“Or let him (Israel) cling to My strength and rely on My protection [My stronghold],
Let him make peace with Me,
Let him make peace with Me.”

In the generations to come Jacob will take root;
Israel will blossom and sprout,
And they will fill the surface of the world with fruit.

You contended with them by exile, by driving them away [from Canaan];
He has expelled them with His fierce wind on the day of the east wind.

Therefore through this the wickedness [the sin, the injustice, the wrongdoing] of Jacob (Israel) will be atoned for and forgiven;
And this will be the full price [that God requires] for taking away his sin:
When Israel makes all the stones of the [pagan] altars like crushed chalk stones;
When the Asherim and the incense altars will not stand.

In that day the Lord will thresh [out His grain] from the flowing stream of the River [Euphrates] to the Brook of Egypt, and you will be gathered up one by one, O sons of Israel.

It will come to pass in that day that a great trumpet will be blown, and those who were lost and perishing in the land of Assyria and who were scattered in the land of Egypt will come and worship the Lord on the holy mountain at Jerusalem.

Woe (judgment is coming) to [Samaria] the splendid crown of the drunkards of Ephraim,
And to the fading flower of its glorious beauty,
Which is at the head of the rich valley
Of those who are overcome with wine!

Listen carefully, the Lord has a strong and mighty agent [the Assyrian];
Like a tempest of hail, a disastrous storm,
Like a tempest of mighty overflowing waters,
He has cast it down to the earth with His hand.

In that day the Lord of hosts will become a magnificent crown
And a glorious diadem to the [converted] remnant of His people,

A spirit of justice for him who sits in judgment [administering the law],
A strength to those who drive back the battle at the gate.

They say “To whom would He teach knowledge?
And to whom would He explain the message?
Those just weaned from milk?
Those just taken from the breast?

Indeed, the Lord will teach this people [in a more humiliating way]
By [men with] stammering lips and a foreign tongue,

He who said to them, “This is the place of quiet, give rest to the weary,”
And, “This is the resting place,” yet they would not listen.

Therefore the word of the Lord to them will be [merely monotonous repetitions]:
“Precept upon precept, precept upon precept,
Rule upon rule, rule upon rule,
Here a little, there a little.”
That they may go and stumble backward, and be broken, ensnared, and taken captive.

Because you have said, “We have made a covenant with death,
And with Sheol (the place of the dead) we have made an agreement,
When the overwhelming scourge passes by, it will not reach us,
For we have made lies our refuge and we have concealed ourselves in deception.”

Therefore the Lord God says this,

“Listen carefully, I am laying in Zion a Stone, a tested Stone,
A precious Cornerstone for the [secure] foundation, firmly placed.
He who believes [who trusts in, relies on, and adheres to that Stone] will not be disturbed or give way [in sudden panic].

“As often as it passes through, it will seize you;
For morning after morning it will pass through, by day and by night,
And it will be sheer terror to understand what it means.”

For the bed is too short to stretch out on,
And the blanket is too narrow to wrap around oneself [and likewise all their preparations are inadequate].

For the Lord will rise up as at Mount Perazim,
He will be stirred up as in the Valley of Gibeon,
To do His work, His unusual and incredible work,
And to accomplish His work, His extraordinary work.

Now do not carry on as scoffers,
Or the bands which bind you will be made stronger;
For I have heard from the Lord God of hosts [a decree]
Of decisive destruction on all the earth.

Does the farmer plow all day to plant seed?
Does he continually dig furrows and harrow his ground [after it is prepared]?

Bread grain is crushed fine,
Indeed, the farmer does not continue to thresh it forever.
Because the wheel of his cart and his horses eventually damage it,
He does not thresh it longer.

Woe (judgment is coming) to Ariel, to Ariel, the city where David [once] camped!
Add yet another year; let the feasts run their course [but only one year more].

Then I will harass Ariel,
And she will be a city of mourning and lamenting (crying out in grief)
Yet she will be like an Ariel [an altar hearth] to Me.

The entire vision [of all these things] will be to you like the words of a scroll that is sealed, which they give to one who can read, saying, “Read this, please,” he shall say, “I cannot, for it is sealed.”

Then the book will be given to the one who cannot read, saying, “Read this, please.” And he will say, “I cannot read.”

Then the Lord said,

“Because this nation approaches [Me only] with their words
And honors Me [only] with their lip service,
But they remove their hearts far from Me,
And their reverence for Me is a tradition that is learned by rote [without any regard for its meaning],

Therefore, listen carefully, I will again do marvelous and amazing things with this people, wonderful and astonishing things;
And the wisdom of their wise men will perish,
And the understanding of their discerning men will be hidden.”

Woe (judgment is coming) to those who [try to] deeply hide their plans from the Lord,
Whose deeds are done in a dark place,
And who say, “Who sees us?” or “Who knows us?”

On that day the deaf will hear the words of a book,
And out of their gloom and darkness the eyes of the blind will see [the words of the book].

For the tyrant will come to an end and the scorner will be finished,
Indeed all who are intent on doing evil will be cut off—

“Those who err in mind will know the truth,
And those who criticize and murmur discontentedly will accept instruction.

“Woe (judgment is coming) to the rebellious children,” declares the Lord,
“Who carry out a plan, but not Mine,
And make an alliance [by pouring out a libation], but not of My Spirit,
In order to add sin to sin;

Who proceed down to Egypt
Without consulting Me,
To take refuge in the stronghold of Pharaoh
And to take shelter in the shadow of Egypt!

“Therefore the safety and protection of Pharaoh will be your shame
And the refuge in the shadow of Egypt, your humiliation and disgrace.

A [mournful, inspired] oracle (a burden to be carried) concerning the beasts of the Negev (the South):

Through a land of trouble and anguish,
From where come lioness and lion, viper and [fiery] flying serpent,
They carry their riches on the shoulders of young donkeys
And their treasures on the humps of camels,
To a people (Egyptians) who cannot benefit them.

Now, go, write it on a tablet before them
And inscribe it on a scroll,
So that it may serve in the time to come
As a witness [against them] forevermore.

Who say to the seers, “You must not see visions from God”;
And to the prophets, “You must not prophesy to us what is right!
Speak to us pleasant things and smooth words,
Prophesy [deceitful] illusions [that we will enjoy].

Therefore this wickedness [this sin, this injustice, this wrongdoing] will be to you
Like a crack [in a wall] about to fall,
A bulge in a high wall,
Whose collapse comes suddenly in an instant,

“Whose collapse is like the smashing of a potter’s jar,
Crushed so savagely
that there cannot be found among its pieces a potsherd [large enough]
To take [coals of] fire from a fireplace,
Or to scoop water from a cistern.”

For the Lord God, the Holy One of Israel has said this,

“In returning [to Me] and rest you shall be saved,
In quietness and confident trust is your strength.”
But you were not willing,

Therefore the Lord waits [expectantly] and longs to be gracious to you,
And therefore He waits on high to have compassion on you.
For the Lord is a God of justice;
Blessed (happy, fortunate) are all those who long for Him [since He will never fail them].

O people in Zion, inhabitant in Jerusalem, you will weep no longer. He will most certainly be gracious to you at the sound of your cry for help; when He hears it, He will answer you.

Your ears will hear a word behind you, “This is the way, walk in it,” whenever you turn to the right or to the left.

And you will defile your carved images overlaid with silver, and your cast images plated with gold. You will scatter them like a bloodstained cloth, and will say to them, “Be gone!”

Then He will give you rain for the seed with which you sow the ground, and bread [grain] from the produce of the ground, and it will be rich and plentiful. In that day your livestock will graze in large and roomy pastures.

On every lofty mountain and on every high hill there will be streams of water on the day of the great slaughter (the day of the Lord), when the towers fall [and all His enemies are destroyed].

The light of the full 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 [concentrated in one], in the day the Lord binds up the fracture of His people and heals the wound He has inflicted [because of their sins].

His breath is like an overflowing river,
Which reaches to the neck,
To sift the nations back and forth in a sieve [of disaster],
And to put in the jaws of the peoples the bridle which leads to ruin.

You will have a song as in the night when a holy feast is kept,
And joy of heart as when one marches [in procession] with a flute,
To go to the [temple on the] mountain of the Lord, to the Rock of Israel.

And the Lord will make His majestic voice heard,
And show the descending of His arm [striking] in [His] fierce anger,
And in the flame of a devouring fire,
In the crashing sound of heavy rain, cloudburst, and hailstones.

And every blow of the rod of punishment,
Which the Lord will lay on them,
Will be to the music of Israel’s tambourines and lyres;
And in battles, brandishing weapons, He will fight Assyria.

Woe (judgment is coming) to those who go down to Egypt for help,
Who rely on horses
And trust in chariots because they are many,
And in horsemen because they are very strong,
But they do not look to the Holy One of Israel, nor seek and consult the Lord!

For so the Lord says to me,

“As the lion or the young lion growls over his prey,
And though a large group of shepherds is called out against him
He will not be terrified at their voice nor cringe at their noise,
So the Lord of hosts will come down to wage war on Mount Zion and on its hill.”

Return to Him from whom you have so deeply defected, O sons of Israel.

For in that day every man will reject and throw away his idols of silver and his idols of gold [in disgust], which your own hands have sinfully made for you.

Then the Assyrian will fall by a sword not of man,
And a sword not of man will devour him.
And he will flee from the sword [of God],
And his young men will become forced labor.

Each [one of them] will be like a hiding place from the wind
And a shelter from the storm,
Like streams of water in a dry land,
Like the shade of a huge rock in a parched and weary land [to those who turn to them].

The fool (the good-for-nothing) will no longer be called noble,
Nor the rogue said to be generous.

For the fool speaks nonsense,
And his heart (mind) plans wickedness:
To practice ungodliness and to speak error concerning the Lord,
To keep the craving of the hungry unsatisfied
And to deprive the thirsty of drink.

As for the rogue, his weapons are evil;
He conceives wicked plans
To ruin the poor with lies,
Even when the plea of the needy one is just and right.

Rise up, you women who are carefree,
And hear my voice,
You confident and unsuspecting daughters!
Listen to what I am saying.

Blessed (happy, fortunate) are you who cast your seed upon all waters [when the river overflows its banks and irrigates the land],
You who allow the ox and the donkey to roam freely.

Woe (judgment is coming) to you, O destroyer,
You who were not destroyed,
And he who is treacherous, while others did not deal treacherously with him.
As soon as you finish destroying, you will be destroyed;
As soon as you stop dealing treacherously, others will deal treacherously with you.

O Lord, be gracious to us; we have waited [expectantly] for You.
Be the arm of Your servants every morning [that is, their strength and their defense],
Our salvation also in the time of trouble.

Your spoil [of Israel’s foe] is gathered [by the people of Jerusalem] as the caterpillar gathers;
As locusts swarming so people swarm on it.

“The peoples will be burned to lime,
Like thorns cut down which are burned in the fire.

He who walks righteously and speaks with integrity,
Who rejects gain from fraud and from oppression,
Who shakes his hand free from the taking of bribes,
Who stops his ears from hearing about bloodshed
And shuts his eyes to avoid looking upon evil;

You will no longer see the fierce and insolent people,
A people of unintelligible speech which no one comprehends,
Of a strange and stammering tongue which no one understands.

Come near, you nations, to hear; and listen, O peoples!
Let the earth and all that is in it hear, and the world and all that comes forth from it.

For the Lord is angry at all the nations,
And His wrath is against all their armies;
He has utterly doomed them,
He has given them over to slaughter.

For the Lord has a day of vengeance,
A year of retribution for the cause of Zion.

The burning will not be quenched night or day;
Its smoke will go up forever.
From generation to generation it will lie in ruins;
No one will ever again pass through it.

Its nobles—there is no one there
Whom they may proclaim king—
And all its princes will be nothing.

The creatures of the desert will encounter jackals
And the hairy goat will call to its kind;
Indeed, Lilith (night demon) will settle there
And find herself a place of rest.

There the arrow snake will make her nest and lay her eggs,
And hatch them and gather her young under her protection;
Indeed, the birds of prey will be gathered there [to breed],
Every one with its own kind.

The Lord has cast the lot for them,
And His hand has divided and apportioned Edom to the wild beasts by measuring-line.
They will possess it forever;
From generation to generation they will dwell in it.

It will blossom abundantly
And rejoice with joy and singing.
The glory of Lebanon will be given to it,
The majesty of [Mount] Carmel and [the plain] of Sharon.
They will see the glory of the Lord,
The majesty and splendor of our God.

Say to those with an anxious and panic-stricken heart,
“Be strong, fear not!
Indeed, your God will come with vengeance [for the ungodly];
The retribution of God will come,
But He will save you.”

And the ransomed of the Lord will return
And come to Zion with shouts of jubilation,
And everlasting joy will be upon their heads;
They will find joy and gladness,
And sorrow and sighing will flee away.

And the king of Assyria sent the Rabshakeh [his military commander] from Lachish [the Judean fortress commanding the road from Egypt] to King Hezekiah at Jerusalem with a large army. And he stood by the canal of the Upper Pool on the highway to the Fuller’s Field.

Then Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, who was in charge of the [royal] household, and Shebna the scribe, and Joah the son of Asaph, the recording historian, came out to [meet] him.

Then the Rabshakeh said to them, “Say to Hezekiah, ‘This is what the great king, the king of Assyria says, “What is [the reason for] this confidence that you have?

I say, ‘Your plan and strength for the war are only empty words.’ Now in whom do you trust and on whom do you rely, that you have rebelled against me?

Listen carefully, you rely on the staff of this broken reed, Egypt, which will pierce the hand of any man who leans on it. So is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all who rely on him.

But if you say to me, ‘We trust in and rely on the Lord our God,’ is it not He whose high places and whose altars Hezekiah has taken away, saying to Judah and to Jerusalem, ‘You shall worship before this altar’?

So now, exchange pledges with my master the king of Assyria and I will give you two thousand horses, if you are able on your part to put riders on them.

Moreover, is it without the Lord that I have now come up against this land to destroy it? The Lord said to me, ‘Go up against this land and destroy it.’”’”

Then Eliakim and Shebna and Joah said to the Rabshakeh, “Please, speak to your servants in Aramaic, because we understand it; and do not speak to us in Judean (Hebrew) in the hearing of the people who are [stationed] on the wall.”

But the Rabshakeh said, “Has my master sent me to speak these words only to your master and to you, and not to the men sitting on the wall, doomed to eat their own dung and drink their own urine with you?”

This is what the king says, ‘Do not let Hezekiah deceive you, for he will not be able to rescue you;

Do not listen to Hezekiah,’ for this is what the king of Assyria says, ‘Make peace with me and come out to me, and each one of you will eat from his own vine and each from his own fig tree and each [one of you] drink from the water of his own cistern,

until I come and take you away to a land like your own land, a land of grain and new wine, a land of bread and vineyards.

Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad [in Aram]? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim? And when have they rescued Samaria from my hand?

But they kept silent and did not say a word to him in reply, for King Hezekiah’s command was, “Do not answer him.”

Then Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, who was in charge of the household, and Shebna the scribe and Joah the son of Asaph, the recording historian, came to Hezekiah with their clothes torn [in grief], and told him the words of the Rabshakeh [the Assyrian commander].

Then he sent Eliakim, who was in charge of the [royal] household, and Shebna the scribe, and the elders of the priests, covered with sackcloth, to Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz.

They said to him, “This is what Hezekiah says, ‘This day is a day of distress, rebuke and disgrace; for children have come to birth, and there is no strength to deliver them.

It may be that the Lord your God will hear the words of the Rabshakeh [the commander], whom his master the king of Assyria has sent to taunt and defy the living God, and will avenge the words which the Lord your God has heard. Therefore, offer a prayer for the remnant [of His people] that is left.’”

So the servants of King Hezekiah came to Isaiah.