Isaiah 1

Common English Bible

1 The vision about Judah and Jerusalem that Isaiah, Amoz’s son, saw in the days of Judah’s kings Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah.

Rebels condemned

²Hear you heavens, and listen earth,
        for the Lord has spoken:
I reared children; I raised them,
    and they turned against me!
³An ox knows its owner,
    and a donkey its master’s feeding trough.
    But Israel doesn’t know;
        my people don’t behave intelligently.

⁴Doom! Sinful nation, people weighed down with crimes,
    evildoing offspring, corrupt children!
They have abandoned the Lord,
    despised the holy one of Israel;
    they turned their backs on God.

⁵Why do you invite further beatings?
    Why continue to rebel?
Everyone’s head throbs,
    and everyone’s heart fails.
⁶From head to toe, none are well—
    only bruises, cuts, and raw wounds,
        not treated, not bandaged,
        not soothed with oil.

⁷Your country is deserted,
    your cities burned with fire;
    your land—strangers are devouring it in plain sight.
    It’s a wasteland, as when foreigners raid.
⁸Daughter Zion is left like a small shelter in a vineyard,
    like a hut in a cucumber field,
    like a city besieged.^[a]
⁹If the Lord of heavenly forces had not spared a few of us,
    we would be like Sodom; we would resemble Gomorrah.

Hands filled with bloodshed

¹⁰Hear the Lord’s word, you leaders of Sodom.
    Listen to our God’s teaching,
        people of Gomorrah!
¹¹What should I think about all your sacrifices?
    says the Lord.
I’m fed up with entirely burned offerings of rams
    and the fat of well-fed beasts.
    I don’t want the blood of bulls, lambs, and goats.
¹²When you come to appear before me,
    who asked this from you,
    this trampling of my temple’s courts?
¹³Stop bringing worthless offerings.
    Your incense repulses me.
New moon, sabbath, and the calling of an assembly—
    I can’t stand wickedness with celebration!
¹⁴I hate your new moons and your festivals.
    They’ve become a burden that I’m tired of bearing.
¹⁵When you extend your hands,
    I’ll hide my eyes from you.
Even when you pray for a long time,
    I won’t listen.
Your hands are stained with blood.
¹⁶    Wash! Be clean!
Remove your ugly deeds from my sight.
    Put an end to such evil;
¹⁷    learn to do good.
Seek justice:
    help the oppressed;^[b]
    defend the orphan;
    plead for the widow.

¹⁸Come now, and let’s settle this,
    says the Lord.
Though your sins are like scarlet,
    they will be white as snow.
If they are red as crimson,
    they will become like wool.
¹⁹If you agree and obey,
    you will eat the best food of the land.
²⁰But if you refuse and rebel,
    you will be devoured by the sword.
The Lord has said this.

Zion will be redeemed

²¹This faithful town has become a prostitute!
She was full of justice;
    righteousness lived in her—
    but now murderers.
²²Your silver has become impure;
    your beer is diluted with water.
²³Your princes are rebels,
    companions of thieves.
Everyone loves a bribe and pursues gifts.
    They don’t defend the orphan,
    and the widow’s cause never reaches them.
²⁴Therefore, says the Lord God of heavenly forces,
    the mighty one of Israel:
Doom! I will vent my anger against my foes;
    I will take it out on my enemies,
²⁵    and I will turn my hand against you.
I will refine your impurities as with lye,
    and remove all your cinders.
²⁶Then I will restore your judges as in earlier times,
    and your counselors as at the beginning.
After this you will be called Righteous City, Faithful Town.

²⁷Zion will be redeemed by justice,
and those who change their lives by righteousness.
²⁸But God will shatter rebels and sinners alike;
those who abandon the Lord will be finished.

²⁹You will be ashamed of the oaks you once desired,
    and embarrassed by the gardens you once chose.
³⁰You will be like an oak with withering leaves,
    like a garden without water.
³¹The strong will be like dry twigs,
        their deeds like sparks;
    the two will burn together,
    with no one to extinguish them.

Footnotes

Isaiah 1:8 LXX, Vulg; MT spared
Isaiah 1:17 LXX, Vulg; MT lead the oppressor

Isaiah 5:1-7:17

Common English Bible

Song of the vineyard

5 Let me sing for my loved one
    a love song for his vineyard.
My loved one had a vineyard on a fertile hillside.
²He dug it,
    cleared away its stones,
    planted it with excellent vines,
    built a tower inside it,
    and dug out a wine vat in it.
He expected it to grow good grapes—
    but it grew rotten grapes.
³So now, you who live in Jerusalem, you people of Judah,
    judge between me and my vineyard:
⁴What more was there to do for my vineyard
    that I haven’t done for it?
When I expected it to grow good grapes,
    why did it grow rotten grapes?
⁵Now let me tell you what I’m doing to my vineyard.
I’m removing its hedge,
    so it will be destroyed.
I’m breaking down its walls,
    so it will be trampled.
⁶I’ll turn it into a ruin;
    it won’t be pruned or hoed,
    and thorns and thistles will grow up.
I will command the clouds not to rain on it.
⁷The vineyard of the Lord of heavenly forces is the house of Israel,
    and the people of Judah are the plantings in which God delighted.
God expected justice, but there was bloodshed;
    righteousness, but there was a cry of distress!

Sayings of doom

⁸Doom to those who acquire house after house,
    who annex field to field until there is no more space left
    and only you live alone in the land.
⁹I heard the Lord of heavenly forces say this:^[a]
Many houses will become total ruins,
    large, fine houses, with no one living in them.
¹⁰Ten acres of vineyard
    will produce just one bath,^[b]
    and a homer of seed
        will produce only an ephah.

¹¹Doom to those who wake up early in the morning to run after beer,
    to those who stay up late, lit up by wine.
¹²They party with lyre and harp, tambourine, flute, and wine;
    but they ignore the Lord’s work;
        they can’t see what God is doing.

¹³Therefore, my people go into exile since they didn’t understand—
    their officials are dying of hunger;
    so many of them are dried up with thirst.
¹⁴Therefore, the grave^[c] opens wide its jaws,
    opens its mouth beyond all bounds,
    and the splendid multitudes will go down, with all their uproar and cheering.
¹⁵Humanity will be humiliated;
    each person laid low,
    the eyes of the exalted laid low.
¹⁶But the Lord of heavenly forces will be exalted in justice,
    and the holy God will show himself holy in righteousness.
¹⁷Lambs will graze as if in their pasture;
    young goats^[d] will feed among the ruins of the rich.^[e]

¹⁸Doom to those who drag guilt along with cords of fraud,
    and haul sin as if with cart ropes,
¹⁹    who say, “God should hurry and work faster so we can see;
    let the plan of Israel’s holy one come quickly, so we can understand it.”

²⁰Doom to those who call evil good and good evil,
who present darkness as light and light as darkness,
who make bitterness sweet and sweetness bitter.

²¹Doom to those
who consider themselves wise,
who think of themselves as clever.

²²Doom to the wine-swigging warriors,
    mighty at mixing drinks,
²³    who spare the guilty for bribes,
    and rob the innocent of their rights.
²⁴Therefore, as a tongue of fire devours stubble,
    and as hay shrivels in a flame,
        so their roots will rot,
        and their blossoms turn to dust,
    for they have rejected the teaching of the Lord of heavenly forces,
        and have despised the word of Israel’s holy one.

God’s powerful hand

²⁵This is why the Lord’s anger burned against the people:
    he extended his hand to strike them,
    the mountains trembled,
    and their corpses lay in the middle of the streets like dung.
Even then God’s anger didn’t turn away;
    God’s hand was still extended.

²⁶God will raise a signal to a nation from far away
    and whistle to them from the end of the earth—
    now look—hurrying, swiftly they come!
²⁷Not one is tired; not one stumbles;
    they don’t rest or sleep;
    no belt is loose; no sandal broken;
²⁸    their arrows are sharp;
    all their bows drawn;
    their horses’ hooves are like flint;
    their wheels like the whirlwind.
²⁹    Their roaring is like the lion;
    they roar like young lions;
    they growl, seize their prey,
    and carry it off, with no one to rescue.
³⁰On that day, they will roar over it like the roaring of the sea.
And if one looks toward the land, there’s darkness.
    Tyre and the Nile will be darkened by the clouds.^[f]

The divine throne room

6 In the year of King Uzziah’s death, I saw the Lord sitting on a high and exalted throne, the edges of his robe filling the temple. ²Winged creatures were stationed around him. Each had six wings: with two they veiled their faces, with two their feet, and with two they flew about. ³They shouted to each other, saying:

“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of heavenly forces!
All the earth is filled with God’s glory!”

⁴The doorframe shook at the sound of their shouting, and the house was filled with smoke.

⁵I said, “Mourn for me; I’m ruined! I’m a man with unclean lips, and I live among a people with unclean lips. Yet I’ve seen the king, the Lord of heavenly forces!”

⁶Then one of the winged creatures flew to me, holding a glowing coal that he had taken from the altar with tongs. ⁷He touched my mouth and said, “See, this has touched your lips. Your guilt has departed, and your sin is removed.”

⁸Then I heard the Lord’s voice saying, “Whom should I send, and who will go for us?”

I said, “I’m here; send me.”

⁹God said, “Go and say to this people:

Listen intently, but don’t understand;
    look carefully, but don’t comprehend.
¹⁰Make the minds of this people dull.
    Make their ears deaf and their eyes blind,
    so they can’t see with their eyes
    or hear with their ears,
    or understand with their minds,
    and turn, and be healed.”

¹¹I said, “How long, Lord?”

And God said, “Until cities lie ruined with no one living in them, until there are houses without people and the land is left devastated.” ¹²The Lord will send the people far away, and the land will be completely abandoned. ¹³Even if one-tenth remain there, they will be burned again, like a terebinth or an oak, which when it is cut down leaves a stump. Its stump is a holy seed.

Reassurance to King Ahaz

7 In the days of Ahaz (Jotham’s son and grandson of Judah’s King Uzziah), Aram’s King Rezin and Israel’s King Pekah (Remaliah’s son) came up to attack Jerusalem, but they couldn’t overpower it.

²When the house of David was told that Aram had become allies with Ephraim, their hearts and the hearts of their people shook as the trees of a forest shake when there is a wind. ³But the Lord said to Isaiah, “Go out to meet Ahaz, you and your son Shear-jashub,^[g] at the end of the channel of the Upper Pool, by the road to the field where laundry is washed, ⁴and say to him, ‘Be careful and stay calm. Don’t fear, and don’t lose heart over these two pieces of smoking torches, over the burning anger of Rezin, Aram, and Remaliah’s son. ⁵Aram has planned evil against you with Ephraim and Remaliah’s son, saying, ⁶“Let’s march up against Judah, tear it apart, capture it for ourselves, and install Tabeel’s son as its king.” ⁷But the Lord God says: It won’t happen; it won’t take place. ⁸The chief of Aram is Damascus; the chief of Damascus is Rezin (in sixty-five more years Ephraim will be shattered as a nation); ⁹the chief of Ephraim is Samaria; and the chief of Samaria is the son of Remaliah. If you don’t believe this, you can’t be trusted.’”

The sign of Immanuel

¹⁰Again the Lord spoke to Ahaz: ¹¹“Ask a sign from the Lord your God. Make it as deep as the grave^[h] or as high as heaven.”

¹²But Ahaz said, “I won’t ask; I won’t test the Lord.”

¹³Then Isaiah said, “Listen, house of David! Isn’t it enough for you to be tiresome for people that you are also tiresome before my God? ¹⁴Therefore, the Lord will give you a sign. The young woman is pregnant and is about to give birth to a son, and she will name him Immanuel.^[i] ¹⁵He will eat butter and honey, and learn to reject evil and choose good. ¹⁶Before the boy learns to reject evil and choose good, the land of the two kings you dread will be abandoned. ¹⁷The Lord will bring upon you, upon your people, and upon your families days unlike any that have come since the day Ephraim broke away from Judah—the king of Assyria.”

Footnotes

Isaiah 5:9 Heb lacks say this.
Isaiah 5:10 One bath is approximately twenty quarts, the same as an ephah; one homer contains ten ephahs (or baths) of grain.
Isaiah 5:14 Heb Sheol
Isaiah 5:17 Or strangers
Isaiah 5:17 Or Calves and young goats will feed on the ruins; Heb uncertain
Isaiah 5:30 Heb uncertain
Isaiah 7:3 Or the remaining few will return
Isaiah 7:11 Heb Sheol
Isaiah 7:14 Or God is with us

Isaiah 9:2-7

Common English Bible

²^[a] The people walking in darkness have seen a great light.
    On those living in a pitch-dark land, light has dawned.
³You have made the nation great;
    you have increased its joy.
They rejoiced before you as with joy at the harvest,
    as those who divide plunder rejoice.
⁴As on the day of Midian, you’ve shattered the yoke that burdened them,
    the staff on their shoulders,
    and the rod of their oppressor.
⁵Because every boot of the thundering warriors,
    and every garment rolled in blood
    will be burned, fuel for the fire.
⁶A child is born to us, a son is given to us,
    and authority will be on his shoulders.
    He will be named
    Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
    Eternal Father, Prince of Peace.
⁷There will be vast authority and endless peace
    for David’s throne and for his kingdom,
    establishing and sustaining it
    with justice and righteousness
    now and forever.

The zeal of the Lord of heavenly forces will do this.

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Footnotes

Isaiah 9:2 9:1 in Heb

Isaiah 11:1-10

Common English Bible

A shoot from Jesse’s stump

11 A shoot will grow up from the stump of Jesse;
    a branch will sprout^[a] from his roots.
²The Lord’s spirit will rest upon him,
    a spirit of wisdom and understanding,
    a spirit of planning and strength,
    a spirit of knowledge and fear of the Lord.
³He will delight in fearing the Lord.
He won’t judge by appearances,
    nor decide by hearsay.
⁴He will judge the needy with righteousness,
    and decide with equity for those who suffer in the land.
He will strike the violent^[b] with the rod of his mouth;
    by the breath of his lips he will kill the wicked.
⁵Righteousness will be the belt around his hips,
    and faithfulness the belt around his waist.
⁶The wolf will live with the lamb,
    and the leopard will lie down with the young goat;
    the calf and the young lion will feed^[c] together,
    and a little child will lead them.
⁷The cow and the bear will graze.
    Their young will lie down together,
    and a lion will eat straw like an ox.
⁸A nursing child will play over the snake’s hole;
    toddlers will reach right over the serpent’s den.
⁹They won’t harm or destroy anywhere on my holy mountain.
    The earth will surely be filled with the knowledge of the Lord,
    just as the water covers the sea.