3 Judgment on Judah and Jerusalem

3:1 For behold, the Lord God of hosts is taking away from Jerusalem and from Judah

support and supply,[1] all support of bread, and all support of water; ²the mighty man and the soldier, the judge and the prophet, the diviner and the elder, ³the captain of fifty and the man of rank, the counselor and the skillful magician and the expert in charms. ⁴And I will make boys their princes, and infants[2] shall rule over them. ⁵And the people will oppress one another, every one his fellow and every one his neighbor; the youth will be insolent to the elder, and the despised to the honorable.

⁶For a man will take hold of his brother in the house of his father, saying: “You have a cloak; you shall be our leader, and this heap of ruins shall be under your rule”; ⁷in that day he will speak out, saying: “I will not be a healer;[3] in my house there is neither bread nor cloak; you shall not make me leader of the people.” ⁸For Jerusalem has stumbled, and Judah has fallen, because their speech and their deeds are against the Lord, defying his glorious presence.^[4]

⁹For the look on their faces bears witness against them; they proclaim their sin like Sodom; they do not hide it. Woe to them! For they have brought evil on themselves. ¹⁰Tell the righteous that it shall be well with them, for they shall eat the fruit of their deeds. ¹¹Woe to the wicked! It shall be ill with him, for what his hands have dealt out shall be done to him. ¹²My people—infants are their oppressors, and women rule over them. O my people, your guides mislead you and they have swallowed up[5] the course of your paths.

¹³The Lord has taken his place to contend; he stands to judge peoples. ¹⁴The Lord will enter into judgment with the elders and princes of his people: “It is you who have devoured[6] the vineyard, the spoil of the poor is in your houses. ¹⁵What do you mean by crushing my people, by grinding the face of the poor?” declares the Lord God of hosts.

¹⁶The Lord said: Because the daughters of Zion are haughty and walk with outstretched necks, glancing wantonly with their eyes, mincing along as they go, tinkling with their feet, ¹⁷therefore the Lord will strike with a scab the heads of the daughters of Zion, and the Lord will lay bare their secret parts. ¹⁸In that day the Lord will take away the finery of the anklets, the headbands, and the crescents; ¹⁹the pendants, the bracelets, and the scarves; ²⁰the headdresses, the armlets, the sashes, the perfume boxes, and the amulets; ²¹the signet rings and nose rings; ²²the festal robes, the mantles, the cloaks, and the handbags; ²³the mirrors, the linen garments, the turbans, and the veils.

²⁴Instead of perfume there will be rottenness; and instead of a belt, a rope; and instead of well-set hair, baldness; and instead of a rich robe, a skirt of sackcloth; and branding instead of beauty. ²⁵Your men shall fall by the sword and your mighty men in battle. ²⁶And her gates shall lament and mourn; empty, she shall sit on the ground.

4 4:1 And seven women shall take hold of one man in that day, saying, “We will eat our own bread and wear our own clothes, only let us be called by your name; take away our reproach.”

The Branch of the Lord Glorified

²In that day the branch of the Lord shall be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit of the land shall be the pride and honor of the survivors of Israel. ³And he who is left in Zion and remains in Jerusalem will be called holy, everyone who has been recorded for life in Jerusalem, ⁴when the Lord shall have washed away the filth of the daughters of Zion and cleansed the bloodstains of Jerusalem from its midst by a spirit of judgment and by a spirit of burning.[7] ⁵Then the Lord will create over the whole site of Mount Zion and over her assemblies a cloud by day, and smoke and the shining of a flaming fire by night; for over all the glory there will be a canopy. ⁶There will be a booth for shade by day from the heat, and for a refuge and a shelter from the storm and rain.

[1] Hebrew staff [2] Or caprice [3] Hebrew binder of wounds [4] Hebrew the eyes of his glory [5] Or they have confused [6] Or grazed over; compare Exodus 22:5 [7] Or purging

5 The Vineyard of the Lord Destroyed

5:1 Let me sing for my beloved my love song concerning his vineyard: My beloved had a vineyard on a very fertile hill. ²He dug it and cleared it of stones, and planted it with choice vines; he built a watchtower in the midst of it, and hewed out a wine vat in it; and he looked for it to yield grapes, but it yielded wild grapes.

³And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah, judge between me and my vineyard. ⁴What more was there to do for my vineyard, that I have not done in it? When I looked for it to yield grapes, why did it yield wild grapes?

⁵And now I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard. I will remove its hedge, and it shall be devoured;^[8]I will break down its wall, and it shall be trampled down. ⁶I will make it a waste; it shall not be pruned or hoed, and briers and thorns shall grow up; I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it.

⁷For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah are his pleasant planting; and he looked for justice, but behold, bloodshed;^[9]for righteousness, but behold, an outcry![10]

Woe to the Wicked

⁸Woe to those who join house to house, who add field to field, until there is no more room, and you are made to dwell alone in the midst of the land. ⁹The Lord of hosts has sworn in my hearing: “Surely many houses shall be desolate, large and beautiful houses, without inhabitant. ¹⁰For ten acres[11] of vineyard shall yield but one bath, and a homer of seed shall yield but an ephah.”^[12]

¹¹Woe to those who rise early in the morning, that they may run after strong drink, who tarry late into the evening as wine inflames them! ¹²They have lyre and harp, tambourine and flute and wine at their feasts, but they do not regard the deeds of the Lord, or see the work of his hands.

¹³Therefore my people go into exile for lack of knowledge;^[13]their honored men go hungry,[14] and their multitude is parched with thirst. ¹⁴Therefore Sheol has enlarged its appetite and opened its mouth beyond measure, and the nobility of Jerusalem[15] and her multitude will go down, her revelers and he who exults in her. ¹⁵Man is humbled, and each one is brought low, and the eyes of the haughty[16] are brought low. ¹⁶But the Lord of hosts is exalted[17] in justice, and the Holy God shows himself holy in righteousness. ¹⁷Then shall the lambs graze as in their pasture, and nomads shall eat among the ruins of the rich.

¹⁸Woe to those who draw iniquity with cords of falsehood, who draw sin as with cart ropes, ¹⁹who say: “Let him be quick, let him speed his work that we may see it; let the counsel of the Holy One of Israel draw near, and let it come, that we may know it!” ²⁰Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter! ²¹Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes, and shrewd in their own sight! ²²Woe to those who are heroes at drinking wine, and valiant men in mixing strong drink, ²³who acquit the guilty for a bribe, and deprive the innocent of his right!

²⁴Therefore, as the tongue of fire devours the stubble, and as dry grass sinks down in the flame, so their root will be as rottenness, and their blossom go up like dust; for they have rejected the law of the Lord of hosts, and have despised the word of the Holy One of Israel. ²⁵Therefore the anger of the Lord was kindled against his people, and he stretched out his hand against them and struck them, and the mountains quaked; and their corpses were as refuse in the midst of the streets. For all this his anger has not turned away, and his hand is stretched out still.

²⁶He will raise a signal for nations afar off, and whistle for them from the ends of the earth; and behold, quickly, speedily they come! ²⁷None is weary, none stumbles, none slumbers or sleeps, not a waistband is loose, not a sandal strap broken; ²⁸their arrows are sharp, all their bows bent, their horses’ hoofs seem like flint, and their wheels like the whirlwind. ²⁹Their roaring is like a lion, like young lions they roar; they growl and seize their prey; they carry it off, and none can rescue. ³⁰They will growl over it on that day, like the growling of the sea. And if one looks to the land, behold, darkness and distress; and the light is darkened by its clouds.

[8] Or grazed over; compare Exodus 22:5 [9] The Hebrew words for justice and bloodshed sound alike [10] The Hebrew words for righteous and outcry sound alike [11] Hebrew ten yoke, the area ten yoke of oxen can plow in a day [12] A bath was about 6 gallons or 22 liters; a homer was about 6 bushels or 220 liters; an ephah was about 3/5 bushel or 22 liters [13] Or without their knowledge [14] Or die of hunger [15] Hebrew her nobility [16] Hebrew high [17] Hebrew high

6 Isaiah’s Vision of the Lord

6:1 In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and the train[18] of his robe filled the temple. ²Above him stood the seraphim. Each had six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. ³And one called to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts;

the whole earth is full of his glory!”^[19]⁴And the foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of him who called, and the house was filled with smoke. ⁵And I said: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” ⁶Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a burning coal that he had taken with tongs from the altar. ⁷And he touched my mouth and said: “Behold, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away, and your sin atoned for.”

Isaiah’s Commission from the Lord

⁸And I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” Then I said, “Here am I! Send me.” ⁹And he said, “Go, and say to this people:

“‘Keep on hearing,[20] but do not understand; keep on seeing,[21] but do not perceive.’¹⁰Make the heart of this people dull,[22] and their ears heavy, and blind their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their hearts, and turn and be healed.” ¹¹Then I said, “How long, O Lord?” And he said: “Until cities lie waste without inhabitant, and houses without people, and the land is a desolate waste, ¹²and the Lord removes people far away, and the forsaken places are many in the midst of the land. ¹³And though a tenth remain in it, it will be burned[23] again, like a terebinth or an oak, whose stump remains when it is felled.”

The holy seed[24] is its stump.

[18] Or hem [19] Or may his glory fill the whole earth [20] Or Hear indeed [21] Or see indeed [22] Hebrew fat [23] Or purged [24] Or offspring