Listen, heavens, and pay attention, earth,
for the Lord has spoken:
“I have raised children and brought them up,
but they have rebelled against Me.

I hate your New Moons and prescribed festivals.
They have become a burden to Me;
I am tired of putting up with them.

When you lift up your hands in prayer,
I will refuse to look at you;
even if you offer countless prayers,
I will not listen.
Your hands are covered with blood.

and many peoples will come and say,
“Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,
to the house of the God of Jacob.
He will teach us about His ways
so that we may walk in His paths.”
For instruction will go out of Zion
and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.

He will settle disputes among the nations
and provide arbitration for many peoples.
They will turn their swords into plows
and their spears into pruning knives.
Nations will not take up the sword against other nations,
and they will never again train for war.

For a day belonging to the Lord of Hosts is coming
against all that is proud and lofty,
against all that is lifted up—it will be humbled—

against all the cedars of Lebanon,
lofty and lifted up,
against all the oaks of Bashan,

He broke up the soil, cleared it of stones,
and planted it with the finest vines.
He built a tower in the middle of it
and even dug out a winepress there.
He expected it to yield good grapes,
but it yielded worthless grapes.

I will make it a wasteland.
It will not be pruned or weeded;
thorns and briers will grow up.
I will also give orders to the clouds
that rain should not fall on it.

to those who say:
“Let Him hurry up and do His work quickly
so that we can see it!
Let the plan of the Holy One of Israel take place
so that we can know it!”

‘Let us go up against Judah, terrorize it, and conquer it for ourselves. Then we can install Tabeel’s son as king in it.’”

It will pour into Judah,
flood over it, and sweep through,
reaching up to the neck;
and its spreading streams
will fill your entire land, Immanuel!

Bind up the testimony.
Seal up the instruction among my disciples.

The Lord has raised up Rezin’s adversaries against him
and stirred up his enemies.

The leaders of the people mislead them,
and those they mislead are swallowed up.

For wickedness burns like a fire
that consumes thorns and briers
and kindles the forest thickets
so that they go up in a column of smoke.

Israel’s Light will become a fire,
and its Holy One, a flame.
In one day it will burn up Assyria’s thorns and thistles.

And the Lord of Hosts will brandish a whip against him as He did when He struck Midian at the rock of Oreb; and He will raise His staff over the sea as He did in Egypt.

He will lift up a banner for the nations
and gather the dispersed of Israel;
He will collect the scattered of Judah
from the four corners of the earth.

There will be a highway for the remnant of His people
who will survive from Assyria,
as there was for Israel
when they came up from the land of Egypt.

Lift up a banner on a barren mountain.
Call out to them.
Wave your hand, and they will go
through the gates of the nobles.

Look! I am stirring up the Medes against them,
who cannot be bought off with silver
and who have no desire for gold.

Hyenas will howl in the fortresses,
and jackals, in the luxurious palaces.
Babylon’s time is almost up;
her days are almost over.

Sheol below is eager to greet your coming.
He stirs up the spirits of the departed for you—
all the rulers of the earth.
He makes all the kings of the nations
rise from their thrones.

You said to yourself:
“I will ascend to the heavens;
I will set up my throne
above the stars of God.
I will sit on the mount of the gods’ assembly,
in the remotest parts of the North.

Prepare a place of slaughter for his sons,
because of the iniquity of their fathers.
They will never rise up to possess a land
or fill the surface of the earth with cities.

“I will rise up against them”—this is the declaration of the Lord of Hosts—“and I will cut off from Babylon her reputation, remnant, offspring, and posterity”—this is the Lord’s declaration.

Dibon went up to its temple
to weep at its high places.
Moab wails on Nebo and at Medeba.
Every head is shaved;
every beard is cut off.

My heart cries out over Moab,
whose fugitives flee as far as Zoar,
to Eglath-shelishiyah;
they go up the slope of Luhith weeping;
they raise a cry of destruction
on the road to Horonaim.

So I join with Jazer
to weep for the vines of Sibmah;
I drench Heshbon and Elealeh with my tears.
Triumphant shouts have fallen silent
over your summer fruit and your harvest.

The waters of the sea will dry up,
and the river will be parched and dry.

Then the fishermen will mourn.
All those who cast hooks into the Nile will lament,
and those who spread nets on the water will shrivel up.

Prepare a table, and spread out a carpet!
Eat and drink!
Rise up, you princes, and oil the shields!

An oracle against the Valley of Vision:

What’s the matter with you?
Why have all of you gone up to the rooftops?

Therefore I said,
“Look away from me! Let me weep bitterly!
Do not try to comfort me
about the destruction of my dear people.”

Elam took up a quiver
with chariots and horsemen,
and Kir uncovered the shield.

wind you up into a ball, and sling you into a wide land. There you will die, and there your glorious chariots will be—a disgrace to the house of your lord.

Be ashamed Sidon, the stronghold of the sea,
for the sea has spoken:
“I have not been in labor or given birth.
I have not raised young men
or brought up young women.”

He said,
“You will not rejoice anymore,
ravished young woman, daughter of Sidon.
Get up and cross over to Cyprus—
even there you will have no rest!”

Look at the land of the Chaldeans—
a people who no longer exist.
Assyria destined it for desert creatures.
They set up their siege towers
and stripped its palaces.
They made it a ruin.

Pick up your lyre,
stroll through the city,
prostitute forgotten by men.
Play skillfully,
sing many a song,
and you will be thought of again.

He will destroy death forever.
The Lord God will wipe away the tears
from every face
and remove His people’s disgrace
from the whole earth,
for the Lord has spoken.

Lord, Your hand is lifted up to take action,
but they do not see it.
They will see Your zeal for Your people,
and they will be put to shame.
The fire for Your adversaries will consume them!

The dead do not live;
departed spirits do not rise up.
Indeed, You have visited and destroyed them;
You have wiped out all memory of them.

Indeed, the bed is too short to stretch out on,
and its cover too small to wrap up in.

For the Lord will rise up as He did at Mount Perazim.
He will rise in wrath, as at the Valley of Gibeon,
to do His work, His strange work,
and to perform His task, His disturbing task.

Does the plowman plow every day to plant seed?
Does he continuously break up and cultivate the soil?

I will camp in a circle around you;
I will besiege you with earth ramps,
and I will set up my siege towers against you.

They are a rebellious people,
deceptive children,
children who do not want to obey the Lord’s instruction.

Therefore the Lord is waiting to show you mercy,
and is rising up to show you compassion,
for the Lord is a just God.
All who wait patiently for Him are happy.

Your singing will be like that
on the night of a holy festival,
and your heart will rejoice
like one who walks to the music of a flute,
going up to the mountain of the Lord,
to the Rock of Israel.

But He also is wise and brings disaster.
He does not go back on what He says;
He will rise up against the house of wicked men
and against the allies of evildoers.

But a noble person plans noble things;
he stands up for noble causes.

Stand up, you complacent women;
listen to me.
Pay attention to what I say,
you overconfident daughters.

Listen! Their warriors cry loudly in the streets;
the messengers of peace weep bitterly.

“Now I will rise up,” says the Lord.
“Now I will lift Myself up.
Now I will be exalted.

Look at Zion, the city of our festival times.
Your eyes will see Jerusalem,
a peaceful pasture, a tent that does not wander;
its tent pegs will not be pulled up
nor will any of its cords be loosened.

All the heavenly bodies will dissolve.
The skies will roll up like a scroll,
and their stars will all wither
as leaves wither on the vine,
and foliage on the fig tree.

It will never go out—day or night.
Its smoke will go up forever.
It will be desolate, from generation to generation;
no one will pass through it forever and ever.

There will be no lion there,
and no vicious beast will go up on it;
they will not be found there.
But the redeemed will walk on it,

Hezekiah took the letter from the messengers, read it, then went up to the Lord’s temple and spread it out before the Lord.

You have mocked the Lord through your servants.
You have said, “With my many chariots
I have gone up to the heights of the mountains,
to the far recesses of Lebanon.
I cut down its tallest cedars,
its choice cypress trees.
I came to its distant heights,
its densest forest.

I dug wells and drank water.
I dried up all the streams of Egypt
with the soles of my feet.”

“Therefore, this is what the Lord says about the king of Assyria:

He will not enter this city
or shoot an arrow there
or come before it with a shield
or build up an assault ramp against it.

Then the angel of the Lord went out and struck down 185,000 in the camp of the Assyrians. When the people got up the next morning—there were all the dead bodies!

My dwelling is plucked up and removed from me
like a shepherd’s tent.
I have rolled up my life like a weaver;
He cuts me off from the loom.
You make an end of me from day until night.

And Hezekiah had asked, “What is the sign that I will go up to the Lord’s temple?”

‘The time will certainly come when everything in your palace and all that your fathers have stored up until this day will be carried off to Babylon; nothing will be left,’ says the Lord.

Every valley will be lifted up,
and every mountain and hill will be leveled;
the uneven ground will become smooth
and the rough places, a plain.

Zion, herald of good news,
go up on a high mountain.
Jerusalem, herald of good news,
raise your voice loudly.
Raise it, do not be afraid!
Say to the cities of Judah,
“Here is your God!”

Look, the nations are like a drop in a bucket;
they are considered as a speck of dust in the scales;
He lifts up the islands like fine dust.

To one who shapes a pedestal,
choosing wood that does not rot?
He looks for a skilled craftsman
to set up an idol that will not fall over.

Look up and see:
who created these?
He brings out the starry host by number;
He calls all of them by name.
Because of His great power and strength,
not one of them is missing.

Who has stirred him up from the east?
He calls righteousness to his feet.
The Lord hands nations over to him,
and he subdues kings.
He makes them like dust with his sword,
like wind-driven stubble with his bow.

“I have raised up one from the north, and he has come,
one from the east who invokes My name.
He will march over rulers as if they were mud,
like a potter who treads the clay.

The Lord advances like a warrior;
He stirs up His zeal like a soldier.
He shouts, He roars aloud,
He prevails over His enemies.

I will lay waste mountains and hills
and dry up all their vegetation.
I will turn rivers into islands
and dry up marshes.

Though seeing many things, you do not obey.
Though his ears are open, he does not listen.”

Who among you will pay attention to this?
Let him listen and obey in the future.

I will say to the north: Give them up!
and to the south: Do not hold them back!
Bring My sons from far away,
and My daughters from the ends of the earth—

who says to the depths of the sea, “Be dry,”
and I will dry up your rivers;

“Heavens, sprinkle from above,
and let the skies shower righteousness.
Let the earth open up
so that salvation will sprout
and righteousness will spring up with it.
I, Yahweh, have created it.

I have raised him up in righteousness,
and will level all roads for him.
He will rebuild My city,
and set My exiles free,
not for a price or a bribe,”
says the Lord of Hosts.

Speak up and present your case—
yes, let them take counsel together.
Who predicted this long ago?
Who announced it from ancient times?
Was it not I, Yahweh?
There is no other God but Me,
a righteous God and Savior;
there is no one except Me.

I will be the same until your old age,
and I will bear you up when you turn gray.
I have made you, and I will carry you;
I will bear and save you.

Look, they are like stubble;
fire burns them up.
They cannot deliver themselves
from the power of the flame.
This is not a coal for warming themselves,
or a fire to sit beside!

My own hand founded the earth,
and My right hand spread out the heavens;
when I summoned them,
they stood up together.

He says,
“It is not enough for you to be My Servant
raising up the tribes of Jacob
and restoring the protected ones of Israel.
I will also make you a light for the nations,
to be My salvation to the ends of the earth.”

This is what the Lord,
the Redeemer of Israel, his Holy One, says
to one who is despised,
to one abhorred by people,
to a servant of rulers:
“Kings will see and stand up,
and princes will bow down,
because of the Lord, who is faithful,
the Holy One of Israel—and He has chosen you.”

I will make all My mountains into a road,
and My highways will be raised up.

Look up, and look around.
They all gather together; they come to you.
As I live”—
this is the Lord’s declaration—
“you will wear all your children as jewelry,
and put them on as a bride does.

For your waste and desolate places
and your land marked by ruins—
will now be indeed too small for the inhabitants,
and those who swallowed you up will be far away.

Then you will say within yourself,
‘Who fathered these for me?
I was deprived of my children and unable to conceive,
exiled and wandering—
but who brought them up?
See, I was left by myself—
but these, where did they come from?’”

This is what the Lord God says:

Look, I will lift up My hand to the nations,
and raise My banner to the peoples.
They will bring your sons in their arms,
and your daughters will be carried on their shoulders.

Why was no one there when I came?
Why was there no one to answer when I called?
Is My hand too short to redeem?
Or do I have no power to deliver?
Look, I dry up the sea by My rebuke;
I turn the rivers into a wilderness;
their fish rot because of lack of water
and die of thirst.

Look up to the heavens,
and look at the earth beneath;
for the heavens will vanish like smoke,
the earth will wear out like a garment,
and its inhabitants will die like gnats.
But My salvation will last forever,
and My righteousness will never be shattered.

Wake up, wake up!
Put on the strength of the Lord’s power.
Wake up as in days past,
as in generations of long ago.
Wasn’t it You who hacked Rahab to pieces,
who pierced the sea monster?

Wasn’t it You who dried up the sea,
the waters of the great deep,
who made the sea-bed into a road
for the redeemed to pass over?

I—I am the One who comforts you.
Who are you that you should fear man who dies,
or a son of man who is given up like grass?

For I am Yahweh your God
who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar—
His name is Yahweh of Hosts.