[The] land mourns; it languishes. Lebanon feels abashed; it withers. Sharon is like the desert, and Bashan and Carmel {are losing their leaves}.

You conceive dry grass, you bring forth stubble; your breath [is] a fire; it will consume you.

[You who are] far away, hear what I have done; and [you who are] near, know my might!"

Your {mind} will meditate [on the] terror: "Where [is the] one who counted? Where [is the] one who weighed out? Where [is the] one who counted the towers?"

Look [on] Zion, the city of our appointed festivals! Your eyes will see Jerusalem, an undisturbed settlement, a tent {that is not moved}. No one will ever pull out its tent pegs, and none of its ropes will be torn in two.

Rather, there Yahweh [will be] mighty for us, a place of rivers [and] {broad streams}, a galley ship with oars cannot go in it, and a mighty ship cannot pass through it.

Your riggings hang slack; they do not hold the base of their mast firm, they do not spread out [the] sail. Then [the] prey of spoil [in] abundance will be divided; [the] lame will take plunder.

And no inhabitant will say, "I am sick"; the people who live in it, [their] iniquity [will be] taken away.

Come near, nations, to hear; and peoples, listen attentively! Let the earth hear, and that which fills it; [the] world and all its offspring.

And their slain shall be cast out; as for their corpses, their stench shall go up. And [the] mountains shall melt with their blood,

When my sword is drenched in the heavens, look! It will descend upon Edom, and upon the people of my ban, for judgment.

{Yahweh has a sword}; it is full [of] blood. It is covered with fat, with [the] blood of lambs and goats, with [the] fat of [the] kidneys of rams, for {Yahweh has a sacrifice} in Bozrah and a great slaughter in the land of Edom.

Night and day it shall not be quenched; its smoke shall go up forever. From generation to generation it shall be in ruins; forever and ever there will be no one who passes through her.

But [the] large bird and [the] hedgehog shall take possession of it, and [the] owl and [the] raven shall live in it. And he shall stretch [the] measuring line of confusion out over it, and [the] plumb line of emptiness.

And thorns shall go up her citadel fortress, weeds and thistle plants in her fortresses; and it shall be [the] settlement of jackals, green grass for [the] daughters of an ostrich.

And he {is the one that} has cast [the] lot for them, and his hand has apportioned it to them with the measuring line; they shall take possession of it forever, they shall live in it {from generation to generation}.

It shall blossom abundantly, and it shall rejoice indeed with rejoicing and exulting. The glory of Lebanon shall be given to it, the majesty of Carmel and Sharon. {They are the ones who} shall see the glory of Yahweh, the majesty of our God.

And a highway shall be there, and a way, and it shall be called the way of holiness. [The] unclean shall not travel through it, but it [is] for them, he who walks [on the] way; and fools shall not wander about.

No lion shall be there, and no ferocious wild beast shall go up it. It shall not be found there, but [the] redeemed shall walk [there].

And Eliakim son of Hilkiah, who {was in charge of the palace}, came out to him, and Shebna the secretary, and Joah son of Asaph, the reminder.

And Rabshakeh said to them, "Now say to Hezekiah, 'Thus says the great king, the king of Assyria: "What [is] this confidence [in] which you trust?

Look, you trust in the staff of this broken reed, on Egypt, which [if] a man leans on it, goes into his hand and bores through it! Such [is] Pharaoh, king of Egypt, to all those who trust in him.

And if you say to me, 'We trust in Yahweh our God,' [was it] not he whose high places and altars Hezekiah removed? And he said to Judah and to Jerusalem, 'You shall bow down in the {presence} of this altar.'"

And now was it without Yahweh that I have come up against this land to destroy it? Yahweh said to me, "Go up against this land and destroy it!" '"

And Eliakim, Shebna, and Joah said to Rabshakeh, "Please speak to your servants in Aramaic, for we can understand [it], and you must not speak to us in Judean in the {hearing} of the people who [are] on the wall."

But Rabshakeh said, "Has my master sent me to speak these words to your masters and you? [Was it] not for the people who sit on the wall, to eat their dung and drink their urine with you?"

You must not listen to Hezekiah, for thus says the king of Assyria: "Make a blessing with me, and come out to me, and each one will eat [from] his vine and [from] his fig tree and drink water from his cistern,

Now he heard concerning Tirhakah the king of Cush, saying, "He has set out to fight against you." When he heard [it], he sent messengers to Hezekiah, saying,

Look! you have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands to destroy them, and you--shall you be delivered?

And Hezekiah took the letter from the hand of the messengers, and he read it. Then he went up [to] the temple of Yahweh, and Hezekiah spread it out before the {presence} of Yahweh.

to {set} their gods in the fire, for they [were] not gods, but [the] work of human hands, wood and stone, and they destroyed them.

Have you not heard from {a long time ago}? I have made it from days of primeval time, and I formed it. Now I have brought it [about], and it is for fortified cities to collapse into heaps of destroyed stones.

And I know your sitting down and your going out, and your coming in, and your raging {against} me.

And this [shall be] the sign for you: the eating of volunteer plants this year, and in the second year self-seeded plants, and in the third year sow, reap, plant vineyards, and eat their fruit.

For a remnant shall go out from Jerusalem and survivors from mountain Zion. The zeal of Yahweh of hosts will do this.'

Therefore thus says Yahweh concerning the king of Assyria: 'He shall not come to this city, and he shall not shoot an arrow there, and he shall not meet it [with] a shield, and he shall not heap a siege ramp up against her.

'And I will defend this city, to save it for my sake and for the sake of David, my servant.'"

And the angel of Yahweh set out and struck one hundred and eighty-five thousand in the camp of the Assyrians. When they rose in the morning, look! All of them [were] dead corpses.

Then Sennacherib king of Assyria left, went, and returned and lived at Nineveh.

"Go and say to Hezekiah, 'Thus says Yahweh, the God of David your ancestor: "I have heard your prayer; I have seen your tears. {Look, I am going to} add fifteen years to your days.

Look! I will cause [the] shadow of the steps, which it had gone down on the steps of Ahaz with the sun, to turn backwards ten steps." And the sun turned back ten steps on the steps which it had gone down.

I said, "I shall not see Yah! Yah in the land of the living! I shall no more look at humankind among [the] inhabitants of [the] world.

What can I say? For he has spoken to me, and he himself has done [it]. I will walk slowly all my years because of the bitterness of my soul.

Yahweh, save me, and we will play my music [on] stringed instruments all the days of our lives at the temple of Yahweh."

And Isaiah said, "Let them {take} a lump of figs, and let them rub [it] on the boil {so that} he may recover."

And Hezekiah said, "What [is the] sign that I shall go up [to] the temple of Yahweh?"

At that time, Merodach-Baladan, son of Baladan, king of Babylon, sent letters and a present to Hezekiah, for he heard that he had been sick and recovered.

And 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 {answered}, "They came to me from a distant country, from Babylon."

And he said, "What have they seen in your house?" And Hezekiah {answered}, "They have seen all that [is] in my house. There is nothing that I have not shown them in my storehouses."

'And some of your sons who go out from you, whom you fathered, shall be taken, and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.'"

And the glory of Yahweh shall be revealed, and all {humankind} together shall see [it], for the mouth of Yahweh has spoken."

A voice [is] saying, "Call!" And he said, "What shall I call?" All {humankind} [are] grass, and all his loyalty [is] like the flowers of the field.

Grass withers; [the] flower withers when the breath of Yahweh blows on it. Surely the people [are] grass.

{Get yourself} up to a high mountain, Zion, bringer of good news! Lift up your voice with strength, Jerusalem, bringer of good news! Lift [it] up; you must not fear! Say to the cities of Judah, "Here [is] your God!"

Who has measured [the] waters in the hollow of his hand and marked off [the] heavens with span, comprehended the dust of the earth in third of a measure and weighed out [the] mountains in the scales, and [the] hills in a balance?

And to whom will you liken God? And to what likeness will you compare him?

A craftsman pours out the idol, and a {goldsmith} overlays it with gold, and [he] smelts chains of silver.

The one who is [too] impoverished [for] a gift chooses wood [that] will not rot; he seeks a skillful artisan for himself to set up an image [that] will not be knocked over.

Have you not known? Have you not heard? Has it not been told to you from [the] {beginning}? Have you not understood [from] the foundation of the earth?

[He is] the one who sits above the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants [are] like grasshoppers; the one who stretches out [the] heavens like a veil and spreads them out like tent to live [in],

Lift your eyes up [on] high, and see! Who created these? The one who brings out their host by number. He calls all them by name. Because [he is] great of power and mighty of power, no man is missing.

But those who wait for Yahweh shall renew [their] strength. They shall go up [with] wings like eagles; they shall run and not grow weary; they shall walk and not be faint.

And [the] artisan encourages [the] {goldsmith}, [the] one who makes smooth with [the] hammer [encourages the] one who strikes [the] anvil, saying of the soldering, "It [is] good!" And they strengthen it with nails [so] it cannot be knocked over.

For I, Yahweh your God, [am] grasping your right hand; {it is I who say} to you, "You must not fear; I myself, I will help you.

so that they may see and know, and take to heart and understand together that the hand of Yahweh has done this, and the holy one of Israel has created it."

Let them bring [them], and let them tell us what will happen. Tell us what the former things [are] {so that} we may take [them to] our heart and know their outcome. Declare to us the things to come;

Who declared [it] from [the] {beginning} {so that} we might know, and {beforehand} {so that} we might say, "[He is] {right}!" Indeed, there was no one who declared [it]; Indeed, there was no one who proclaimed [it]. Indeed there was no one who heard your words.

First to Zion, look! Look at them! And I give a herald of good tidings to Jerusalem.

He will not cry out and lift up and make his voice heard in the street.

He will not grow faint, and he will not be broken until he has established justice in the earth. And [the] coastlands wait for his teaching.

Thus says the God, Yahweh, who created the heavens and stretched them out, who spread out the earth and its offspring, who gives breath to the people upon it and spirit to those who walk in it.

to open [the] blind eyes, to bring [the] prisoner out from [the] dungeon, those who sit [in] darkness from [the] house of imprisonment.

Sing a new song to Yahweh; praise him from the end of the earth, you who go down [to] the sea and that which fills it, [the] coastlands and their inhabitants.

Yahweh was willing for the sake of his righteousness; he showed [his] teaching to be great and proved [it] to be glorious.

Who gave Jacob to a plunderer and Israel to those who plunder? [Was it] not Yahweh, against whom we have sinned? And they were not willing to walk in his ways, and they would not {obey} his law.

So he poured [the] wrath [of] his anger upon him and [the] strength of war. And it set him afire all around, but he did not understand; and it burned him, but he did not take [it] to heart.

Bring out [the] people blind yet with eyes, and deaf, though they have ears.

Let all the nations gather together, and let [the] peoples assemble. Who among them has declared this, and {declared} [the] former things to us? Let them bring their witnesses, that they may be in the right, and let them hear and say, "[It is] true!"

Indeed, from [this] day I [am] the one, and no one can deliver from my hand. I perform, and who can {cancel it}?"

who brings out chariot and horse, army and mighty one. Together they lie down; they cannot rise. They are extinguished, quenched like wick.

Look! I [am] about to do a new thing! Now it sprouts! Do you not perceive it? Indeed, I will {make} a way in the wilderness, rivers in [the] desert.

I, I am the one who blots out your transgressions for my sake, and I will not remember your sins.

For I will pour out water on a thirsty [land] and streams on dry ground. I will pour my spirit out on your descendants and my blessing on your offspring.

And who [is] like me? Let him proclaim [it]! And let him declare it and set it in order for me {since I established an eternal people} and things that are to come, and let them tell them [the things] that are coming.

You must not tremble, and you must not be paralyzed with fear. Have I not made you hear from of old and declared [it], and you [are] my witnesses? Is there a god besides me? And there is no rock! I know none!"

[The] {ironsmith} works in the coals [with his] tool and forms it with hammers. And he makes it with {his strong arm}; indeed, he becomes hungry, and {he lacks} strength; he does not drink water, and he is faint.

[The] {woodworker} stretches out a line; he makes an outline [of] it with marker. He makes it with knife and makes an outline [of] it with compass. He makes it like [the] image of a man, like [the] beauty of a human, to dwell [in] a temple.

Cutting down cedars for himself, he {chooses} a holm tree and an oak, and he lets it grow strong for him among [the] trees of [the] forest. He plants a cedar, and [the] rain makes [it] grow.

And it {becomes fuel for a human}, and he takes some of it and grows warm; also, he kindles a fire and bakes bread. Also, he makes a god and bows in worship; he makes himself an image and bows down to it!

He burns half of it in [the] fire; he eats meat over half of it; he roasts a roast and is satisfied. Also he grows warm and says, "Ah! I am warm! I see [the] fire!"

And he makes the remainder of it into a god! He bows down to his idol, and he bows in worship and prays to him, and he says, "Save me, for you [are] my god!"

And {no one takes it to heart}, and [there is] no knowledge and no understanding to say, "I burned half of it in [the] fire and also I baked bread on its coals; I roasted meat, and I have eaten. And I shall make [the] rest of it into an abomination! I shall bow down to a block of wood!"

I have wiped your transgressions out like cloud and your sins like mist. Return to me, for I have redeemed you!"

Sing for joy, heavens, for Yahweh has done [it]! Shout, depths of [the] earth! Break forth, mountains, [in] rejoicing, forest and every tree in it, for Yahweh has redeemed Jacob, and he will show his glory in Israel!

Thus says Yahweh, your redeemer, and he who formed you in [the] womb: "I [am] Yahweh, who made everything, who stretched out [the] heavens alone, who spread out the earth--who [was] with me?--

who keeps the word of his servant and carries out the plan of his messengers, who says of Jerusalem, 'It shall be inhabited,' and of the cities of Judah, 'They shall be rebuilt, and I will restore its ruins';

who says of Cyrus, 'My shepherd,' and he shall carry out all my wishes; and saying of Jerusalem, 'It shall be rebuilt,' and [the] temple, 'It shall be founded.'"

Trickle, O heavens, from above, and let clouds trickle [with] righteousness; let [the] earth open so that salvation may be fruitful, and let it cause righteousness to sprout along with it. I myself, Yahweh, have created it.

Woe [to the] one who strives with his {maker}, a potsherd among potsherds of earth! Does [the] clay say to the one who fashions it, 'What are you making?' and 'Your work has no hands'?

Woe [to the] one who says to a father, 'What you are begetting?' or to a woman, '[With] what are you in labor?'"