What use to me is the number of the offerings which you give me? says the Lord; your burned offerings of sheep, and the best parts of fat cattle, are a weariness to me; I take no pleasure in the blood of oxen, or of lambs, or of he-goats.

And I will give you judges again as at the first, and wise guides as in the past; then you will be named, The Town of Righteousness, the true town.

And after working the earth of it with a spade, he took away its stones, and put in it a very special vine; and he put up a watchtower in the middle of it, hollowing out in the rock a place for the grape-crushing; and he was hoping that it would give the best grapes, but it gave common grapes.

Is there anything which might have been done for my vine-garden which I have not done? why then, when I was hoping for the best grapes did it give me common grapes?

He has gone up from Pene-Rimmon, he has come to Aiath; he has gone past Migron, at Michmash he puts his forces in order.

I will make men so small in number, that a man will be harder to get than gold, even the best gold of Ophir.

This is the word which the Lord said about Moab in the past.

Is this the town which was full of joy, whose start goes back to times long past, whose wanderings took her into far-off countries?

O Lord, you are my God; I will give praise to you, I will give honour to your name; for you have done great acts of power; your purposes in the past have been made true and certain in effect.

The sword of the Lord is full of blood, it is fat with the best of the meat, with the blood of lambs and goats, with the best parts of the sheep: for the Lord has a feast in Bozrah, and much cattle will be put to death in the land of Edom.

No lion will be there, or any cruel beast; they will not be seen there; but those for whom the Lord has given a price,

You have sent your servants with evil words against the Lord, and have said, With all my war-carriages I have come up to the top of the mountains, to the inmost parts of Lebanon; and its tall cedars will be cut down, and the best trees of its woods: I will come up into his highest places, into his thick woods.

Has it not come to your ears how I did it long before, purposing it in times long past? Now I have given effect to my design, so that by you strong towns might be turned into masses of broken walls.

Even the young men will become feeble and tired, and the best of them will come to the end of his strength;

Let the future be made clear to us: give us news of the past things, so that we may give thought to them; or of the things to come, so that we may see if they are true.

From time long past I am God, and from this day I am he: there is no one who is able to take you out of my hand: when I undertake a thing, by whom will my purpose be changed?

Give no thought to the things which are past; let the early times go out of your minds.

If there is one like me, let him come forward and say it, let him make it clear and put it in order before me: who has made clear in the past the things to come? let him make clear the future to me.

Have no fear, be strong in heart; have I not made it clear to you in the past, and let you see it? and you are my witnesses. Is there any God but me, or a Rock of whom I have no knowledge?

Give the word, put forward your cause, let us have a discussion together: who has given news of this in the past? who made it clear in early times? did not I, the Lord? and there is no God but me; a true God and a saviour; there is no other.

Bel is bent down, Nebo is falling; their images are on the beasts and on the cattle: the things which you took about have become a weight to the tired beast.

Let the things which are past come to your memory: for I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is no one like me;

Making clear from the first what is to come, and from past times the things which have not so far come about; saying, My purpose is fixed, and I will do all my pleasure;

I gave word in the past of the things which came about; they came from my mouth, and I made them clear: suddenly I did them, and they came about.

For this reason I made it clear to you in the past, before it came I gave you word of it: for fear that you might say, My god did these things, and my pictured and metal images made them come about.

They have only now been effected, and not in the past: and before this day they had not come to your ears; for fear that you might say, I had knowledge of them.

Truly you had no word of them, no knowledge of them; no news of them in the past had come to your ears; because I saw how false was your behaviour, and that your heart was turned against me from your earliest days.

Awake! awake! put on strength, O arm of the Lord, awake! as in the old days, in the generations long past. Was it not by you that Rahab was cut in two, and the dragon Wounded?

Why do you give your money for what is not bread, and the fruit of your work for what will not give you pleasure? Give ear to me, so that your food may be good, and you may have the best in full measure.

While you do acts of power for which we are not looking, and which have not come to the ears of men in the past.

Will you not have mercy on him who takes pleasure in doing righteousness, even on those who keep in mind your ways? Truly you were angry, and we went on doing evil, and sinning against you in the past.

So that he who is requesting a blessing will make use of the name of the true God, and he who takes an oath will do so by the true God; because the past troubles are gone out of mind, and because they are covered from my eyes.

For see, I am making a new heaven and a new earth: and the past things will be gone completely out of mind.