing will remain, says Jehovah.
7.And some of your sons that have come forth from you, whom you fathered, will be taken away, and they will be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.”
8. Then Hezekiah said to Isaiah, “The word of the Lord that you have spoken is good.” Moreover, he said, “Because there will be peace and truth in my days.”
Isaiah 40
¶1. “Comfort ye, comfort ye my people!” says your God.
2.“Speak to the heart of Jerusalem and cry out to her that her hard service is fulfilled, that her iniquity has been pardoned, because she has received double from the hand of the Lord for all her sins.
3.A voice crying in the wilderness, ‘Prepare the way of the Lord! Make straight in the desert a highway for our God!
4.Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill shall be brought low. The hilly place will be level, and the rugged places, a plain.
5.Yea, the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh will see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.’
6.A voice is saying, ‘Cry out!’ And he said, ‘What shall I cry out?’ ‘All flesh is grass, and all its comeliness is like a flower of the field.’”
7. The grass withers, the flower fades because the Spirit of the Lord blows upon it. Truly, the people are grass.
8. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever.
¶9. Go up on a high mountain, O herald of good news for Zion! Lift up your voice with strength, O herald of good news for Jerusalem! Lift it up! Do not fear! Say to the cities of Judah, “Behold your God!”
10. Behold! The Lord God will come with power, and His arm rules for Him! Behold, His reward is with Him, and His recompense before Him.
11. He will feed His flock like a shepherd; He will gather the lambs with His arm and carry them in His bosom; He will be a guide for those who are nursing.
¶12. Who measured the waters in the hollow of His hand, and meted out heaven with His span, and measured out the dust of the earth by His Prince, and weighed the mountains in His scale and the hills in a balance?
13. Who has directed the Spirit of the Lord, and who, being His counsellor, has taught Him?
14. With whom has He taken counsel, or who caused Him to understand, or instructed Him in the path of judgment, or taught Him knowledge, or showed Him the way of understanding?
15. Behold! The nations are as a drop from a bucket, and are accounted as fine dust on a balance. Behold! Islands are as fine dust floating in air.
16. Yea, Lebanon is insufficient to burn, and its beasts are insufficient for a burnt offering for Him.
17. All the nations are as nothing before Him. Less than nothing! They are considered nothingness before Him.
18. To whom shall you liken God? And what likeness shall you compare to Him?
19. The craftsman pours out the image, and the goldsmith overlays it with gold and casts chains of silver.
20. As for the poor man’s offering, he selects a tree that will not rot. He seeks out for himself a skillful woodworker to prepare an image that cannot be moved.
21. Do you not know? Have you not heard? Has it not been told you from the beginning? Have you not been given understanding of the foundations of the earth?
22. He who sits upon the circle of the earth, with its inhabitants like grasshoppers, who spreads out heaven like a curtain and stretches it out like a tent to dwell in,
23.who brings potentates to nothing, He has made the judges of earth like nothingness.
24. No, they are not established! No, they are not planted! No, their stock is not rooted in the earth! Moreover, He blows on them, and they wither; yea, a tempest will carry them off like chaff.
25. Yea, to whom will you liken me, that I should be his equal? says the Holy One.
26. Lift up your eyes on high and see who created these things! He who brought forth their host by number, calling them all by name. By an abundance of great strength and mighty power, not one has failed.
27. Why do you say, O Jacob, and you, O Israel, say, “My way is hidden from Jehovah, even from my God; He disregards my cause”?
28. Do you not know? I will damn myself if you have not heard the God of eternity, Jehovah, Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not grow weary or tired. His understanding is unsearchable.
29. He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no vigor, He multiplies strength.
30. Yea, young men may faint and grow weary; yea, young men may stumble and stagger,
31.but they who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles. They shall run and not grow weary; they shall walk and not faint.
Isaiah 41
¶1. “Be silent before me, O coastlands! And let peoples renew strength. Let them draw near. Let them then say as one, ‘Let us draw near for judgment!’”
2. Who stirred up justice from the East? Who summoned him to his feet, made nations bow before him, and gave him rule over kings? Who made them like dust to his sword, like chaff driven away by his bow?
3. He put them to flight; he passed through safely. He did not go on a path with his feet.
4. “Who has done and made it so, calling forth the generations from the beginning? I, Jehovah, called the first and those who followed. I am He!
5.The coastlands saw and were afraid; the ends of the earth trembled. They approached and came.
6.They will help, each one, his neighbor, and each will say to his brother, ‘Be strong!’
7.So, the craftsman strengthens the goldsmith as he beats with a hammer, the one who strikes an anvil, saying, ‘It is ready for joining.’ Then he fastens it with nails so that it will not move.
8. But you, O Israel my servant, O Jacob whom I have chosen, the seed of Abraham my friend,
9.whom I have taken from the ends of the earth and its corners, I have called you and said to you, You are my servant. I have chosen you, and I will not reject you.
10.Do not fear, for I am with you! Do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will make you strong. Yea, I will help you. Yea, I will uphold you with the right hand of my righteousness.
11. Behold, all who are angry with you will be ashamed and confounded. They will be as nothing, and the men who contend with you will perish.
12.You will seek them, but you will not find them. The men who strove with you shall be as nothing, and the men who made war against you, as though they had not been.
13.For I am Jehovah your God, who holds your right hand and says to you, do not be afraid; I will help you.’
¶14. “Do not be afraid, O worm Jacob, you men of Israel! I will help you! says Jehovah your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel.
15.Behold, I will make of you a sharp, new threshing-sledge, having teeth; you will thresh mountains and crush them, and you will make hills like chaff.
16.You will winnow them, and a wind will carry them away, and a tempest will scatter them. And you will rejoice in Jehovah, and you will glory in the Holy One of Israel.
¶17. “The poor and the needy seek water and there is none; their tongue is parched with thirst. I, Jehovah, will answer them; I, the God of Israel, will not forsake them.
18.I will open up rivers in high places, and fountains in the midst of valleys. I will make the wilderness a pool of water, and the dry land, springs of water.
19.I will plant cedar, acacia, and myrtle, and olive trees in the wilderness. I will set in the desert plain the cypress, the plane-tree, and the box tree together,
20.that they may all see, and realize, and consider, and understand that the hand of Jehovah has done this, and the Holy One of Israel has brought it to pass.
21. Present your case, says Jehovah. Bring your proofs, says the King of Jacob.
22.Let them approach and tell us what will happen! Let them reveal former things, what they were, that we may wonder, and acknowledge their fulfillment. Or declare to us things to come.
23.Tell what is coming in the future, that we may know that you are gods! Yea, do good! Or do evil, that we may be in awe, and fear!
24.Behold, you are nothing and your work is nothing. Whoever chooses you is an abomination.
25.I have stirred up one from the north, and he will come. From the rising of the sun, he was called by my name, and he will trample on rulers as on clay, the way a potter treads clay.
26.Who has declared it from the beginning, that we might know, or beforehand, that we might say he is righteous? Yea, there is no one declaring it. Yea, there is no one proclaiming it. Yea, there is no one who hears your words.
27.A leader shall say to Zion, ‘Behold! Behold them! Yea, to Jerusalem will I give a bearer of good news.’
28.Yet, when I looked, there was no man, even among these. Yea, there was no counselor. And when I questioned them, they could answer nothing.
29.Behold, they are all vanity! Their works are nothing; their molten images are wind and emptiness.
Isaiah 42
¶1. “Behold my servant whom I uphold, my chosen one, in whom my soul delights! I have put my Spirit upon him. He will bring forth justice to the nations.
2.He will not cry aloud; nor will he lift up his voice and cause it to be heard in the street.
3.A bruised reed he will not break, and smoldering flax he will not quench. He will assuredly bring forth justice.
4.He will not fail, nor be discouraged, until he has established justice on the earth, and the isles will wait for his law.
¶5. “Thus says the Lord God, Creator of the heavens, and He who stretched them out, He who shaped the earth and that which comes from it, who gives breath to the people on it, and breath to those who live in it:
6.I, Jehovah, have called you in righteousness, and I will hold your hand and keep you hidden. And then, I will give you for a covenant for the people, for a light of the nations,
7.to open the eyes of the blind, to bring prisoners out of the dungeon, those who sit in darkness out of the prison house.
8.I am Jehovah. That is my name. And I will not give my glory to another, nor my praise to graven images.
9.The former things, behold, they came to pass, and now, I am declaring new things! Before they spring forth, I am making you hear it!”
¶10. Sing to the Lord a new song, His song of praise, from the end of the earth, you who go down to the sea and its fullness, the coastlands and their inhabitants:
11.Let the wilderness and its cities lift up their voice, the villages Kedar inhabits! Let the inhabitants of Selah, cry out for joy! Let them cry aloud from the top of the mountains!
12.Let them give glory to Jehovah, and declare His praise in the coastlands!
13.Jehovah will go out like a mighty warrior. He will stir up zeal like a man of war. He will raise a shout; yea, He will roar. Against His enemies, He will prevail.
¶14. “I have kept still; for a long time, I have been silent. I have restrained myself. Like a woman giving birth, I have been groaning, panting, and gasping, all together.
15.I will lay waste the mountains and the hills and dry up all their vegetation, and I will make the rivers islands and dry up the ponds.
16.And I will lead blind men in a way they have not known. In paths they have not known will I guide them. I will make the darkness before them light, and the crooked places straight. These are the things I will do for them, and I will not forsake them.
17.They have been turned away; they will be greatly ashamed who trust in an image and say to a molten image, ‘You are our gods!’
¶18. “Hear, you who are deaf, and look, you who are blind, that you may see!
19. Who is blind, but my servant, and deaf like my messenger that I send? Who is blind like the one to be repaid, and blind like the servant of Jehovah?
20. You see many things, but you do not see them. Your ears are open, but no one hears.
21. Jehovah was pleased, because of His righteousness, to magnify the law and glorify it.
22. But this is a pillaged and plundered people, ensnared in holes, all of them, and hidden away in prison houses. They are a prey, and there is no deliverer, a spoil, and no one is saying, “Bring it back!”
23. Who among you will give ear to this? Pay attention, and hear from now on!
24.Who has given Jacob over as plunder, and Israel to spoilers? Is it not Jehovah, against whom we have sinned? For they would neither walk in His ways, nor obey His law,
25.and so, He poured out His furious anger on him, even a fierce battle which set him on fire on every side. Yet, he did not understand, and so it consumed him, and he did not lay it to heart.
Isaiah 43
¶1. “But now, thus says Jehovah who created you, O Jacob, and who formed you, O Israel: Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I called you by name. You are mine.
2.When you pass through the waters, I will be with you, and through the rivers, they will not overwhelm you! Though you walk in the midst of fire, you will not be burned; yea, the flame will not burn you.
3.For I am Jehovah your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior. I gave Egypt as your ransom, Ethiopia and Seba in exchange for you.
4.Because you were precious in my sight, you were honored, for I have loved you. Yea, I will give men in exchange for you, and nations in exchange for your life.
5.Do not be afraid, for I am with you; I will bring your children from the east, and I will gather you from the west.
6.I will say to the north, ‘Give them up!’ and to the south, ‘Do not withhold them! Bring my sons from afar and my daughters from the ends of the earth –
7.each one who is called by my name, and whom I created for my glory! I formed him! Yea, I made him!’
8. Bring forth the blind people who have eyes, and the deaf who have ears!
9. Let all the nations be gathered together, and let the peoples be assembled! Who among them will declare this, and tell us of former things? Let them put forth their witnesses, that they may be justified. And let men hear and say it is true!
10.You are my witnesses, says the Lord, and my servant whom I have chosen, that you may know and may believe me, and understand that I am He. Before me, no god was formed, and after me shall be none.
¶11. “I, even I, am Jehovah, and besides me, there is no Savior.
12.I declared, and I saved, and I caused you to hear when there was no strange god among you. Yea, you are my witnesses, says Jehovah, and I am God!
13.Yea, before day was, I am He, and there is no one who can deliver out of my hand. I work, and who can reverse it?
14.Thus says Jehovah your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel: For your sakes, I sent to Babylon and brought down the bars,[29] all of them, and the Chaldeans in the ships with their ringing cries.
15.I am Jehovah, your Holy One, Creator of Israel, your King.
¶16. “Thus says the Lord, who makes a way in the sea, and a path in mighty waters,
17.who sends forth chariot and horse, army and mighty man. Together, they will lie down; they will not rise. They are extinguished the way a wick is put out.
18.Stop thinking on former things! Stop dwelling on times gone by!
19.Behold, I do a new thing! It is about to spring up! Will you not understand it? I will even make a way in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert.
20.The beast of the field will honor me, the wolves and the unclean fowl, when I give waters in the wilderness and rivers in the desert, to give drink to my people, my chosen.
21.I planned this people for myself; they shall declare my praise.
¶22. “But you did not call on me, Jacob. You grew tired of me, O Israel.
23.You have not brought the sheep of your burnt offerings to me, nor honored me with your sacrifices, though I have not burdened you with offerings nor wearied you with frankincense.
24.You did not buy calamus for me with silver, nor satisfy me with the fat of your sacrifices. Yea, you burdened me with your sins; you wearied me with your iniquities.
¶25. “I am He who blots out your transgressions for my own sake, and I will not remember your sins.
26.Remind me! Let us enter into judgment together! You do the talking, so that you may be vindicated.
27.Your first father sinned, and your instructors transgressed against me.
28.So I profaned the princes of the sanctuary, and I gave Jacob over to destruction, and Israel to revilings.
Isaiah 44
¶1. “But now, listen, O Jacob my servant, and Israel, whom I have chosen.
2.Thus says Jehovah: He who made you and formed you from the womb will help you. Do not be afraid, O Jacob my servant, even Jeshurun, whom I have chosen.
3.For I will pour out water on thirsty ground, and streams on dry land. I will pour out my Spirit on your seed, and my blessing on your offspring.
4.And they will spring up among grass, like the sallows by springs of water.
5.One will say, ‘I belong to Jehovah,’ and another will call himself by the name of Jacob, and another will write on his hand, ‘Jehovah’s,’ and surname himself by the name of Israel.
¶6. Thus says Jehovah, the King of Israel and his Redeemer, the Lord of Hosts: I am first, and I am last, and besides me, there is no God.
7.And who is like me? Let him proclaim, and let him declare future events, and let him explain to me who created people in ancient times. And let him declare to them what will come about!
8.Do not fear. Oh, do not be afraid! Did I not cause you to hear this long ago? I certainly declared it, and you are my witnesses. Is there any God besides me? There is no other Rock. I know of none.
9.The fashioners of an image, all of them, are worthless, and the things they delight in are worthless, and they are their witnesses. They do not see and they do not know, and so, they shall be ashamed.
10.Who would fashion a god or cast an image for no benefit?
11.Behold! All his companions are ashamed, and the craftsmen, they are but men. Let them all assemble; let them take a stand! They will be afraid; together, they will be put to shame.
12.The craftsman uses an iron tool and makes an idol with hammers in the glowing coals. He fashions it and makes it with his strong arm. Even if it were hungry, it has no power to eat, and if it were faint, it cannot drink water.
13.The craftsman who works with trees stretches out a line and draws it with a stylus. He makes it with shaping instruments and a compass; he outlines it and then makes it in man’s likeness, like a glorious man, to sit in a house.
14.He cuts down cedars for himself, or he takes a cypress[30] or an oak and secures it for himself among the trees of a forest. He plants a fir, and rain makes it grow.
15.It is there for a man to burn, and so, he takes from them and warms himself. Yea, he makes a fire and bakes bread. But then, he makes a god and worships; he makes it a graven image and bows down to it.
16.Half of it, he burns up in a fire. Over that half, he cooks a roast, eats meat and is filled. Moreover, he is warmed and says, ‘Ah! I am warm. I see the firelight.’
17.And the rest of it, he makes a god, his graven image. He bows down to it and worships, and prays to it, saying, ‘Save me! For you are my god!’
18.They do not know, nor do they understand that He has besmeared their eyes so that they cannot see, and their hearts, so they cannot understand.
19.Yea, no one takes it to his heart, nor has the knowledge or understanding to think, ‘Half of it, I burn up in a fire, and on its coals I also bake bread, roast flesh, and then eat. And with the rest of it, I make an abomination, that I might bow down to a block of wood.’
20.Communing with a god through ashes‽ A deceived heart has led him astray, for it will not save his soul. Nor does he say, ‘Is not a lie in my right hand?’
¶21. “Remember these things, Jacob; for you are my servant, O Israel. I formed you as a servant for me. O Israel, you will not be forgotten by me!
22.I have blotted out your transgressions as with a cloud, and your sins as with a thick cloud. Return to me, for I have redeemed you!
23.Shout for joy, O heavens, for Jehovah has done it! Shout, O lower parts of the earth! Break out in praise, O mountains! Forest, and every tree in it! For Jehovah has redeemed Jacob and glorified Himself in Israel!
¶24. “Thus says the Lord, your Redeemer, and the One who formed you from the womb: I am Jehovah, Creator of everything, stretching out heaven alone, spreading out the earth by myself,
25.frustrating the omens of praters and making diviners fools, confuting wise men and making their knowledge foolishness,
26.confirming the word of His servant, and fulfilling the council of His messengers, who says of Jerusalem, ‘She shall be inhabited!’ and of the cities of Judah, ‘They shall be built!’ and ‘I will raise up her waste places,’
27.who says to the deep, ‘Dry up!’ and ‘I will dry up your rivers,’
28.who says to Cyrus, ‘You are my shepherd,’ and he will do all my pleasure, even saying of Jerusalem, ‘Let it be built, and the temple foundation laid.’”
Isaiah 45
¶1. Thus says the Lord to His Messiah, to Cyrus, whose right hand I have made strong to subdue nations before him. Yea, I will loosen the loins of kings and open doors before him; yea, gates will not be closed:
2.I will go before you and level the hilly places. Bronze doors will I shatter, and bars of iron will I cut apart.
3.I will also give you the treasures of darkness, and hidden riches of secret places, so that you may know that I, the Lord, who calls you by your name, am the God of Israel.
4.For Jacob my servant’s sake, even Israel my chosen, I am calling you by your name. I have granted your title, though you do not know me.
5.I am Jehovah, and there is no other; besides me there is no God. I gird you, though you do not know me,
6.so that they may know, from the rising of the sun and to the west, that there is none besides me. I am Jehovah, and there is no other.
7.I form the light, and create darkness; I make peace, and create evil.[31] I, Jehovah, do all these things.
8.Send your showers, O heavens, from above! Yea, let the clouds drip righteousness! Let the earth open up, so that they may bring forth salvation, and let righteousness spring up with it.
¶9. Woe to him who strives with his Maker. Let a potsherd strive with potsherds of the earth. Should the clay say to the one who fashions it, ‘What are you doing?’ Or should the thing you have made say, “He has no hands’?
10. Woe to him who says to a father, “What are you fathering?” or to a mother, “What are you giving birth to?”
¶11. Thus says Jehovah, Israel’s Holy One, and his Maker: “Ask me about things to come concerning my children! But you command me concerning the work of my own hands!
12.I made the earth, and created man upon it. I, even my hands, stretched out the heavens, and I ordained all their hosts.
13.I have stirred him up in righteousness, and I will direct all his ways. He will build my city, and he will set my captives free, not at a price, nor for a reward, says the Lord of Hosts.”
¶14. Thus says Jehovah: The goods of Egypt and the merchandise of Ethiopia and the Sabeans (men of stature) will pass over to you, and they will be yours. They will follow you in chains. They will pass over and bow down to you. They will entreat you, saying, “God is with you, and there is no other God! No other!”
15. Truly, O God of Israel, Savior,[33] you truly are a God who hides Himself.
16. They shall be ashamed, and humiliated as well, all of them; those who engrave images shall go together into infamy.
17. Israel shall be saved by Jehovah with an eternal salvation! You shall not be ashamed, and you shall not be humiliated for all eternity.
¶18. For thus says Jehovah, Creator of the heavens: He is God, shaper of the earth and maker of it; he is the one who founded it. He did not create it for emptiness; he shaped it to be inhabited. I am Jehovah, and there is no other!
19.I have not spoken in secret, in a dark place of earth. I have not said in vain to the seed of Jacob, “Seek me!” I, Jehovah, speak in righteousness, declaring right things.
20. Assemble and come! Gather yourselves together, you survivors of the nations! They have no knowledge who raise up their carved image of wood and pray to a god who cannot save.
21.Declare it, and bring evidence! Yea, let them consult together! Who spoke this long ago? Who declared it of old? Was it not I, Jehovah? There is no other god besides me, a righteous God and a Savior![34] There is no one but me!
22.Turn to me and be saved, all ends of the earth! I am God, and there is no other!
23.I have sworn by myself; the word has gone out of my mouth in righteousness and shall not return, that every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess.
24.“Only in Jehovah,” he said to me, “is righteousness and strength.” He shall come, and all who are incensed against him shall be put to shame.
25.In Jehovah shall all the seed of Israel be justified and make their boast.
Isaiah 46
¶1. Bel is bowed down; Nebo stoops over. Their idols are upon beasts and cattle. The burdens you bore in procession are loaded as a burden for a weary animal.
2. They stoop over; they bow down together; they are unable to rescue the burden, but they themselves have gone into captivity.
3. Listen to me, O house of Jacob and all who remain of the house of Israel who have been carried from the belly, who have been carried since the womb:
4.Even to old age, I am He, and to gray hair, I myself carry the load. I myself have created, and I myself will carry it; yea, I myself will bear the load, and I will deliver.
5.To whom will you liken me, or make me equal, or compare me, as though we were alike?
6.Those who lavish gold from a purse and weigh out silver on the scales hire a goldsmith, who makes it a god. Then they fall down and worship it.
7.They bear it on the shoulder; they carry it, and set it in its place, and it remains. From its place, it does not move. Yea, one may cry out to it, but it will not answer nor save him in his distress.
8.Remember this and have some gumption! Take it to heart, you rebels!
9.Call to mind the beginning things from ancient time, that I am God, and there are no other gods. There is none like me,
10.revealing the end from the beginning, and from ancient time what has not yet happened, saying, “My counsel shall stand, and I will do all that I please,”
11.calling a bird of prey from the rising sun, the man of my counsel from a distant land. Yea, I have spoken; I will also bring to pass! I have planned; I will also do!
12.Listen to me, you stout-hearted who are far from righteousness!
13.My righteousness will I bring near; it will not be far off. And my salvation will not tarry. I will grant salvation in Zion for Israel, my glory.
Isaiah 47
¶1. Go down and sit in the dust, O virgin daughter of Babylon! Sit on the ground; there is no throne, O daughter of the Chaldeans, for they will not again call you tender and delicate.
2. Take millstones and grind meal; remove your veil; strip off the skirt; expose the leg; cross over rivers!
3. Your nakedness is uncovered, and your shame is seen. I will take vengeance; I will not spare a man.
¶4. Our Redeemer is the Lord of Hosts. The Holy One of Israel is His name.
5. Sit in silence and enter into the darkness, O daughter of the Chaldeans, for they will not again call you the madam of kingdoms.
6. I was furious with my people; I polluted my heritage and gave them into your hand. You showed them no mercy. On the aged one, you made your yoke very heavy.
7. You have said, “I shall be queen forever.” Therefore, you did not take these things to heart, nor did you remember her end.
8. So now, hear this, O licentious woman who sits confidently, who says in her heart, “I am, and there is no other besides me. I shall not sit as a widow, nor shall I know the loss of children,”
9. These two things will come to you in a moment, in one day: loss of children and widowhood. They will come upon you in their full measure because of your many sorceries and because of your great charms.
10. You were bold in your wickedness, and you thought, “There is no one who sees me.” Your wisdom and your knowledge turned you from me, and you said in your heart, “I am, and there is none besides me.”
11. But evil will come upon you that you will not know how to charm away, and sudden destruction will fall upon you for which you cannot provide atonement, and devastation will come upon you suddenly, of which you know nothing.
12. Stand now with your charms and with the multitude of your sorceries with which you have toiled from your youth. Maybe you can prevail! Maybe you will frighten me!
13. You are worn out with your many consultations. Let now your astrologers stand up and save you, those who scan the stars, predicting each month what is coming upon you.
14. Behold, they are like stubble; the fire consumes them. They cannot deliver themselves from the power of the flame. There is no coal to keep them warm, or fire to sit before.
15. Thus shall your merchants be to you, for whom you have labored from your youth. They will wander off, each to his own way. There will be no one to save you.
Isaiah 48
¶1. Hear this, O house of Jacob, who are called by the name of Israel, and come out from the waters of Judah, who take oaths by the name of Jehovah, and offer invocations by the God of Israel, but not in truth or in righteousness.
2. How they claim to belong to the holy city and to be sustained by the God of Israel whose name is the Lord of Hosts!
3.I revealed past events before they happened. Yea, they went forth from my mouth, and I caused them to be heard. I acted suddenly, and they came to pass.
4.Knowing that you are stubborn, and that your neck is sinew of iron, and that your brow is brass,
5.I told you of them ahead of time. Before it came to pass, I made you hear of them, lest you should say, “My own effort brought those things about” or “My graven image and my molten image ordained them.”
6.You have heard; now, look at all this! Will you not declare it? Even now, I am causing you to hear new things, even hidden things that you do not know!
7. Right now they are created, and not long ago; before today, you have not heard them, lest you should say, “Behold, I knew them.”
8. You have not heard, nor have you understood, nor was your ear open before. For I know that you are very treacherous. From the womb, you were named, “Rebel”.
9. For my name’s sake will I defer my anger, and for the sake of my praise will I restrain it for you, lest I cut you off.
10. Behold, I have refined you, but not the way silver is refined; I have chosen you in a furnace of affliction.
11. For my own sake – for my own sake! – will I do it. For why should my name be profaned? And I will not give my glory to another.
¶12.Listen to me, Jacob! And Israel, whom I named! I am He! I am the beginning and the end.
13.Yea, my hand founded the earth, and my right hand spread out the heavens! When I call, they stand up together.
14.Come together, all of you, and listen! Who among them has declared these things? Jehovah has loved him, and he will do His pleasure in Babylon, and his arm shall be against the Chaldeans.
15.I, even I, have spoken! Yea, I ordained him; I sent him, and he made his way successful.
16.Draw near to me! Hear this! From the beginning, I have not spoken in secret. From the beginning of time, I was there. And now, the Lord Jehovah has sent me and His Spirit.
17. Thus says Jehovah your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel: I am Jehovah your God, who teaches you to profit, leading you in the way you should go.
18.If only you had heeded my commandments! Then your peace would have been like a river, and your righteousness, like billows of the sea,
19.and your seed would have been like the sand, and those who come from your loins, like its grains. Their name would not have been cut off or destroyed before me.
20. Get out of Babylon! Flee from the Chaldeans with a voice of singing! Declare it, cause this to be heard, send it out to the end of the earth! Say, “Jehovah has redeemed His servant Jacob!”
21.They did not thirst when He led them through the deserts. He made water to flow for them from a rock; He split a rock, and water gushed out.
22. There is no peace, says the Lord, to the wicked.
Isaiah 49
1. Hear me, O isles! Listen, people from afar! Jehovah called me from the womb. From my mother’s belly, He made mention of my name.
2. He made my mouth like a sharp sword; in the shadow of His hand, He hid me. He made me a polished arrow; in His quiver, He has hidden me.
3. He said to me, “You are my servant Israel, for in you, I will glorify myself.”
4. As for me, I said, “I have labored for nothing; I have spent my strength in vain. For nothing! Yet, my judgment is surely with the Lord, and my reward with my God.”
5. And then the Lord, the One who formed me from the womb as His servant to bring Jacob back to Him, said that even if Israel is not brought in, I will yet be honored in the Lord’s eyes. My God is my strength!
6. Yea, He said, “It is too small a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, to bring back those of Israel who are preserved. I have appointed you to be a light for the nations, to be my salvation to the end of the earth.”
7. Thus said Jehovah, the Redeemer of His holy one Israel, to the one despised by man, the one abhorred by the nation, the servant of rulers: “Kings will see and arise, and princes shall bow down because of the Lord who is faithful, Israel’s Holy One, who has chosen you.”
8. This is what Jehovah said: “In the acceptable time, I will answer you, and in the day of salvation, I will help you. And I will watch over you and give you for a covenant of the people, to cause the earth to rise to inherit desolate inheritances,
9.saying to the prisoners, ‘Come forth!’ And to those in darkness, ‘Show yourselves!’ They shall feed along the roads, and their pastures shall be in all the high places.
10.And they will neither hunger nor thirst, and heat and sun will not beat upon them. For He who pities them will guide them, and by springs of water will He refresh them.
11.And I will turn all my mountains into a road, and my highways will be raised up.
12.Behold, some shall come from far away, and behold, others from the north and from the west, and others from the land of Sinim.”
13. Shout for joy, O heavens, and rejoice, O earth! Break forth with a shout of praise, O mountains! For Jehovah has comforted His people, and He will have compassion on His afflicted.
14. And Zion will think, “Jehovah has abandoned me, and my Lord has forgotten me!”
15. Can a woman forget her sucking child, to have compassion on the son of her womb? Indeed, these women may forget, but I will not forget you.
16. Behold, I have engraved you upon the palms of my hands. Your walls are always before me.
17. Your children will make haste; your destroyers and your devastators will depart from you.
18. Lift up your eyes and look round about. They all are gathered; they have come to you. As I live, declares Jehovah, truly, you will put all of them on like an ornament and bind them on, as the bride does,
19.for your ruins, and your desolate places, and your devastated land will surely then be crowded by settlers, but those who swallowed you up will be far away.
20.Children of your bereavement will keep saying in your ears, “This place is too crowded for me! Come to me that I may dwell here.”
21. And you shall say in your heart, “Who bare these for me? For I was bereaved and barren, an exiled woman, one put away. But who reared these? Behold, I was left alone! These, where were they?”
22. Thus says the Lord Jehovah: Behold, I will lift up my hand to the Gentiles and raise up my signal to the nations, and they will bring your sons in their bosom, and your daughters will be carried on their shoulder.
23.Kings will be your attendants, and their queens, your supporters. They will bow before you, face to the earth, and lick the dust of your feet. Then you shall know that I am Jehovah. Those who wait for me will not be disappointed!
24.Can prey be taken away from a mighty warrior, or a captive be rescued from a fierce man?”
25. For thus says Jehovah: The captive of the mighty warrior will indeed be taken, and the prey of the fearsome man will be rescued. For I will contend with him who contends with you, and I will rescue your children.
26.And I will make your oppressors eat their own flesh, and they will be drunk on their own blood as on sweet wine. And all flesh shall know that I am Jehovah, your Savior and your Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob.
Isaiah 50
¶1. Thus says Jehovah: Where is this certificate of divorce for your mother, with which I sent her away? Or who is it among my creditors to whom I sold you? Behold, by your iniquities have you sold yourselves, and by your transgressions was your mother sent away.
2.Why is it that I came, and there was no man, that I called, and there was no one to answer? Has my hand grown too short to redeem, or is there insufficient power in me to deliver? Behold, by my rebuke, I dry up a sea! I make rivers a desert, so that their fish stink because there is no water; they die of thirst.
3. I clothe the heavens with darkness and make sackcloth their covering.
¶4. My Lord, Jehovah, has given me the tongue of the learned, that I might know how to help the weary with a word. He awakens, morning by morning, He awakens my ear to hear as the learned.
5. My Lord, Jehovah, opened my ear, and I did not rebel. I did not turn back.
6. I gave my back to the strikers, and my cheeks to those who pulled out my beard. I did not hide my face from shame or spit.
7. But my Lord, Jehovah, helps me. That is why I was not confounded. Therefore, I have set my face like a flint, and I know that I will not be put to shame.
8. He who justifies me is close by. Who will contend with me? Let us appear together! Who is the accuser in my case? Let him come near me!
9. Behold, my Lord, Jehovah, helps me. Who is he that will condemn me? Behold, they all, like a garment, will wax old; a moth will eat them.
10. Who among you fears Jehovah, hearing the voice of His servant? When he walks in darkness and there is no light for him, he will trust in the name of the Lord and lean upon his God.
11. Behold, all of you who kindle a fire, surrounding yourselves with sparks! Walk by the flame of your fire and with the sparks that you ignite. But this you will have from my hand: you will lie down in a place of torment.
Isaiah 51
¶1. Hear me, you who pursue righteousness, who seek Jehovah! Look to the rock from which you have been hewn, and to the hole of the pit from which you were dug!
2. Look to Abraham your father and to Sarah who bore you, for I called him alone, and I blessed him and multiplied him.
3. For Jehovah will comfort Zion; He will comfort all her ruins and make her wilderness like Eden, and her dry plain like the garden of Jehovah. Joy and gladness will be found in her, thanksgiving and the voice of singing.
¶4. Listen to me, O my people! Give me your ear, O my nation! For a law will go forth from me, and my justice, as a light. I will give rest to the nations.
5. My righteousness will come near them, my salvation will go forth, and my arms will bring justice to the nations. The isles will yearn for me, and they will put their hope in my strength.
6. Lift your eyes to the heavens, and behold the earth below! For the heavens will vanish like smoke, and the earth will wax old like a garment, and its inhabitants will likewise die, but my salvation will be forever, and my righteousness will not be destroyed.
¶7. Hear me, you who know righteousness, the people in whose heart is my law! Do not fear the reproach of man and do not be dismayed at their revilings,
8.for the moth shall eat them like a garment, and the worm shall eat them like wool. But my righteousness shall be forever, and my salvation to all generations.
9. Rouse yourself! Rouse yourself! Put on strength, O Arm of the Lord! Rouse yourself as in days of old, in generations long past! Are you not the one who will hew the proud one into pieces and pierce the serpent through?
10. Are you not the one by whom the sea was dried up, waters of the great deep, who made the depths of the sea a way for the redeemed to pass through?
11. And the redeemed of Jehovah will return and enter into Zion with singing, and eternal joy on their heads. They will obtain gladness and joy, and sorrow and sighing will flee away.[35]
¶12. I, even I, am He who gives you comfort! Who are you, that you should fear a man who dies or the son of man who is made like grass?
13. And you have forgotten Jehovah, your Maker, who spread out the heavens and laid the foundation of earth. But you are in continual dread, every day, of the wrath of the oppressor, when He is preparing to destroy him. So, where will the wrath of the oppressor be?
14. He who is stooped over will quickly be released; he will not die and go to the Pit, and he will not lack his bread.
15. I am Jehovah your God, who troubles the sea so that its waves roar. The Lord of Hosts is His name.
16. I put my words in your mouth (but covered you in the shadow of my hand), to plant the heavens, and to lay the foundation of the earth, and to say to Zion, “You are my people.”
17. Wake yourself! Wake yourself! Arise, O Jerusalem, who have drunk from the hand of Jehovah the cup of His wrath, who have drunk the dregs[36] of the cup of staggering, and drained it.
18. Of all the sons she has begotten, there is not one to lead her; there is not one of all the sons she has brought up who will take her by the hand.
19. These two things have befallen you – who will mourn for you? – devastation and destruction and famine and sword. By whom will I comfort you?
20. Your children are entangled; they lie at the head of all the streets like an antelope in a net. They are full of wrath from Jehovah, the rebuke of your God.
21. Therefore, hear this now, you who are afflicted and drunk, but not from wine!
¶22. Thus says your Lord, Jehovah, and your God, who pleads the cause of His people: “Behold, I have taken from your hand the cup of staggering, the dregs[37] of the cup of my wrath. You will never drink it again.
23. But I will put it in the hand of your tormentors who said to your soul, ‘Bow down that we may walk over you!’ And you have made your back like the ground, like the street, for them to walk over.”
Isaiah 52
¶1. Awake! Awake! Put on your strength, O Zion! Put on your beautiful garments, O Jerusalem, the holy city, for no longer will the uncircumcised or the unclean enter into you.
2. Shake off the dust! Arise, O captive Jerusalem! Loose the bonds from your neck, O captive daughter of Zion!
¶3. For thus says Jehovah: “You were sold for nothing, and you will be redeemed without money.”
4. For thus says my Lord, Jehovah: “At the first, my people went down to Egypt to sojourn there, and then Assyria oppressed them, for nothing.
5.Now, therefore, who is mine here? says the Lord. For my people were taken away with no remuneration. They that rule over them howl, says the Lord, and everyday my name is continually blasphemed.
6.Therefore, my people will know my name. Therefore, in that day, they will know that I am He who is speaking. Behold, it is I.”
7. How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who proclaims peace, who brings tidings of good, who proclaims salvation, saying to Zion, “Your God reigns!”
8. The voice of your watchmen! They lift up their voice! They cry out as one, for they will see eye to eye when Jehovah comes back to Zion.
9. Break forth, shout joyfully together, O you ruins of Jerusalem! For Jehovah has comforted His people; He has redeemed Jerusalem.
10. Jehovah has bared His holy arm before the eyes of all the nations, and all the ends of the earth will see the salvation of our God.
11. Leave! Leave! Come out of there! Don’t touch the unclean thing! Come out from her midst; purify yourselves, you who bear the vessels of the Lord.
12. For you will not go out in haste, nor will you go in flight, for Jehovah is going before you, and the God of Israel will be your rearguard.
13. Behold, my servant will act prudently. He will be exalted and lifted up; yea, he will be very high.
14. Many shall be aghast at you. So great shall be the disfigurement of his visage that it will be beyond human, and his form, beyond the sons of men.
15. By this, he shall sprinkle many nations. Kings shall shut their mouths at him, for that which had not been told them, they will see, and that which they had not heard, they shall understand.
Isaiah 53
1. Who has believed our report? And to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed?
2. For he shall grow up before Him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground. He will have no form or majesty, and when we see him, there will be no beauty that we should desire him.
3. He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief.[38] He was like one hiding his face from us. He was despised, and we did not value him.
4. He took our sicknesses and bore our sufferings, yet we considered him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted.
5. But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; chastisement for our peace was laid upon him; and by his wounds, we are healed.
6. We all, like sheep, have gone astray; every one of us has turned to his own way, and the Lord laid upon him the iniquity of us all.
7. He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth. He was brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shearers is dumb, so he opened not his mouth.
8. He was taken from prison and from justice, and who will speak of his generation? He was cut off from the land of the living; for the transgression of my people was he stricken.
9. He made his grave with the wicked and with the rich in his death, although he had done no violence, neither was any deceit in his mouth.
10. Yet it pleased the Lord to crush him; He has put him to grief. When his life is given[39] as an offering for sin, he shall see his generation. He shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in his hand.
11. He will see the travail of his soul and be satisfied. By his knowledge, my righteous servant shall justify many, for he will bear their iniquities.
12. Therefore will I divide to him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong because he exposed his soul to death and was numbered with transgressors. Yet, he bore the sins of many and made intercession for the transgressors.
Isaiah 54
¶1. Sing, O barren woman who did not bear! Break out in song, and shout, you who have not travailed! For the children of the barren woman are more than the children of the married woman, says Jehovah.
2. Enlarge the place of your tent, and let the curtains of your habitations be stretched! Do not hold back! Lengthen your ropes and strengthen your stakes!
3. For you will break out to the right and to the left, and your seed will possess the nations and populate abandoned cities.
4. Do not be afraid, for you will not be ashamed, nor will you be humiliated. You will not be disgraced! On the contrary, you will forget the shame of your youth, and the reproach of your estrangement will you remember no more.
5. For your Maker is your Husband. His name is the Lord of Hosts, even your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel! He will be called God of the whole earth.
6. For Jehovah called you when you were a wife forsaken and grieved in spirit, even a young wife when she is rejected, says your God.
7. For a brief moment, I forsook you, but in great compassion will I gather you.
8. In a wave of rage, I hid my face from you for a moment, but in eternal lovingkindness will I have compassion on you, says your Redeemer, Jehovah.
9. For this is as the waters of Noah to me, concerning which I swore, “The waters of Noah will never again overflow the earth.” Likewise have I sworn that I will be angry no more with you, nor rebuke you.
10. For the mountains may depart, and the hills may be shaken, but my lovingkindness will not depart from you, and my covenant of peace will not be shaken, says Jehovah, the One who pities you.
11. O afflicted, stormed-tossed, and uncomforted soul! Behold! I am about to set your stones in antimony and lay your foundation with sapphires.
12. And I will make your battlements of rubies, and your gates of sparkling stones, and your entire wall of beautiful stones.
13. And all your children will be taught by Jehovah, and the peace of your children will be great.
14. By righteousness will you be restored. Keep far from oppression, that you be not afraid, and from extortion, that it come not near you.
15. Behold, he will surely quarrel, but not with me. Whoever quarrels with you will fall because of you.
16. Behold, I created the craftsman who blows on fiery coals and produces a weapon for its work, and I created the Destroyer to destroy.
17. No weapon formed against you shall prosper, and every tongue that rises against you in judgment, you shall condemn. This is the inheritance of the servants of Jehovah, and their righteousness is from me, says the Lord.
Isaiah 55
¶1. Ho! Every one who is thirsty, come to the water! And he who has no money, come! Buy and eat! Yea, come! Buy wine and milk without money, and without price.
2. Why do you spend money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy? Listen closely to me and eat that which is good, and let your soul delight itself in fatness.
3. Incline your ear and come to me! Hear, and your soul will live! And I will make an eternal covenant with you, the sure mercies of David.
4. Behold, I have appointed him a witness to the peoples, a leader and commander for the peoples.
5. Behold, you will call a nation that you do not know, and nations that do not know you will run to you because of Jehovah your God, the Holy One of Israel, for He has honored you.
¶6. Seek the Lord while He may be found; call upon Him while He is near.
7. Let the evil man forsake his way, and the wicked man, his thoughts, and return to the Lord, and He will have mercy on him, even to our God, for He will abundantly pardon.
8. “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, and your ways are not my ways,” says the Lord.
9.“As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.”
10. For just as the rain and snow come down from heaven and do not return there until they have made the land to drink, and make it bring forth and sprout, so that it yields seed for the sower, and bread for the eater,
11. so is my word that goes out from my mouth. It shall not return to me empty, but will accomplish that which pleases me, and succeed in that for which I sent it.
12. For you will come out with joy and be led forth in peace; the mountains and the hills will burst out before you into singing, and all the trees of the field will clap their hands.
13. Instead of the thorn-bush will come up the cypress; instead of the nettle[40] will come up the myrtle. And it will be for Jehovah’s acclaim, an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off.
Isaiah 56
¶1. Thus says the Lord: Keep judgment and do righteousness, for my salvation is near to come, and my righteousness is to be revealed.
2. Blessed is the man who does this, and the son of man who holds fast to it, who keeps from profaning the Sabbath and keeps his hand from doing any evil.
3. And let not the son of the foreigner who has joined himself to Jehovah speak, saying, “Jehovah has utterly separated me from His people.” Nor let the eunuch say, “Behold, I am a dry tree.”
4. For thus says Jehovah to the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths, and choose what pleases me, and hold fast my covenant:
5.In my house and within my walls, I will surely give them authority and a name better than sons and daughters. I will give them an everlasting name that will not be cut off.
¶6. And as for the children of the foreigner who join themselves to Jehovah, to minister to Him and to love the name of Jehovah, and to be His servants, every one who keeps His Sabbath rather than profane it, and who holds fast my covenant,
7.them will I also bring to my holy mountain, and I will make them joyful in my house of prayer. Their burnt offerings and their sacrifices will be acceptable on my altar, for my house will be called a house of prayer for all peoples.
8. The Lord, Jehovah, Gatherer of the outcasts of Israel, says, “I will gather more to him than those already gathered to him.”
9. All His beasts of the field shall come to eat, and all His beasts of the forest.
10. Blind men are watching, all of them. They do not know. They all are dumb dogs; they cannot bark, dreaming, lying down, loving to slumber.
11. And the dogs have a mighty appetite; they never have enough. Yea, they are shepherds who have no understanding. They all have turned to their own way, each man, to his ill-gotten gain, to the very last one.
12. “Come,” they say, “let me take wine, and let’s drink strong drink. And tomorrow will be like today, and much more abundant.”
Isaiah 57
¶1. The righteous man perishes, and no one takes it to heart; good men are gathered to their fathers without anyone understanding that the righteous man is taken away from the presence of evil.
2. He shall enter into peace. They shall rest upon their beds, who walks in his uprightness.
3. Come near, you sons of a witch, you seed of an adulterer and a whore!
4. Against whom do you so lightly speak? Against whom do you open your mouth wide and stick out your tongue? Are you not the children of transgression and the seed of deceit,
5.inflaming yourselves among the terebinths, beneath every luxuriant tree, slaughtering children in the valleys under the clefts of rocks,
6.among smooth stones of the valleys. They will be your portion! They will be your lot, inasmuch as you have poured out a libation to them and offered a grain offering. Am I not grieved at these things?
7. On a high and lofty hill, you made your bed; you went up there to offer sacrifice.
8. And by the door and the doorpost, you put your symbol. Yea, you exposed yourself to others besides me and went up, widened your bed, and made your covenant with them. You loved their bed. You saw a vision of power.
9. And with the oil, you journeyed for Molech,[41] and you multiplied your incenses, and you sent your missionaries to distant places, and you brought men down to Sheol.
10. You wore yourself out with the length of your journey. You would not admit it was useless. You had found your powerful beast; that is why you did not feel weak.
11. Whom do you dread or fear, that you dissembled and did not remember me? You did not take it to heart! Have I not refrained myself from ancient time, and yet, you will not honor me?
12. I myself will expose your righteousness and your works, and they will not profit you.
13. When you cry out, let your mass of idols deliver you! Yet, a wind will carry them all away; a breath will take them. But he who takes refuge in me shall inherit the earth and possess my holy mountain.
14. Then He said to them, “Build it up! Build it up! Prepare the way! Remove the stumbling-block out of the way of my people!”
¶15. Thus says the high and exalted One who inhabits eternity, whose name is holy: I dwell in a high and holy place and with the humbled and lowly in spirit, to revive the spirits of the lowly and to revive the hearts of the oppressed.
16. For I will not contend forever, nor will I be angry forever, for the spirit before me would faint away, and the souls that I have made.
17. Because of the iniquity of his unjust gain, I was angry, and I struck him. I hid myself and was angry, but he went on rebelling in the way of his own heart.
18.I have seen his ways, and I will heal him. And I will lead him and restore comforts to him and to those who mourn for him,
19.creating the fruit of his lips. Peace! Peace both far and near, says Jehovah, for I will surely heal him!
20. But the wicked are like the tossing sea that cannot rest, and whose waters churn up muck and mire.
21. There is no peace, says my God, to the wicked.
Isaiah 58
¶1. Cry aloud! Do not hold back! Lift up your voice like a shofar and show my people their transgression and the house of Jacob their sins!
2. Yet, they seek me daily, and delight in knowing my ways, as a nation that did righteousness, and did not forsake the judgment of their God. They ask me for righteous judgments; they delight in approaching God.
3. “Why have we fasted, and you take no notice? We have afflicted our souls, but you do not acknowledge it!” “Behold, in the day of your fast, you find pleasure and drive on all your laborers.
4.Behold, you fast for strife and contention and to beat down with a fist of wickedness. You shall not fast as you do today to make your voice heard on high.
5.Is this the kind of fast I have chosen, a day for a man to afflict his soul, for him to bow down his head like a bulrush and spread out sackcloth and ashes? Do you call this a fast, and an acceptable day to Jehovah?
6.Is this not the fast that I have chosen? to undo the bonds of wickedness, to loosen the thongs of the yoke, and to let the oppressed go free, and that you remove every yoke?
7.Is it not to break your bread to the hungry, that you bring the homeless poor into your house, that when you see the naked, you cover him, and that you do not hide yourself from your own kindred?
8.Then shall your light break forth as the dawn, and your healing shall spring forth quickly, and your righteousness shall go before you, and the glory of Jehovah shall be your rearguard.
9.Then you shall call and Jehovah will answer. You shall cry for help, and He will say, ‘Here I am!’ If you put away from the midst of you the yoke, the pointing of the finger, and speaking wickedness;
10.yea, if you provide freely for the hungry, and satisfy the afflicted soul, then shall your light rise in darkness, and your darkness shall be as the noon.
11.And Jehovah will always guide you, and satisfy your soul in dry places, and strengthen your whole being, and you shall be like a watered garden and like a spring of water whose waters do not fail.
12.And those who are from you will rebuild the old, wasted places. You shall raise up foundations for many generations, and He shall call you, ‘Repairer of the breach’, and ‘Restorer of paths to dwell in’.
13.If you refrain your foot on the Sabbath from taking care of your own affairs on my holy day, and if you call the Sabbath a delight, holy to Jehovah, honorable, and honor it by not pursuing your own ways, nor choosing your own will, nor saying anything of yourself,
14.then, you shall delight yourself in Jehovah, and I will cause you to ride upon the high places of earth, and I will feed you the portion of Jacob your father, for the mouth of Jehovah has spoken.”
Isaiah 59
¶1. Behold, the hand of the Lord is not too short to save, nor His ear too dull to hear.
2. Rather, your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden His face from you, so that He will not hear.
3. Yea, your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity. Your lips speak falsehood; your tongue utters injustice.
4. There is no one calling out for justice, and no one is judged honestly. They trust in emptiness and speak vanity. They conceive mischief and give birth to wickedness.
5. They cut open viper’s eggs; they weave spider’s webs. He who eats their eggs dies, for what is crushed breaks out as a viper.
6. Their webs are not for clothing; yea, they do not cover themselves with their works. Their works are works of iniquity, and a work of violence is in their hands.
7. Their feet run to evil, and they hasten to shed innocent blood. Their thoughts are wicked thoughts. Devastation and destruction are in their highways.
8. The way of peace, they do not know, and there is no justice in their paths. They have made crooked pathways for themselves. No one who walks therein knows peace.
9. Therefore, justice is far from us, and righteousness has not overtaken us. We wait for light, and behold, darkness; instead of brightness, we walk in gloom.
10. We grope like blind men for a wall; yea, we grope like those who have no eyes. We stumble at noonday as at twilight. Among the stout, we are like dead men.
11. We growl like bears, all of us, and like doves, we moan mournfully. We wait for justice, but there is none, for salvation, but it is far from us.
12. For our transgressions are many before you, and our sins testify against us, for our transgressions are with us, and we know our iniquities:
13. transgressing and denying the Lord, and backsliding from following after our God, speaking oppression and apostasy, conceiving and uttering from the heart lying words.
14. Moreover, justice is turned away, and righteousness stands afar off. Yea, truth has fallen in the public place, and uprightness cannot enter.
15. Yea, the truth is gone, and he who turns from evil makes himself a prey. And Jehovah has seen it, and it is evil in His eyes that there is no justice.
16. And when He saw that there was no man, He was appalled that there was no intercessor. And so, His own arm brought him salvation, and His righteousness, it upheld him.
17. Then will he put on righteousness like a breastplate, with a helmet of salvation on his head. And for clothes, he will put on garments of vengeance and wrap himself in zeal like a robe.
18. He will repay them according to their deeds: wrath to his adversaries, retribution to his enemies. He will render retribution to the isles.
19. From the west, they will fear the name of Jehovah, and from the rising of the sun, they will fear His glory. For he will come like a rushing river, the Spirit of God driving him on.
20. And the Redeemer will come to Zion, even to those in Jacob who repent of their transgression, says Jehovah.
21. As for me, this will be my covenant with them, says Jehovah: my Spirit that is upon you, and my words that I put in your mouth, will not depart from your mouth, nor from the mouth of your children, nor from the mouth of your children’s children, says Jehovah, from that time, and forever.
Isaiah 60
¶1. Arise! Shine! For your light has come, and the glory of Jehovah has risen upon you!
2. For behold, darkness may cover the earth, and thick darkness the nations, but upon you will Jehovah rise, and His glory will be seen over you.
3. And nations will come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your rising.
4. Lift up your eyes and look around! All of them have been gathered. They are coming to you. Your sons are coming from far away, and your daughters will be borne on the hip.
5. Then you will see, and you will beam, and your heart will be in awe and swell because the multitude of the sea will be changed toward you, and the wealth of the Gentiles will come to you.
6. A multitude of camels will cover you, camels of Midian and Ephah. All those of Sheba will come, carrying gold and incense, proclaiming the praises of God.
7. All the flocks of Kedar will be gathered to you; the rams of Nebaioth will be at your service. They will be offered up with favor on my altar, and I will magnify the house of my glory.
8. Who are these, flying like a cloud, and like doves to their dovecotes.
9. Surely, the isles will gather them for me, with ships of Tarshish in the lead, to bring your children from afar, their silver and gold with them, to the Name of Jehovah your God, even to the Holy One of Israel, because He will have honored you.
10. And sons of the foreigner will build your wall, and their kings will serve you, for in my wrath, I struck you down, but in my favor, I have had mercy on you.
11. Your gates will always be open; they will not be closed day or night so that the wealth of the Gentiles may come in to you, their kings led in procession.
12. For the nation or kingdom that does not serve you will perish; those nations will be utterly laid waste.
13. The glory of Lebanon will come to you, the cypress, the plane-tree, and the box tree together, to beautify the place of my sanctuary, and I will glorify the place of my feet.
14. And the children of those who are afflicting you will come to you bending low, and all who despise you will bow at the soles of your feet, and they will call you, “The City of Jehovah, Zion of the Holy One of Israel”.
15. Instead of you being forsaken and hated, with no one passing through, I will make you an everlasting excellency, a joy from generation to generation.
16. You will suck the milk of the Gentiles and suck the breasts of kings, and you shall know that I, Jehovah, am your Savior, and your Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob.
17. Instead of brass, I will bring gold; and instead of iron, I will bring silver; and instead of wood, brass; and instead of stones, iron. And I will make peace your overseer, and righteousness your taskmaster.
18. Violence will no longer be heard in your land, nor devastation and destruction within your borders, and you will call your walls “Salvation” and your gates “Praise”.
19. The sun will no longer be for your light by day, nor will the brightness of the moon be for your light, but Jehovah will be your light forever, and your God will be your glory.
20. Your sun will never go down, and your moon will not wane, for Jehovah will forever be your light, and your days of mourning will be over.
21. And all your people will be righteous; they will possess the land forever, the plant of his planting, the work of my hands, that I might glorify myself.
22. The least one will become like a thousand, and the insignificant one, like a mighty nation. I, Jehovah, will hasten it in its time.
Isaiah 61
¶1. The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, for Jehovah has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the broken-hearted, to declare liberty[42] to those held captive and freedom to those in prison,
2.to proclaim the year of Jehovah’s favor and the day of our God’s vengeance, to comfort all who mourn,
3.to provide for those mourning in Zion – to give them beauty instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, a mantle of praise instead of a weary spirit – that they might be called, “trees of righteousness, the planting of Jehovah”, that He might be glorified.
4. And they will build again the ancient ruins; they will raise up places laid waste of old; they will repair desolate cities that have lain waste for many generations.
5. And strangers will stand and tend your flocks, and the children of foreigners will be your plowmen and your vinedressers,
6.but you will be called priests of Jehovah; you will be addressed as “ministers of our God”. You will consume the wealth of the Gentiles and boast in their riches.
7. Because your shame has been double, and humiliation was decreed their lot, they will possess double in their land. Everlasting joy will be theirs.
8. For I, Jehovah, love justice; I hate robbery and injustice. And I will give them a true recompense, and I will make an eternal covenant with them,
9.and their seed will be of repute among the Gentiles, and their offspring among the nations; all who see them will acknowledge them, that they are the seed that Jehovah has blessed.
10. I will greatly rejoice in Jehovah! My soul shall rejoice in my God, for He has clothed me with garments of salvation; with a robe of righteousness has He covered me, the way a bridegroom dons a splendid headdress, or a bride puts on her adornments.
11. For as the earth brings forth its shoot, and as a garden causes its seed to sprout, so will the Lord Jehovah cause righteousness and praise to spring up before all the Gentiles.
Isaiah 62
¶1. For Zion’s sake, I will not be silent, and for Jerusalem’s sake, I will not be still until her righteousness goes forth like brightness, and her salvation like a flaming torch.
2. And the Gentiles shall see your righteousness, and all kings, your glory. And you shall be called by a new name, which the mouth of Jehovah shall give.
3. And you shall be a beautiful crown in the hand of Jehovah, and a royal diadem in the palm of your God.
4. You will no longer be thought of as forsaken, and your land will no longer be considered a desolation, but you will be called Hephzibah,[43] and your land, Beulah.[44] For Jehovah delights in you, and your land will be married.
5. For as a young man marries a virgin, your sons shall marry you, and like the rejoicing of a bridegroom with a bride shall your God rejoice over you.
6. Upon your walls, O Jerusalem, I have appointed watchmen. They will never be silent, all day and all night. There is no rest for you who are making Jehovah remember!
7. Yea, give Him no rest until He accomplishes it and makes Jerusalem the praise of the earth.
8. Jehovah has sworn by His right hand and by His mighty arm, I will damn myself if I again give your grain as food for your enemies, or if sons of a stranger drink your new wine for which you have toiled.
9. But those who gather it will eat it, and will praise Jehovah. And those who collect it will drink it in the courts of my holiness.
¶10. Pass through, pass through the gates! Prepare the way of the people! Build up, build up the highway! Clear away the stone! Let them lift up as a banner for the nations!
11. Behold, Jehovah has declared to the ends of the earth, “Say to the daughter of Zion, ‘Behold! Your salvation is coming! Behold! His reward is with him, and his recompense before him.
12. And they shall call them “the holy people, redeemed of Jehovah”, and you will be called “Wanted”, a city not forsaken.
Isaiah 63
¶1. “Who is this coming from Edom, from Bozrah in red-stained garments, this man glorious in his apparel, marching in his mighty strength?” “It is I, who speaks in righteousness, mighty to save!”
2. “How is it that there is red on your apparel, like a treader in a winepress?”
3. “I have trodden the winepress alone, and from the nations, no man was with me. I trod them down in my anger and trampled them in my rage; their lifeblood spattered on my garments, and all my raiment was sullied.
4. For the day of vengeance was in my heart, and the year of my redeemed ones had come.”
5. I looked, but there was no helper, and I was astonished that there was no one to support me; so, my own arm brought me victory, and my anger, it supported me.
6. I trampled down the nations in my anger; I made them drunk with my rage, and I brought down their lifeblood to the earth.
7. I will make known the mercies of Jehovah, the praises of Jehovah, because of all that Jehovah has bestowed upon us, and the great goodness to the house of Israel which He has bestowed upon them, according to His compassions and according to His abundant mercies.
8. For He said, “Surely, they are my people, children who do not lie. And so, he will be their Savior.”
9. In all their affliction, He was afflicted, and the angel of His presence saved them. In His love and in His pity, He redeemed them, and lifted them up, and carried them all the days of old,
10.but they rebelled and grieved His holy Spirit, and He was turned to be their enemy. He, Himself, fought against them.
11.Then His people remembered days of old and Moses. Where is the One who brought them up from the sea with shepherds for His flock? Where is the One who put His holy Spirit in their midst,
12.leading them by the right hand of Moses, His glorious arm, dividing the waters before them to win for Himself lasting fame,
13.leading them into the depths? Like a horse in the desert, they did not stumble.
14. As the cattle go down into the valley, the Spirit of the Lord gave them rest. Thus did you guide your people, making for yourself a glorious name.
15. Look down from heaven, and see from your holy and your glorious, lofty abode! Where are your jealousy and your strength? The yearning of your heart and your compassion toward me are restrained.
16. But you are our Father, though Abraham did not know us and Israel was not acquainted with us. You, Jehovah, are our Father; from ancient times, our Redeemer is your name.
17. Why have you caused us to err from your ways, O Jehovah? You have hardened our hearts to your fear. Return for the sake of your servants, the tribes of your inheritance!
18. Your holy people possessed it for just a little while; our adversaries trampled down your sanctuary.
19. We are become like those over whom you have never ruled, those who are not called by your name.
Isaiah 64
¶1. Oh, that you would tear heaven open, that you would come down, that the mountains would quake at your presence –
2.as fire ignites brushwood, and as fire makes water boil – to make your Name known to your adversaries, that the nations might tremble at your presence!
3. Then you did astonishing things we did not expect! You did come down, and the mountains did quake at your presence!
4. From the beginning of time, no one has heard, no ear has perceived, nor eye seen, O God, but you, what He will do for him who earnestly looks for Him.
5. You greet him who rejoices and works righteousness; they will remember you in your ways. Behold, you were angry, for we perpetually sinned against them, and yet we will be saved!
6. Yea, we are all like an unclean thing, and all our forms of righteousness are like filthy rags. We all fall like a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, carry us away.
7. There has been no one calling on your name or stirring himself up to take hold of you because you hid your face from us and melted us in the hand of our iniquities.
8. But now, O Lord, you are our Father. We are the clay, and you are our Potter; we are all the work of your hand.
9. Do not, O Jehovah, be very angry, and do not remember iniquity forever. Behold, I pray you, look upon your people, all of us!
10. Your holy cities are a wilderness; Zion is a wilderness; Jerusalem has become a desolate place.
11. Our holy and beautiful temple, where our fathers offered you praise, has been given to consuming fire, and all our desirable things are in ruins.
12. After all these things, O Jehovah, why do you restrain yourself? You remain silent while you greatly afflict us.
Isaiah 65
¶1. I let myself be sought by those who did not ask for me; I let myself be found by those who did not seek me. I said, “Here I am! Here I am!” to a nation that was not called by my name.
2. I have spread out my hands all the day to a rebellious people who walk in the way that is not good, following their own devices,
3.the people who are continually provoking me to anger to my face, sacrificing in the gardens and burning incense upon the bricks,
4.who sit among the graves and spend the night in the secret places, who eat the flesh of a pig and a broth of unclean things in their vessels,
5. who say, “Keep to yourself! Do not come near me because I am holier than you.” These are smoke in my nostrils, a fire that burns all the day.
6. Behold! It is written before me. I will not be silent. I swear, I will repay! Yea, I will repay it into their own bosom,
7.your iniquities and the iniquities of your fathers together, says Jehovah. Because they burned incense upon the mountains and brought a reproach on me upon the hills; into their own bosom will I mete out their recompense first.
8. Thus says Jehovah: “Just as new wine is obtained from a cluster, and one says, ‘Don’t destroy it, for there is good in it,’ so will I do for the sake of my servants, lest he destroy them all.
9.And I will send forth a Seed from Jacob, even an Inheritor of my mountains from Judah, and my chosen ones will inherit it, and my servants will dwell there.
10.And Sharon will be a habitation for flocks, and the Valley of Achor, a resting-place for cattle, for my people who have sought me.
11.But you who forsake the Lord, who forget my holy mountain, who arrange a table for Fortune and who fill cups of mixed wine for Destiny,
12.I will destine you to the sword, and you will all bow down to the slaughter because I called and you would not answer, I spoke and you would not hear, but you did what was evil in my eyes and you chose that in which I was not pleased.
¶13. “Therefore, thus says the Lord, Jehovah: Behold, my servants shall eat, but you shall be hungry. Behold, my servants shall drink, but you shall be thirsty. Behold, my servants shall rejoice, but you shall be ashamed.
14. Behold, my servants shall sing for gladness of heart, but you shall cry out for anguish of heart and shall wail with a broken spirit.
15. You shall leave your name as a curse to my chosen ones, and my Lord, Jehovah, will put you to death and call His servants by another name.
16. Whoever blesses himself in the earth will bless himself by the God of truth, and he who swears in the earth will swear by the God of truth, for the former troubles will be forgotten, and will be hidden from my eyes.
17. For behold, I am creating new heavens and a new earth, and the former things will not be remembered nor come to mind.
18.Nevertheless, be glad and rejoice forever for what I am creating, for behold, I am creating Jerusalem a joy, and her people a delight.
19.And I will rejoice in Jerusalem and delight in my people, and no one will ever hear in her a sound of mourning or a sound of crying.
20.And there will no longer be an infant there that lives but a few days or an old man who does not fulfill his days. If the young man, even the sinner, dies at a hundred years old, he will have been cursed at a hundred years old.
21.They will build houses and live in them, and they will plant vineyards and eat their fruit.
22.They will not build and another dwell; they will not plant and another eat. For as the days of a tree will be the days of my people, and my chosen will enjoy the work of their hands.
23.They will not labor for nothing, and they will not give birth for trouble, for they are the seed blessed of Jehovah, and their offspring with them.
24.And it shall come to pass that before they cry out, I will answer. While they are yet speaking, I will hear.
25.The wolf and the lamb will feed together, and the lion will eat straw like the ox, and dust will be the serpent’s food. They will neither do harm nor destroy in all my holy mountain, says Jehovah.”
Isaiah 66
¶1. “Thus says the Lord: Heaven is my throne, and the earth, my footstool. Where is this house that you would build for me? And where is this resting-place for me?
2.All these things my hand made, and all these things already existed, says the Lord. But I will have regard to this man, to him who is humble and smitten in spirit, and who trembles at my word.
3.Slaughtering one of the herd will be like killing a man; sacrificing one of the flock, like breaking a dog’s neck; offering up a gift, like offering up blood from a pig; burning incense, like blessing an idol. Yea, they have chosen their own ways, and their soul takes pleasure in their abominations.
4.Therefore, I will choose their delusions and bring their fears upon them because when I called, no one answered; when I spoke, they would not hear. But they did evil before my eyes, and chose that in which I take no pleasure.
¶5. Hear the word of the Lord, you who tremble at His word: “Your brothers who hate you and cast you out for my name’s sake said, ‘Let the Lord be glorified!’ but He shall appear to your joy, and they will be ashamed.”
6. A sound of uproar from the city! A sound from the temple! The sound of the Lord rendering recompense to His enemies.
7. Before she travailed, she gave birth. Before she was in pain, she gave birth to a man.
8. Who has heard such a thing? Who has seen such things? Shall the earth be born in one day? Shall a nation be born at once? For even as she travailed, Zion gave birth to her children.
9. “Would I bring to the birth and not bring forth?” says Jehovah. “Or would I who brings forth hold back?” says your God.
¶10. Rejoice with Jerusalem, and be glad with her, all you who love her! Greatly rejoice with her, all you who mourn over her,
11.so that you may nurse and be satisfied at her comforting breast, so that you may milk out and take great delight from her bountiful bosom.
12. For thus says Jehovah: “Watch me! I will pour forth prosperity to her like a river, and the abundance of the Gentiles like an overflowing stream. And you will nurse, you will be borne on the hip, and you will be dandled on knees.
13. As one whom his mother comforts, so will I comfort you, and you will be comforted in Jerusalem.
14. And you will see, and your heart will rejoice, and your whole being will flourish like the grass. And it will be known that the hand of Jehovah is upon His servants and His indignation is upon His enemies.
15. For behold, Jehovah will come in fire, and His chariots like a violent, rushing wind, and He will requite them in the fury of His wrath, and His rebuke will be with flames of fire.
16. For by fire and by His sword will Jehovah contend with all flesh, and the slain of Jehovah will be many.
17. Those who sanctify and purify themselves to enter the gardens, following one in the center, eating the flesh of pigs, and detestable things, and mice will come to an end together, says Jehovah.
18. For I know their works and their thoughts. The time is coming when I will gather all nations and tongues, and they will come and see my glory,
19.and I will set a sign among them, and I will send some of the survivors to the nations, Tarshish, Pul, and Lud (who draw the bow), Tubal and Javan, the distant coasts that have not heard the news about me and who did not see my glory, and they will proclaim my glory among the Gentiles.
20. And they will bring all your brothers from all the nations as a grain offering to Jehovah, on horses, and by chariots, and in wagons, and on mules, and on camels to my holy mountain, Jerusalem, says Jehovah, the way children of Israel take their grain offering in clean vessels to the house of Jehovah.
21. And I will also take some of them for priests and for Levites, says Jehovah.
22. For as the new heavens and the new earth which I have created will endure before me, says Jehovah, so will your seed and your name endure.
23. And it shall come to pass that from one new moon to the next, and from one Sabbath to the next, all flesh will come to worship before me, says Jehovah.
24. And they will go out and look at the dead bodies of men who rebelled against me, for their worm will not die and their fire will not be quenched, and they will be an abhorrence to all flesh.
Footnotes
[1] Hebrew uncertain.
[2] Hebrew uncertain.
[3] That is, “You [plural] tell”. Who God is giving this commandment to is not stated.
[4] Hebrew obscure.
[5] Literally, “ – if I ever forget…” The curse intended with this oath is so unthinkable – God’s death and damnation – that it is not even uttered. See also 22:14; 40:28; 62:8.
[6] Immanuel means “God with us”.
[7] Hebrews words that mean, “Hasten to the spoil; swiftly to the plunder!”
[8] Probably the Euphrates River.
[9] Literally, “windows”.
[10] Or, raisin-cakes.
[11] Hebrew text, “City of Destruction”. The Dead Sea Scrolls (4q56) has “City of the Sun” (Greek: Heliopolis).
[12] That is, strictly accounted for.
[13] That is, for heads to be shaved as a sign of contrition.
[14] The verb is 2nd person plural: “you sing!”
[15] BHL translation. BHS: “O delightful vineyard!”
[16] LXX translation. MT: “hasten away”.
[17] Hebrew, “atoned for”.
[18] This is a reference to Jerusalem. Here, the meaning of “Ariel” is probably, “lioness of God”.
[19] Here, the meaning of “ariel” seems to be “altar”, as in Ezekiel 43:15–16, that is, a place for flames.
[20] Possibly, “And I will camp around you”.
[21] People possessed with a demon made abnormal sounds. Isaiah 8:19, for example, mentions “the mediums and the soothsayers, who squeal and growl.”
[22] Or, “from one with”.
[23] Most translators understand the word “teachers” in this verse to be a “plural of majesty”, referring to Jesus as the Teacher of Israel.
[24] That is, to remove those whom God considers worthless.
[25] Most translations add words to this clause to make it appear that God will add this bridle to the Gentiles, to make them err, but that is contrary to what the previous part of this verse says God will be doing. This is a promise from God that He will rid the Gentiles both of worthless men and of the spiritual bridle by which those worthless men misled them.
[26] DSS. MT has “it will hail.”
[27] DSS reading. MSS: “I say”.
[28] MSS: “like a field before the grain matures.”
[29] Hebrew uncertain.
[30] Hebrew uncertain.
[31] Or, “bring about calamity”.
[32] Or, “created it”.
[33] Or, “Messiah”.
[34] Or, “a Messiah”.
[35] This verse is identical to 35:10.
[36] Hebrew uncertain.
[37] Hebrew uncertain.
[38] Or, “with sickness”.
[39] Or, “When he makes . . .”
[40] Hebrew uncertain.
[41] Or “the king”.
[42] That is, as in the year of Jubilee. See Leviticus 25:10.
[43] Literally, “My delight is in her.”
[44] Literally, “married”.