16 Lord, (A)in trouble they have visited You,
They poured out a prayer when Your chastening was upon them.
17 As (B)a woman with child
Is in pain and cries out in her [a]pangs,
When she draws near the time of her delivery,
So have we been in Your sight, O Lord.
18 We have been with child, we have been in pain;
We have, as it were, [b]brought forth wind;
We have not accomplished any deliverance in the earth,
Nor have (C)the inhabitants of the world fallen.

19 (D)Your dead shall live;
Together with [c]my dead body they shall arise.
(E)Awake and sing, you who dwell in dust;
For your dew is like the dew of herbs,
And the earth shall cast out the dead.

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Footnotes

  1. Isaiah 26:17 sharp pains
  2. Isaiah 26:18 given birth to
  3. Isaiah 26:19 So with MT, Vg.; Syr., Tg. their dead bodies; LXX those in the tombs

16 Yahweh, in distress they have visited you;
    they poured out an incantation;[a]
    your discipline was on them.
17 Like a pregnant woman on the point of giving birth, she writhes;
    she cries in her labor pains.

So we were because of your presence, Yahweh.

18 We became pregnant, we writhed;
    we gave birth to wind.
We cannot bring about deliverance on the earth,
    and no inhabitants of the world are born.
19 Your dead shall live; their corpses[b] shall rise.
    Wake up and sing for joy, dwellers of the dust,
for your dew is celestial dew,[c]
    and the earth will give birth to dead spirits.[d]

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Footnotes

  1. Isaiah 26:16 Literally “whispering”
  2. Isaiah 26:19 Literally “my corpse;” some manuscripts propose an emendation to the suffix to change it to third person masculine plural (“their corpses”), which makes better sense
  3. Isaiah 26:19 Literally “dew of light”
  4. Isaiah 26:19 Or “you make the land of Rephaim fall”