Chapter 26

Song of Trust in God’s Protection

1 aIn that day this song will be sung in the land of Judah:

“We have a bstrong city;

He sets up walls and ramparts for 1csecurity.

2 “Open the agates, that the brighteous nation may enter,

The one that 1remains faithful.

3 “The steadfast of mind You will keep in perfect apeace,

Because he trusts in You.

4 “aTrust in the Lord forever,

For in 1God the Lord, we have an everlasting bRock.

5 “For He has brought low those who dwell on high, the aunassailable city;

bHe lays it low, He lays it low to the ground, He casts it to the dust.

6 “aThe foot will trample it,

The feet of the bafflicted, the steps of the helpless.”

7 The away of the righteous is smooth;

O Upright One, bmake the path of the righteous level.

8 Indeed, while following the way of aYour judgments, O Lord,

We have waited for You eagerly;

bYour name, even Your cmemory, is the desire of our souls.

9 aAt night 1my soul longs for You,

Indeed, 2my spirit within me bseeks You diligently;

For when the earth 3experiences Your judgments

The inhabitants of the world clearn righteousness.

10 Though the wicked is shown favor,

He does not alearn righteousness;

He bdeals unjustly in the land of uprightness,

And does not perceive the majesty of the Lord.

11 O Lord, Your hand is lifted up yet they ado not see it.

1They see bYour zeal for the people and are put to shame;

Indeed, 2cfire will devour Your enemies.

12 Lord, You will establish apeace for us,

Since You have also performed for us all our works.

13 O Lord our God, aother masters besides You have ruled us;

But through You alone we 1bconfess Your name.

14 aThe dead will not live, the 1departed spirits will not rise;

Therefore You have bpunished and destroyed them,

And You have wiped out all remembrance of them.

15 aYou have increased the nation, O Lord,

You have increased the nation, You are glorified;

You have bextended all the borders of the land.

16 O Lord, they sought You ain distress;

They 1could only whisper a prayer,

Your chastening was upon them.

17 aAs the pregnant woman approaches the time to give birth,

She writhes and cries out in her labor pains,

Thus were we before You, O Lord.

18 We were pregnant, we writhed in labor,

We agave birth, as it seems, only to wind.

We could not accomplish deliverance for the earth,

Nor were binhabitants of the world 1born.

19 Your adead will live;

1Their corpses will rise.

You who lie in the dust, bawake and shout for joy,

For your dew is as the dew of the 2dawn,

And the earth will 3give birth to the 4departed spirits.

20 Come, my people, aenter into your rooms

And close your doors behind you;

Hide for a little 1bwhile

Until cindignation 2runs its course.

21 For behold, the Lord is about to acome out from His place

To bpunish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity;

And the earth will creveal her bloodshed

And will no longer cover her slain.

Chapter 27

The Deliverance of Israel

1 In that day athe Lord will punish 1bLeviathan the fleeing serpent,

With His fierce and great and mighty sword,

Even 1Leviathan the twisted serpent;

And cHe will kill the dragon who lives in the sea.

2 In that day,

“A 1avineyard of wine, sing of it!

3 “I, the Lord, am its keeper;

aI water it every moment.

So that no one will 1damage it,

I bguard it night and day.

4 “I have no wrath.

Should 1someone give Me abriars and thorns in battle,

Then I would step on them, bI would burn them 2completely.

5 “Or let him 1arely on My protection,

Let him make peace with Me,

Let him bmake peace with Me.”

6 1In the days to come Jacob awill take root,

Israel will bblossom and sprout,

And they will fill the 2whole world with cfruit.

7 Like the striking of Him who has struck them, has aHe struck them?

Or like the slaughter of His slain, 1have they been slain?

8 You contended with them 1by banishing them, by adriving them away.

With His fierce wind He has expelled them on the day of the beast wind.

9 Therefore through this Jacob’s iniquity will be aforgiven;

And this will be 1the full price of the 2bpardoning of his sin:

When he makes all the caltar stones like pulverized chalk stones;

When 3Asherim and incense altars will not stand.

10 For the fortified city is aisolated,

A 1homestead forlorn and forsaken like the desert;

bThere the calf will graze,

And there it will lie down and 2feed on its branches.

11 When its alimbs are dry, they are broken off;

Women come and make a fire with them,

For they are not a people of bdiscernment,

Therefore ctheir Maker dwill not have compassion on them.

And their Creator will not be gracious to them.

12 In that day the Lord awill start His threshing from the flowing stream of the bEuphrates to the brook of Egypt, and you will be cgathered up one by one, O sons of Israel.

13 It will come about also in that day that a great atrumpet will be blown, and those who were perishing in the land of bAssyria and who were scattered in the land of Egypt will come and cworship the Lord in the holy mountain at Jerusalem.

Chapter 28

Ephraim’s Captivity Predicted

1 Woe to the proud crown of the adrunkards of bEphraim,

And to the fading flower of its glorious beauty,

Which is at the head of the 1fertile valley

Of those who are 2overcome with wine!

2 Behold, the Lord has a strong and amighty agent;

As a storm of bhail, a tempest of destruction,

Like a storm of cmighty overflowing waters,

He has cast it down to the earth with His hand.

3 The proud crown of the drunkards of Ephraim is atrodden under foot.

4 And the fading flower of its glorious beauty,

Which is at the head of the 1fertile valley,

Will be like the afirst-ripe fig prior to summer,

Which 2one sees,

And 3as soon as it is in his 4hand,

He swallows it.

5 In that day the aLord of hosts will become a beautiful bcrown

And a glorious diadem to the remnant of His people;

6 A aspirit of justice for him who sits in judgment,

A bstrength to those who repel the 1onslaught at the gate.

7 And these also areel with wine and stagger from strong drink:

bThe priest and cthe prophet reel with strong drink,

They are confused by wine, they stagger from dstrong drink;

They reel while 1having evisions,

They totter when rendering judgment.

8 For all the tables are full of filthy avomit, without a single clean place.

9 “To awhom would He teach knowledge,

And to whom would He interpret the message?

Those just bweaned from milk?

Those just taken from the breast?

10 “For He says,

‘1aOrder on order, order on order,

Line on line, line on line,

A little here, a little there.’ ”

11 Indeed, He will speak to this people

Through astammering lips and a foreign tongue,

12 He who said to them, “Here is arest, give rest to the weary,”

And, “Here is repose,” but they would not listen.

13 So the word of the Lord to them will be,

“1Order on order, order on order,

Line on line, line on line,

A little here, a little there,”

That they may go and astumble backward, be broken, snared and taken captive.

Judah Is Warned

14 Therefore, ahear the word of the Lord, O bscoffers,

Who rule this people who are in Jerusalem,

15 Because you have said, “We have made a acovenant with death,

And with 1Sheol we have made a 2pact.

bThe overwhelming 3scourge will not reach us when it passes by,

For we have made cfalsehood our refuge and we have dconcealed ourselves with deception.”

16 Therefore thus says the Lord 1God,

“aBehold, I am laying in Zion a stone, a tested bstone,

A costly cornerstone for the foundation, 2firmly placed.

He who believes in it will not be 3disturbed.

17 “I will make ajustice the measuring line

And righteousness the level;

Then bhail will sweep away the refuge of lies

And the waters will overflow the secret place.

18 “Your acovenant with death will be 1bcanceled,

And your pact with Sheol will not stand;

When the aoverwhelming scourge passes through,

Then you become its ctrampling place.

19 “As aoften as it passes through, it will 1seize you;

For bmorning after morning it will pass through, anytime during the day or night,

And it will be 2sheer cterror to understand 3what it means.”

20 The bed is too short on which to stretch out,

And the ablanket is too 1small to wrap oneself in.

21 For the Lord will rise up as at Mount aPerazim,

He will be stirred up as in the valley of bGibeon,

To do His ctask, His 1dunusual task,

And to work His work, His 2extraordinary work.

22 And now do not carry on as ascoffers,

Or your fetters will be made stronger;

For I have heard from the Lord 1God of hosts

Of decisive bdestruction on all the earth.

23 Give ear and hear my voice,

Listen and hear my words.

24 Does the 1farmer plow 2continually to plant seed?

Does he continually 3turn and harrow the ground?

25 Does he not level its surface

And sow dill and scatter acummin

And 1plant bwheat in rows,

Barley in its place and rye within its 2area?

26 For his God instructs and teaches him properly.

27 For dill is not threshed with a athreshing sledge,

Nor is the cartwheel 1driven over cummin;

But dill is beaten out with a rod, and cummin with a club.

28 Grain for bread is crushed,

Indeed, he does not continue to thresh it forever.

Because the wheel of his cart and his horses eventually 1damage it,

He does not thresh it longer.

29 This also comes from the Lord of hosts,

Who has made His counsel awonderful and His wisdom bgreat.

Chapter 29

Jerusalem Is Warned

1 Woe, O 1Ariel, 1Ariel the city where David once acamped!

Add year to year, 2bobserve your feasts on schedule.

2 I will bring distress to Ariel,

And she will be a city of lamenting and amourning;

And she will be like an Ariel to me.

3 I will acamp against you 1encircling you,

And I will set siegeworks against you,

And I will raise up battle towers against you.

4 Then you will abe brought low;

From the earth you will speak,

And from the dust where you are prostrate

Your words will come.

Your voice will also be like that of a 1spirit from the ground,

And your speech will whisper from the dust.

5 But the multitude of your 1enemies will become like fine adust,

And the multitude of the bruthless ones like the chaff which 2blows away;

And it will happen cinstantly, suddenly.

6 From the Lord of hosts you will be apunished with bthunder and earthquake and loud noise,

With whirlwind and tempest and the flame of a consuming fire.

7 And the amultitude of all the nations who wage war against 1Ariel,

Even all who wage war against her and her stronghold, and who distress her,

Will be like a dream, a bvision of the night.

8 It will be as when a hungry man dreams—

And behold, he is eating;

But when he awakens, his 1hunger is not satisfied,

Or as when a thirsty man dreams—

And behold, he is drinking,

But when he awakens, behold, he is faint

And his 1thirst is not quenched.

aThus the multitude of all the nations will be

Who wage war against Mount Zion.

9 aBe delayed and wait,

Blind yourselves and be blind;

They bbecome drunk, but not with wine,

They stagger, but not with strong drink.

10 For the Lord has poured over you a spirit of deep asleep,

He has bshut your eyes, the prophets;

And He has covered your heads, the seers.

11 The entire vision will be to you like the words of a sealed 1abook, which when they give it to the one who 2is literate, saying, “Please read this,” he will say, “I cannot, for it is sealed.”

12 Then the 1book will be given to the one who 2is illiterate, saying, “Please read this.” And he will say, “I 3cannot read.”

13 Then the Lord said,

“Because athis people draw near with their 1words

And honor Me with their 2lip service,

But they remove their hearts far from Me,

And their 3reverence for Me 4consists of 5tradition learned by rote,

14 Therefore behold, I will once again deal amarvelously with this people, wondrously marvelous;

And bthe wisdom of their wise men will perish,

And the discernment of their discerning men will be concealed.”

15 Woe to those who deeply ahide their 1plans from the Lord,

And whose bdeeds are done in a dark place,

And they say, “cWho sees us?” or “Who knows us?”

16 You turn things around!

Shall the potter be considered 1as equal with the clay,

That awhat is made would say to its maker, “He did not make me”;

Or what is formed say to him who formed it, “He has no understanding”?

Blessing after Discipline

17 Is it not yet just a little while

1Before Lebanon will be turned into a afertile field,

And the fertile field will be considered as a forest?

18 On that day the adeaf will hear bwords of a book,

And out of their gloom and darkness the ceyes of the blind will see.

19 The aafflicted also will increase their gladness in the Lord,

And the bneedy of mankind will rejoice in the Holy One of Israel.

20 For the aruthless will come to an end and the bscorner will be finished,

Indeed call who 1are intent on doing evil will be cut off;

21 Who 1cause a person to be indicted by a word,

And aensnare him who adjudicates at the gate,

And 2bdefraud the one in the right with 3meaningless arguments.

22 Therefore thus says the Lord, who redeemed aAbraham, concerning the house of Jacob:

“Jacob bshall not now be ashamed, nor shall his face now turn pale;

23 But when 1he sees his achildren, the bwork of My hands, in his midst,

They will sanctify My name;

Indeed, they will csanctify the Holy One of Jacob

And will stand in awe of the God of Israel.

24 “Those who aerr in 1mind will bknow 2the truth,

And those who 3criticize will 4caccept instruction.

Chapter 30

Judah Warned against Egyptian Alliance

1 “Woe to the arebellious children,” declares the Lord,

“Who bexecute a plan, but not Mine,

And 1cmake an alliance, but not of My Spirit,

In order to add sin to sin;

2 Who aproceed down to Egypt

Without bconsulting 1Me,

cTo take refuge in the safety of Pharaoh

And to seek shelter in the shadow of Egypt!

3 “Therefore the safety of Pharaoh will be ayour shame

And the shelter in the shadow of Egypt, your humiliation.

4 “For atheir princes are at Zoan

And their ambassadors arrive at Hanes.

5 “Everyone will be aashamed because of a people who cannot profit them,

Who are bnot for help or profit, but for shame and also for reproach.”

6 The 1oracle concerning the abeasts of the bNegev.

Through a land of cdistress and anguish,

From 2where come lioness and lion, viper and dflying serpent,

They ecarry their riches on the 3backs of young donkeys

And their treasures on fcamels’ humps,

To a people who cannot profit them;

7 Even Egypt, whose ahelp is vain and empty.

Therefore, I have called 1her

“2bRahab who has been exterminated.”

8 Now go, awrite it on a tablet before them

And inscribe it on a scroll,

That it may 1serve in the time to come

2As a witness forever.

9 For this is a arebellious people, bfalse sons,

Sons who 1refuse to clisten

To the 2instruction of the Lord;

10 Who say to the aseers, “You must not see visions”;

And to the prophets, “You must not bprophesy to us what is right,

cSpeak to us 1pleasant words,

Prophesy illusions.

11 “Get out of the way, aturn aside from the path,

1bLet us hear no more about the Holy One of Israel.”

12 Therefore thus says the Holy One of Israel,

“aSince you have rejected this word

And have put your trust in boppression and guile, and have relied on them,

13 Therefore this ainiquity will be to you

Like a bbreach about to fall,

A bulge in a high wall,

Whose collapse comes csuddenly in an instant,

14 Whose collapse is like the smashing of a apotter’s jar,

1So ruthlessly shattered

That a sherd will not be found among its pieces

To 2take fire from a hearth

Or to scoop water from a cistern.”

15 For thus the Lord 1God, the Holy One of Israel, has said,

“In 2repentance and arest you will be saved,

In bquietness and trust is your strength.”

But you were not willing,

16 And you said, “No, for we will flee on ahorses,”

Therefore you shall flee!

“And we will ride on swift horses,”

Therefore those who pursue you shall be swift.

17 aOne thousand will flee at the threat of one man;

You will flee at the threat of five,

Until you are left as a 1flag on a mountain top

And as a signal on a hill.

God Is Gracious and Just

18 Therefore the Lord 1alongs to be gracious to you,

And therefore He 2waits on bhigh to have compassion on you.

For the Lord is a cGod of justice;

How blessed are all those who 3dlong for Him.

19 1O people in Zion, ainhabitant in Jerusalem, you will bweep no longer. He will surely be gracious to you at the sound of your cry; when He hears it, He will canswer you.

20 Although the Lord has given you abread of privation and water of oppression, He, your Teacher will no longer bhide Himself, but your eyes will behold your Teacher.

21 Your ears will hear a word behind you, “1This is the away, walk in it,” whenever you bturn to the right or to the left.

22 And you will defile your graven aimages overlaid with silver, and your molten aimages plated with gold. You will scatter them as an impure thing, and say to 1them, “bBe gone!”

23 Then He will agive you rain for 1the seed which you will sow in the ground, and bread from the yield of the ground, and it will be 2rich and 3plenteous; on that day byour livestock will graze in a roomy pasture.

24 Also the oxen and the donkeys which work the ground will eat salted fodder, which 1has been awinnowed with shovel and fork.

25 On every lofty mountain and on aevery high hill there will be 1streams running with water on the day of the great bslaughter, when the towers fall.

26 aThe light of the moon will be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun will be seven times brighter, like the light of seven days, on the day bthe Lord binds up the cfracture of His people and dheals the bruise 1He has inflicted.

27 Behold, athe name of the Lord comes from a 1remote place;

bBurning is His anger and 2dense is His 3smoke;

His lips are filled with cindignation

And His tongue is like a dconsuming fire;

28 His abreath is like an overflowing torrent,

Which breaches to the neck,

To cshake the nations back and forth in a 1sieve,

And to put in the jaws of the peoples dthe bridle which 2leads to ruin.

29 You will have 1songs as in the night when you keep the festival,

And gladness of heart as when one marches to the sound of the flute,

To go to the mountain of the Lord, to the Rock of Israel.

30 And the Lord will cause 1His voice of authority to be heard,

And the 2descending of His arm to be seen in fierce anger,

And in the flame of a consuming fire

In cloudburst, downpour and hailstones.

31 For aat the voice of the Lord bAssyria will be terrified,

When He strikes with the crod.

32 And every 1blow of the 2arod of punishment,

Which the Lord will lay on him,

Will be with the music of btambourines and lyres;

And in battles, cbrandishing weapons, He will fight them.

33 For 1aTopheth has long been ready,

Indeed, it has been prepared for the king.

He has made it deep and large,

2A pyre of fire with plenty of wood;

The bbreath of the Lord, like a torrent of cbrimstone, sets it afire.