Isaiah 29-33

Isaiah 29

¹Woe to Ariel! Ariel, the city where David encamped! Add year to year; let the feasts come around;

²then I will distress Ariel, and there will be mourning and lamentation. She shall be to me as an altar hearth.

³I will encamp against you all around you, and will lay siege against you with posted troops. I will raise siege works against you.

⁴You will be brought down, and will speak out of the ground. Your speech will mumble out of the dust. Your voice will be as of one who has a familiar spirit, out of the ground, and your speech will whisper out of the dust.

⁵But the multitude of your foes will be like fine dust, and the multitude of the ruthless ones like chaff that blows away. Yes, it will be in an instant, suddenly.

⁶She will be visited by the LORD of Armies with thunder, with earthquake, with great noise, with whirlwind and storm, and with the flame of a devouring fire.

⁷The multitude of all the nations that fight against Ariel, even all who fight against her and her stronghold, and who distress her, will be like a dream, a vision of the night.

⁸It will be like when a hungry man dreams, and behold, he eats; but he awakes, and his hunger isn’t satisfied; or like when a thirsty man dreams, and behold, he drinks; but he awakes, and behold, he is faint, and he is still thirsty. The multitude of all the nations that fight against Mount Zion will be like that.

⁹Pause and wonder! Blind yourselves and be blind! They are drunken, but not with wine; they stagger, but not with strong drink.

¹⁰For the LORD has poured out on you a spirit of deep sleep, and has closed your eyes, the prophets; and he has covered your heads, the seers.

¹¹All vision has become to you like the words of a book that is sealed, which men deliver to one who is educated, saying, “Read this, please;” and he says, “I can’t, for it is sealed;”

¹²and the book is delivered to one who is not educated, saying, “Read this, please;” and he says, “I can’t read.”

¹³The Lord said, “Because this people draws near with their mouth and honors me with their lips, but they have removed their heart far from me, and their fear of me is a commandment of men which has been taught;

¹⁴therefore, behold, I will proceed to do a marvelous work among this people, even a marvelous work and a wonder; and the wisdom of their wise men will perish, and the understanding of their prudent men will be hidden.”

¹⁵Woe to those who deeply hide their counsel from the LORD, and whose deeds are in the dark, and who say, “Who sees us?” and “Who knows us?”

¹⁶You turn things upside down! Should the potter be thought to be like clay, that the thing made should say about him who made it, “He didn’t make me;” or the thing formed say of him who formed it, “He has no understanding”?

¹⁷Isn’t it yet a very little while, and Lebanon will be turned into a fruitful field, and the fruitful field will be regarded as a forest?

¹⁸In that day, the deaf will hear the words of the book, and the eyes of the blind will see out of obscurity and out of darkness.

¹⁹The humble also will increase their joy in the LORD, and the poor among men will rejoice in the Holy One of Israel.

²⁰For the ruthless is brought to nothing, and the scoffer ceases, and all those who are alert to do evil are cut off—

²¹who cause a person to be indicted by a word, and lay a snare for one who reproves in the gate, and who deprive the innocent of justice with false testimony.

²²Therefore the LORD, who redeemed Abraham, says concerning the house of Jacob: “Jacob shall no longer be ashamed, neither shall his face grow pale.

²³But when he sees his children, the work of my hands, in the middle of him, they will sanctify my name. Yes, they will sanctify the Holy One of Jacob, and will stand in awe of the God of Israel.

²⁴They also who err in spirit will come to understanding, and those who grumble will receive instruction.”

Isaiah 30

¹“Woe to the rebellious children”, says the LORD, “who take counsel, but not from me; and who make an alliance, but not with my Spirit, that they may add sin to sin;

²who set out to go down into Egypt without asking for my advice, to strengthen themselves in the strength of Pharaoh, and to take refuge in the shadow of Egypt!

³Therefore the strength of Pharaoh will be your shame, and the refuge in the shadow of Egypt your confusion.

⁴For their princes are at Zoan, and their ambassadors have come to Hanes.

⁵They shall all be ashamed because of a people that can’t profit them, that are not a help nor profit, but a shame, and also a reproach.”

⁶The burden of the animals of the South. Through the land of trouble and anguish, of the lioness and the lion, the viper and fiery flying serpent, they carry their riches on the shoulders of young donkeys, and their treasures on the humps of camels, to an unprofitable people.

⁷For Egypt helps in vain, and to no purpose; therefore I have called her Rahab who sits still.

⁸Now go, write it before them on a tablet, and inscribe it in a book, that it may be for the time to come forever and ever.

⁹For it is a rebellious people, lying children, children who will not hear the LORD’s law;

¹⁰who tell the seers, “Don’t see!” and the prophets, “Don’t prophesy to us right things. Tell us pleasant things. Prophesy deceits.

¹¹Get out of the way. Turn away from the path. Cause the Holy One of Israel to cease from before us.”

¹²Therefore the Holy One of Israel says, “Because you despise this word, and trust in oppression and perverseness, and rely on it,

¹³therefore this iniquity shall be to you like a breach ready to fall, swelling out in a high wall, whose breaking comes suddenly in an instant.

¹⁴He will break it as a potter’s vessel is broken, breaking it in pieces without sparing, so that there won’t be found among the broken pieces a piece good enough to take fire from the hearth, or to dip up water out of the cistern.”

¹⁵For thus said the Lord GOD, the Holy One of Israel, “You will be saved in returning and rest. Your strength will be in quietness and in confidence.” You refused,

¹⁶but you said, “No, for we will flee on horses;” therefore you will flee; and, “We will ride on the swift;” therefore those who pursue you will be swift.

¹⁷One thousand will flee at the threat of one. At the threat of five, you will flee until you are left like a beacon on the top of a mountain, and like a banner on a hill.

¹⁸Therefore the LORD will wait, that he may be gracious to you; and therefore he will be exalted, that he may have mercy on you, for the LORD is a God of justice. Blessed are all those who wait for him.

¹⁹For the people will dwell in Zion at Jerusalem. You will weep no more. He will surely be gracious to you at the voice of your cry. When he hears you, he will answer you.

²⁰Though the Lord may give you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, yet your teachers won’t be hidden any more, but your eyes will see your teachers;

²¹and when you turn to the right hand, and when you turn to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, “This is the way. Walk in it.”

²²You shall defile the overlaying of your engraved images of silver, and the plating of your molten images of gold. You shall cast them away as an unclean thing. You shall tell it, “Go away!”

²³He will give the rain for your seed, with which you will sow the ground; and bread of the increase of the ground will be rich and plentiful. In that day, your livestock will feed in large pastures.

²⁴The oxen likewise and the young donkeys that till the ground will eat savory feed, which has been winnowed with the shovel and with the fork.

²⁵There will be brooks and streams of water on every lofty mountain and on every high hill in the day of the great slaughter, when the towers fall.

²⁶Moreover the light of the moon will be like the light of the sun, and the light of the sun will be seven times brighter, like the light of seven days, in the day that the LORD binds up the fracture of his people, and heals the wound they were struck with.

²⁷Behold, the LORD’s name comes from far away, burning with his anger, and in thick rising smoke. His lips are full of indignation. His tongue is as a devouring fire.

²⁸His breath is as an overflowing stream that reaches even to the neck, to sift the nations with the sieve of destruction. A bridle that leads to ruin will be in the jaws of the peoples.

²⁹You will have a song, as in the night when a holy feast is kept, and gladness of heart, as when one goes with a flute to come to the LORD’s mountain, to Israel’s Rock.

³⁰The LORD will cause his glorious voice to be heard, and will show the descent of his arm, with the indignation of his anger and the flame of a devouring fire, with a blast, storm, and hailstones.

³¹For through the LORD’s voice the Assyrian will be dismayed. He will strike him with his rod.

³²Every stroke of the rod of punishment, which the LORD will lay on him, will be with the sound of tambourines and harps. He will fight with them in battles, brandishing weapons.

³³For his burning place has long been ready. Yes, it is prepared for the king. He has made its pyre deep and large with fire and much wood. The LORD’s breath, like a stream of sulfur, kindles it.

Isaiah 31

¹Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help, and rely on horses, and trust in chariots because they are many, and in horsemen because they are very strong, but they don’t look to the Holy One of Israel, and they don’t seek the LORD!

²Yet he also is wise, and will bring disaster, and will not call back his words, but will arise against the house of the evildoers, and against the help of those who work iniquity.

³Now the Egyptians are men, and not God; and their horses flesh, and not spirit. When the LORD stretches out his hand, both he who helps shall stumble, and he who is helped shall fall, and they all shall be consumed together.

⁴For the LORD says to me, “As the lion and the young lion growling over his prey, if a multitude of shepherds is called together against him, will not be dismayed at their voice, nor abase himself for their noise, so the LORD of Armies will come down to fight on Mount Zion and on its heights.

⁵As birds hovering, so the LORD of Armies will protect Jerusalem. He will protect and deliver it. He will pass over and preserve it.”

⁶Return to him from whom you have deeply revolted, children of Israel.

⁷For in that day everyone shall cast away his idols of silver and his idols of gold—sin which your own hands have made for you.

⁸“The Assyrian will fall by the sword, not of man; and the sword, not of mankind, shall devour him. He will flee from the sword, and his young men will become subject to forced labor.

⁹His rock will pass away by reason of terror, and his princes will be afraid of the banner,” says the LORD, whose fire is in Zion, and his furnace in Jerusalem.

Isaiah 32

¹Behold, a king shall reign in righteousness, and princes shall rule in justice.

²A man shall be as a hiding place from the wind, and a covert from the storm, as streams of water in a dry place, as the shade of a large rock in a weary land.

³The eyes of those who see will not be dim, and the ears of those who hear will listen.

⁴The heart of the rash will understand knowledge, and the tongue of the stammerers will be ready to speak plainly.

⁵The fool will no longer be called noble, nor the scoundrel be highly respected.

⁶For the fool will speak folly, and his heart will work iniquity, to practice profanity, and to utter error against the LORD, to make empty the soul of the hungry, and to cause the drink of the thirsty to fail.

⁷The ways of the scoundrel are evil. He devises wicked plans to destroy the humble with lying words, even when the needy speaks right.

⁸But the noble devises noble things, and he will continue in noble things.

⁹Rise up, you women who are at ease! Hear my voice! You careless daughters, give ear to my speech!

¹⁰For days beyond a year you will be troubled, you careless women; for the vintage will fail. The harvest won’t come.

¹¹Tremble, you women who are at ease! Be troubled, you careless ones! Strip yourselves, make yourselves naked, and put sackcloth on your waist.

¹²Beat your breasts for the pleasant fields, for the fruitful vine.

¹³Thorns and briers will come up on my people’s land; yes, on all the houses of joy in the joyous city.

¹⁴For the palace will be forsaken. The populous city will be deserted. The hill and the watchtower will be for dens forever, a delight for wild donkeys, a pasture of flocks,

¹⁵until the Spirit is poured on us from on high, and the wilderness becomes a fruitful field, and the fruitful field is considered a forest.

¹⁶Then justice will dwell in the wilderness; and righteousness will remain in the fruitful field.

¹⁷The work of righteousness will be peace, and the effect of righteousness, quietness and confidence forever.

¹⁸My people will live in a peaceful habitation, in safe dwellings, and in quiet resting places,

¹⁹though hail flattens the forest, and the city is leveled completely.

²⁰Blessed are you who sow beside all waters, who send out the feet of the ox and the donkey.

Isaiah 33

¹Woe to you who destroy, but you weren’t destroyed, and who betray, but nobody betrayed you! When you have finished destroying, you will be destroyed; and when you have finished betrayal, you will be betrayed.

²LORD, be gracious to us. We have waited for you. Be our strength every morning, our salvation also in the time of trouble.

³At the noise of the thunder, the peoples have fled. When you lift yourself up, the nations are scattered.

⁴Your plunder will be gathered as the caterpillar gathers. Men will leap on it as locusts leap.

⁵The LORD is exalted, for he dwells on high. He has filled Zion with justice and righteousness.

⁶There will be stability in your times, abundance of salvation, wisdom, and knowledge. The fear of the LORD is your treasure.

⁷Behold, their valiant ones cry outside; the ambassadors of peace weep bitterly.

⁸The highways are desolate. The traveling man ceases. The covenant is broken. He has despised the cities. He doesn’t respect man.

⁹The land mourns and languishes. Lebanon is confounded and withers away. Sharon is like a desert, and Bashan and Carmel are stripped bare.

¹⁰“Now I will arise,” says the LORD. “Now I will lift myself up. Now I will be exalted.

¹¹You will conceive chaff. You will give birth to stubble. Your breath is a fire that will devour you.

¹²The peoples will be like the burning of lime, like thorns that are cut down and burned in the fire.

¹³Hear, you who are far off, what I have done; and, you who are near, acknowledge my might.”

¹⁴The sinners in Zion are afraid. Trembling has seized the godless ones. Who among us can live with the devouring fire? Who among us can live with everlasting burning?

¹⁵He who walks righteously and speaks blamelessly, he who despises the gain of oppressions, who gestures with his hands, refusing to take a bribe, who stops his ears from hearing of bloodshed, and shuts his eyes from looking at evil—

¹⁶he will dwell on high. His place of defense will be the fortress of rocks. His bread will be supplied. His waters will be sure.

¹⁷Your eyes will see the king in his beauty. They will see a distant land.

¹⁸Your heart will meditate on the terror. Where is he who counted? Where is he who weighed? Where is he who counted the towers?

¹⁹You will no longer see the fierce people, a people of a deep speech that you can’t comprehend, with a strange language that you can’t understand.

²⁰Look at Zion, the city of our appointed festivals. Your eyes will see Jerusalem, a quiet habitation, a tent that won’t be removed. Its stakes will never be plucked up, nor will any of its cords be broken.

²¹But there the LORD will be with us in majesty, a place of wide rivers and streams, in which no galley with oars will go, neither will any gallant ship pass by there.

²²For the LORD is our judge. The LORD is our lawgiver. The LORD is our king. He will save us.

²³Your rigging is untied. They couldn’t strengthen the foot of their mast. They couldn’t spread the sail. Then the prey of a great plunder was divided. The lame took the prey.

²⁴The inhabitant won’t say, “I am sick.” The people who dwell therein will be forgiven their iniquity.