Beginning
Chapter 45
1 [a]Thus says the Lord to his anointed,
to Cyrus whose right hand I have grasped,
to subdue nations before him
and to remove the armor of kings,
opening doors before him
and leaving no gates barred:
2 I myself will advance before you
and level the mountains;
I will tear down bronze gates[b]
and cut through bars of iron.
3 I will give you treasures concealed in darkness
and riches hidden away in secret places,
so that you may know that I am the Lord,
the God of Israel who calls you by your name.
4 For the sake of my servant Jacob
and of Israel my chosen one,
I have called you by your name,
and I have given you a title,
even though you do not know me.
5 I am the Lord and there is no other;
there is no god besides me.
I am the Lord who armed you
even though you did not know me,
6 so that it may be acknowledged from east to west
that there is no god besides me.
I am the Lord, and there is no other.
7 I form the light and create the darkness;
prosperity and disaster depend upon my will;
I, the Lord, do all these things.
8 Rain down righteousness, you heavens;
let the skies pour it down from above.
Let the earth open up
so that salvation may blossom forth,
and let justice also spring up;
I, the Lord, have created it.
9 Woe to anyone who rises up against his Maker,
or to the pot that is displeased with the potter.
Does the clay say to the one who molds it,
“What are you doing?
Your work makes no sense.”
10 Woe to anyone who asks a father,
“What are you begetting?”
or who says to a mother,
“To what have you given birth?”
11 Thus says the Lord,
the Holy One of Israel and its Maker:
How dare you question me about my children
or command me regarding the work of my hands?
12 I was the one who made the earth
and created mankind upon it.
It was my hands that stretched out the heavens
and commanded all their host.
13 I have raised this man for the triumph of justice,
and I will smooth all his paths.
He will rebuild my city
and set my exiles free
without price or ransom,
says the Lord of hosts.
14 Thus says the Lord:
The wealth of Egypt, the commerce of Ethiopia,
and the Sabeans, tall of stature,
will come over to you and belong to you;
they will follow you, wearing chains.
They will bow down before you
and pray to you, saying,
“God is with you alone, and there is no other;
there is no god aside from him.”[c]
15 Truly you are a God who is hidden,
O God of Israel, the Savior.
16 All the makers of idols are disgraced and humbled;
they perish in their shame.
17 But Israel is saved by the Lord,
a salvation that is everlasting.
You will never be put to shame or humiliated
forever and ever.
18 For thus says the Lord,
the Creator of the heavens,
he who is God,
the one who formed the earth and created it
and established it;
he did not create it to be a wasteland,
but a place to be lived in.
I am the Lord,
and there is no other.
19 I did not speak in secret,
in realms of darkness.
I did not say to the offspring of Jacob,
“Search for me in an empty waste.”
I the Lord proclaim the truth;
I declare what is right.
20 Gather together and come forth;
assemble, all you survivors of the nations.
Bereft of knowledge are those
who parade with their wooden idols
and pray to gods who are unable to save them.
21 Come forward and present your case
once you have examined the evidence.
Who foretold this in ages past?
Who revealed it long ago?
Was it not I, the Lord?
There is no god aside from me,
I alone am the righteous God and Savior.
22 If you turn to me, you will be saved,
all you ends of the earth,
for I am God, and there is no other.
23 By myself I have sworn
that the word that issues forth from my mouth
is righteous and irrevocable.
To me every knee will bow,
every tongue will swear,
24 saying, “In the Lord alone
are righteousness and strength;
all those who formerly defied him
and vented their rage against him
will come before him in shame.
25 Then all the descendants of Israel
will be triumphant and glory in the Lord.”
Chapter 46
The Idols of Babylon[d]
1 Bel[e] bows down, Nebo stoops low;
their idols are borne by beasts and cattle.
The images you used to carry on your shoulders
are now a burden for weary animals.
2 They stoop and bow down together
but are unable to transport their burden safely,
and they too move forth into captivity.
3 Listen to me, O house of Jacob,
all who remain of the house of Israel,
you who have been carried by me since your birth
and borne by me from the womb.
4 Even when you reach old age
I will still be the same.
Even when your hair is gray,
I will still carry you.
I have made you and I will uphold you;
I will carry you and save you.
5 Whom can you regard as my equal?
To whom can you compare me as identical?
6 Some pour out gold from a purse
and weigh out silver on the scales.
Then they hire a goldsmith
who fashions it into a god
before which they prostrate themselves in adoration.
7 They lift it to their shoulders and carry it;
when they return it to its place, it stands there,
unable to budge from the spot.
If you cry out to it, it cannot reply,
nor can it save anyone from trouble.
8 Remember this and stand firm in your resolve;
keep it foremost in your mind, you rebels.
9 Remember the things that happened long ago;
for I am God, and there is no other;
I am God, and there is no one like me.
10 From the beginning I reveal the end;
in advance I foretell what has not yet occurred.
I proclaim that my plan will be fulfilled
and that I will accomplish my intention.
11 I summon a bird of prey from the east,
a man from a distant country to fulfill my purpose.
I have spoken, and I will bring it to pass;
what I have planned, I will accomplish.
12 Listen to me, you whose hearts are stubborn
and who are far removed from deliverance.
13 I will bring near my justice;
it is not far distant,
and my salvation will not be delayed.
I will grant my salvation to Zion
and my glory to Israel.
Chapter 47
The Fall of Babylon
1 Come down and sit in the dust,
O virgin daughter of Babylon.
Sit on the ground without a throne,
O daughter of the Chaldeans.
Never again will you be called
tender and delicate.[f]
2 Take the millstone and grind meal;
remove your veil,
strip off your skirt, bare your legs,
and wade through the rivers.
3 Your nakedness will be exposed
and your shame will be seen.
I will take vengeance,
and I will show clemency to no one.
4 Thus says our redeemer,
the Holy One of Israel,
whose name is the Lord of hosts.
5 Sit in silence and conceal yourself in darkness,
O daughter of the Chaldeans.
For never again will you be called
the mistress of kingdoms.
6 Because I was angry with my people
I profaned my inheritance
and gave them over into your power.
You showed them no mercy,
and you laid a very heavy yoke on the aged.
7 You said, “I will be a queen forever.”
Thus you did not reflect carefully on your actions
or give any consideration to their outcome.
8 Now listen to this, you voluptuous woman,
as you sit securely on your throne,
thinking to yourself,
“I am the only one who matters.
I will never be a widow
or experience the loss of children.”
9 However, both of these things will befall you,
suddenly, in a single day;
both the loss of children and widowhood
will come upon you in full measure
despite all your sorceries
and all your potent spells.
10 You felt secure in your wickedness
as you thought, “No one can see me.”
But your wisdom and your knowledge
led you astray,
and you said to yourself,
“I am the only one who matters.”
11 As a result, evil will come upon you,
and you will not know how to conjure it away,
disaster will befall you
that you will not be able to avert;
complete ruin which you did not foresee
will suddenly afflict you.
12 [g]But continue to persist in your spells
and your many sorceries
in which you have placed your confidence
throughout your life.
Perhaps you can succeed with them;
perhaps you can inspire terror.
13 You have exhausted yourself with consultations
ever since your youth.
Let the astrologers now come forth to save you,
those who seek the future in the stars
and who predict at each new moon
what will befall you next.
14 But they are like stubble;
the fire consumes them.
They cannot even deliver themselves
from the heat of the flames.
These flames are not meant to sit beside;
these glowing embers are not meant for keeping warm.
15 Of absolutely no use to you are your astrologers
upon whom you have depended from your youth.
Each of them follows his own path;
not one of them can save you.
Chapter 48
A Plea to the Captives
1 Hear this, O house of Jacob,
you who are called by the name of Israel,
and who came forth from the stock of Judah,
who swear by the name of the Lord
and invoke the God of Israel
but not with righteousness or good faith,
2 even though you call yourselves citizens of the holy city
and rely on the God of Israel
whose name is the Lord of hosts.
3 Things that happened in the past
I foretold long before they occurred.
These predictions issued forth from my mouth,
and I made them known to you;
then suddenly I acted and they came to pass.
4 Because I know full well that you are obstinate,
with your neck an iron sinew
and your forehead firm as bronze,
5 I foretold these events to you long ago
and declared them to you before they happened
so that you could not assert, “My idols did them;
my carved statue and my molten image ordained them.”
6 You have heard what I said; now consider it
and admit the truth of what I have stated.
From now on I will reveal new things,
hidden things of which you have not been aware.
7 They have just been brought into existence, and not long ago;
before today you have never heard of them,
so that you cannot claim to have already known them.
8 You neither heard nor knew;
knowledge of them never reached your ears before now.
For I knew how treacherous you are
and that from your birth you were rebellious.
9 For the sake of my name I will restrain my anger;
for the sake of my honor I will be patient with you
lest I should be tempted to destroy you.
10 See, I have tested you,
but not in the manner that silver is tested;
I have tested you in the furnace of affliction.
11 For my sake, for my own sake, I do this,
for why should my name be profaned?
I will not yield my glory to another.
12 Listen to me, O Jacob,
and Israel, whom I have called.
I am he; I am the first
and I am the last.
13 My hand laid the foundations of the earth,
and my right hand spread out the heavens;
when I summon them,
they all present themselves immediately.
14 Assemble, all of you, and listen!
Who among the idols has revealed what will happen—
that he whom I love[h] will do my will
against Babylon and the Chaldeans?
15 I myself have spoken and summoned him;
I have brought him,
and his mission will succeed.
16 Draw near to me and hear this:
From the very beginning
I have not spoken in secret.
From the time it came to be, I have been there.
Now the Lord God has sent me and his Spirit.
17 Thus says the Lord God,
your redeemer, the Holy One of Israel:
I am the Lord, your God
who teaches you what is for your own good
and who leads you in the way you should go.
18 If only you had listened to my commandments,
your prosperity would have been like a river
and your success like the waves of the sea.
19 Your descendants would have been as numerous as the sand
and your offspring like its countless grains.
Their name would never be erased
or blotted out from my sight.
20 Go forth from Babylon! Flee from Chaldea!
Proclaim this with shouts of joy
and make it known.
Send the message to the ends of the earth and say,
“The Lord has redeemed his servant Jacob.”
21 Those whom he led through desert lands
never endured thirst.
He caused water to flow from the rock for them;
he split open the rock and waters streamed forth.
22 Thus says the Lord:
There is no peace for the wicked.
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