Isaiah 34:5-17
Lexham English Bible
5 When my sword is drenched in the heavens,
look! It will descend upon Edom,
and upon the people of my ban, for judgment.
6 Yahweh has a sword;[a]
it is full of blood.
It is covered with[b] fat,
with[c] the blood of lambs and goats,
with[d] the fat of the kidneys of rams,
for Yahweh has a sacrifice[e] in Bozrah
and a great slaughter in the land of Edom.
7 And wild oxen shall go down with them,
and steers with strong bulls.
And their land shall be drenched with[f] blood,
and their soil shall be fattened with[g] fat.
8 For Yahweh has a day of vengeance,[h]
a year of retribution for the strife of Zion.
9 And its streams shall be changed to pitch and its soil to sulfur,
and its land shall become like burning pitch.
10 Night and day it shall not be quenched;
its smoke shall go up forever.
From generation to generation it shall be in ruins;
forever and ever there will be no one who passes through her.
11 But[i] the large bird and the hedgehog shall take possession of it,
and the owl and the raven shall live in it.
And he shall stretch the measuring line of confusion out over it,
and the plumb line of emptiness.
12 Its nobles—but no kingdom is there—shall call,
and all its princes shall be nothing.
13 And thorns shall go up her citadel fortress,
weeds[j] and thistle plants[k] in her fortresses;
and it shall be the settlement of jackals,
green grass for the daughters of an ostrich.
14 And desert creatures shall meet with hyenas,
and a goat-demon shall call to his neighbor;
surely there Lilith[l] shall repose,
and she shall find a resting place for herself.
15 There the owl shall nest and lay
and hatch and care for her chicks in her shadow;
surely there the birds of prey shall be gathered,
each one with her mate.
16 Seek from the book of Yahweh and read;[m]
none of these shall be missing;
none shall miss her mate.
For my[n] mouth is the one that[o] has commanded,
and his spirit is the one that[p] has gathered them.
17 And he is the one that[q] has cast the lot for them,
and his hand has apportioned it to them with the measuring line;
they shall take possession of it forever,
they shall live in it from generation to generation.[r]
Footnotes
- Isaiah 34:6 Literally “A sword for Yahweh”
- Isaiah 34:6 Or “from”
- Isaiah 34:6 Or “from”
- Isaiah 34:6 Or “from”
- Isaiah 34:6 Literally “a sacrifice for Yahweh”
- Isaiah 34:7 Or “from”
- Isaiah 34:7 Or “from”
- Isaiah 34:8 Literally “a day of vengeance for Yahweh”
- Isaiah 34:11 Or “And”
- Isaiah 34:13 Hebrew “weed”
- Isaiah 34:13 Hebrew “thistle plant”
- Isaiah 34:14 Hebrew transliteration; possibly a proper name for a Mesopotamian night-demon
- Isaiah 34:16 Literally “call”
- Isaiah 34:16 The Dead Sea Scroll has “his”
- Isaiah 34:16 Literally “he”
- Isaiah 34:16 Literally “he”
- Isaiah 34:17 Literally “he”
- Isaiah 34:17 Literally “to generation and generation”
Isaiah 34:5-17
International Standard Version
5 For my sword will be seen[a] in the heavens.
Look! It descends in judgment on Edom,
on the people I have doomed to destruction.
6 The Lord has a sword bathed in blood;
it’s covered[b] with fat,
with the blood of lambs and goats,
and with fat from the kidneys of rams.”
Judgment on Bozrah and Edom
“For the Lord holds a sacrifice in Bozrah,
and a great slaughter in the land of Edom.
7 Wild oxen will fall together with them—
young steers and mighty bulls.
Their land will be drenched[c] with blood,
and their soil will be swollen with fat.
8 For the Lord has a day of vengeance,
a year of recompense for Zion’s cause.
9 Edom’s[d] streams will be turned into burning sulfur,
and its dust into sulfur;
its land will become pitch.
10 It will burn night and day,
and will never be extinguished.
Its smoke will rise from generation to generation,
and it will lie desolate forever and ever.
And no one will pass through it.[e]
11 “But hawks and hedgehogs will possess it;
owls and ravens will nest in it.
God[f] will stretch out over it a measuring line, and chaos,[g]
and plumb lines of emptiness, and its nobles.[h]
12 They will name it “No Kingdom There,”
and all its princes will come to nothing.
13 Thorns will grow over its palaces,
nettles and brambles its fortresses.
It will become a haunt for jackals,
a home for ostriches.
14 And desert creatures will meet with hyenas,
and goat-demons will call out to each other.
There also Liliths[i] will settle,
and find for themselves[j] a resting place.
15 Owls[k] will nest there, lay eggs,
hatch them, and care for their young
under the shadow of their wings;[l]
yes[m] indeed, vultures will gather there,
each one with its mate.”
The Certainty of God’s Deliverance
16 “Study and read from the book of the Lord:
And not one[n] will be missing,
each will not long for its mate.[o]
For it is the mouth of the Lord that has issued the order,
and it is his Spirit that has gathered them.
17 It is he who has allotted their portions,[p]
and his hand has divided it for them with a measuring line forever.[q]
They will possess it forever;[r]
from generation to generation they will live in it.”[s]
Footnotes
- Isaiah 34:5 So 1QIsaa; MT reads has drunk its fill; cf. LXX
- Isaiah 34:6 Or satiated
- Isaiah 34:7 So 1QIsaa LXX; MT reads drench
- Isaiah 34:9 Lit. Its
- Isaiah 34:10 So 1QIsaa; MT reads blazing pitch. 10 Night and day it will not be extinguished. Its smoke will go up forever; from generation to generation it will lie desolate. No one will ever pass through it again. LXX lacks the last line
- Isaiah 34:11 Lit. He
- Isaiah 34:11 So 1QIsaa; MT reads a measuring line of chaos
- Isaiah 34:11 So 1QIsaa; MT reads And plumb lines of emptiness are 12 its nobles; LXX reads and satyrs will live in it. 12 Its nobles
- Isaiah 34:14 I.e. desert demons of the night
- Isaiah 34:14 So 1QIsaa; MT reads The Lilith will settle, and find for itself
- Isaiah 34:15 Or tree-snakes; LXX reads Hedgehogs
- Isaiah 34:15 Lit. in her shadow
- Isaiah 34:15 So 1QIsaa; MT lacks yes
- Isaiah 34:16 So 1QIsaa; MT reads Not one of them
- Isaiah 34:16 So MT; 1QIsaa reads each its mate
- Isaiah 34:17 Lit. has cast the lot for them
- Isaiah 34:17 So 1QIsaa; the Heb. lacks forever
- Isaiah 34:17 So MT; 1QIsaa lacks Forever
- Isaiah 34:17 So MT; 1QIsaa corrector reads will they possess … live in it.
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