Isaiah 55-56
Complete Jewish Bible
55 “All you who are thirsty, come to the water!
You without money, come, buy, and eat!
Yes, come! Buy wine and milk
without money — it’s free!
2 Why spend money for what isn’t food,
your wages for what doesn’t satisfy?
Listen carefully to me, and you will eat well,
you will enjoy the fat of the land.
3 Open your ears, and come to me;
listen well, and you will live —
I will make an everlasting covenant with you,
the grace I assured David.
4 I have given him as a witness to the peoples,
a leader and lawgiver for the peoples.
5 You will summon a nation you do not know,
and a nation that doesn’t know you will run to you,
for the sake of Adonai your God,
the Holy One of Isra’el, who will glorify you.”
6 Seek Adonai while he is available,
call on him while he is still nearby.
7 Let the wicked person abandon his way
and the evil person his thoughts;
let him return to Adonai,
and he will have mercy on him;
let him return to our God,
for he will freely forgive.
8 “For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
and your ways are not my ways,” says Adonai.
9 “As high as the sky is above the earth
are my ways higher than your ways,
and my thoughts than your thoughts.
10 For just as rain and snow fall from the sky
and do not return there, but water the earth,
causing it to bud and produce,
giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater;
11 so is my word that goes out from my mouth —
it will not return to me unfulfilled;
but it will accomplish what I intend,
and cause to succeed what I sent it to do.”
12 Yes, you will go out with joy,
you will be led forth in peace.
As you come, the mountains and hills
will burst out into song,
and all the trees in the countryside
will clap their hands.
13 Cypresses will grow in place of thorns,
myrtles will grow instead of briars.
This will bring fame to Adonai
as an eternal, imperishable sign.
56 Here is what Adonai says:
“Observe justice, do what is right,
for my salvation is close to coming,
my righteousness to being revealed.”
2 Happy is the person who does this,
anyone who grasps it firmly,
who keeps Shabbat and does not profane it,
and keeps himself from doing any evil.
3 A foreigner joining Adonai should not say,
“Adonai will separate me from his people”;
likewise the eunuch should not say,
“I am only a dried-up tree.”
4 For here is what Adonai says:
“As for the eunuchs who keep my Shabbats,
who choose what pleases me
and hold fast to my covenant:
5 in my house, within my walls,
I will give them power and a name
greater than sons and daughters;
I will give him an everlasting name
that will not be cut off.
6 “And the foreigners who join themselves to Adonai
to serve him, to love the name of Adonai,
and to be his workers,
all who keep Shabbat and do not profane it,
and hold fast to my covenant,
7 I will bring them to my holy mountain
and make them joyful in my house of prayer;
their burnt offerings and sacrifices
will be accepted on my altar;
for my house will be called
a house of prayer for all peoples.”
8 Adonai Elohim says,
he who gathers Isra’el’s exiles:
“There are yet others I will gather,
besides those gathered already.”
9 All you wild animals, come and devour,
yes, all you animals in the forest!
10 [Isra’el’s] watchmen are, all of them, blind;
they don’t know anything.
They are all dumb dogs, unable to bark,
lying there dreaming, loving to sleep.
11 Greedy dogs, never satisfied —
such are the shepherds, unable to understand;
they all turn to their own way,
each one intent on his own gain:
12 “Come, I’ll get some wine,
we’ll fill up on good, strong liquor!
Tomorrow will be like today;
in fact, it will be even better!”
Copyright © 1998 by David H. Stern. All rights reserved.
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