Isaiah 28-33

New Catholic Bible

¹ Woe to the proud garlands of Ephraim’s drunkards
    and to the fading flowers of its glorious beauty,
the crowning glory of a nation of men
    overcome with wine and lying in the streets.
² But behold, the Lord has one in his service
    who is mighty and strong,
and who, like a storm of hail,
    like a destroying tempest,
like a torrent of rain and raging flood waters,
    will hurl them violently to the ground.
³ The majestic garlands of Ephraim’s drunkards
    will be trampled underfoot.
⁴ And the fading blooms of its glorious beauty,
    at the head of the lush valley,
will be like early figs before the summer;
    whoever sees them will pluck them
    and immediately consume them.
⁵ On that day the Lord of hosts
    will be a crown of glory
and a beautiful diadem
    to the remnant of his people,
⁶ a spirit of justice
    to the one who sits in judgment,
and a spirit of strength to those
    who repel the enemy at the city gates.

⁷ These also stagger from wine
    and stumble due to strong drink.
Priests and prophets are confused because of liquor;
    alcohol leaves them unable to think clearly
    or to pronounce fair judgments.
⁸ Every table is covered with filthy vomit;
    no place is clean.
⁹ “To whom will the prophet impart knowledge?
    To whom will he explain his message?
To babies who are newly weaned,
    to those just taken from the breast?
¹⁰ With him we are given
    command after command, command after command,
rule after rule, rule after rule,
    here a little, there a little.”^[b]
11 Now, with stammering lips
    and in an alien tongue,
he will speak to this people,
¹²     to whom he has said,
“This is the place for rest;
    give rest to the weary.
This is the place for repose.”
    However, they would not listen.
¹³ Therefore, to them the word of the Lord will be,
    “Command after command, command after command,
rule after rule, rule after rule,
    here a little, there a little.”
¹⁴ Therefore, listen to the word of the Lord,
    you arrogant rulers of this people in Jerusalem.
¹⁵ Proudly you have boasted,
    “We have made a covenant with death
    and entered into a pact with the netherworld.
And so, when the overwhelming scourge occurs,
    it will not afflict us.
For we have made lies our refuge
    and taken shelter in falsehood.”
¹⁶ Therefore, the Lord God
    has this to say to you in response:
Behold, I am laying a stone in Zion,
    a stone that has been tested,
a precious cornerstone as a firm foundation;
    those who place their trust in it will not falter.
¹⁷ And I will make justice the measuring line,
    with righteousness as the plumb line.
Hail will sweep away the refuge of lies,
    and flood waters will submerge your hiding place.
¹⁸ Then your covenant with death will be annulled
    and your pact with Sheol will not survive.
When the raging waters roar forth,
    you will be overwhelmed by them.
¹⁹ As often as the flood sweeps through,
    it will engulf you,
sweeping over you day and night,
    as terror conveys the message clearly.
²⁰ For your bed will be too short
    to enable you to stretch out,
and the blanket will be too narrow
    to cover you sufficiently.
²¹ Then the Lord will rise up as on Mount Perazim,
    and he will rage as he did in the Valley of Gibeon,
to accomplish his work, his mysterious work,
    and to perform his deed, his strange deed.^[c]
22 Therefore, cease your arrogance,
    or your bonds will be further tightened.
For the Lord God of hosts has revealed to me
    the destruction he has decreed for the entire earth.
²³ Listen carefully to my words;
    pay close attention to what I have to say.
²⁴ Does the plowman spend his entire time plowing,
    breaking up and harrowing his land?
²⁵ Once he has leveled its surface,
    does he not scatter the fennel and sow cummin,
and plant wheat and barley,
    with spelt around the borders?
²⁶ God has instructed him in this
    and trained him correctly.
²⁷ Fennel must not be threshed with a sledge,
    nor is a cartwheel rolled over cummin.
²⁸ Grain must be crushed for bread,
    but it cannot be done so to excess;
one maneuvers the cartwheels and the horses
    but is careful not to grind it too fine.
²⁹ All this knowledge comes from the Lord of hosts
    whose counsel is wonderful
    and whose wisdom is great.

^{1     [d]}Woe to Ariel, Ariel,^[e]
    the city where David encamped.
Year after year will pass,
    and the festivals will be celebrated annually.
² Yet I will inflict distress upon Ariel,
    and there will be endless mourning and lamentation
    as she becomes like an altar of fire.
³ I will encamp against you like David,
    completely surround you with my forces
    and erect siege-works against you.
⁴ Then, as you lie prostrate, you will speak,
    and from the dust of the earth
    your words will come forth.
Your voice will rise from the ground
    like that of a ghost,
    and your words will whisper out of the dust.
⁵ But the vast throng of your enemies
    will be like fine dust,
and the horde of your ruthless foes
    will be like flying chaff.
Then suddenly, in an instant,
⁶     you will be visited by the Lord of hosts,
accompanied by thunder and earthquake and intense din,
    by whirlwind and tempest
    and the flame of devouring fire.
⁷ Then the horde of all the nations
    that fight against Ariel,
all who fight against her,
    besieging her and causing her great anguish,
will fade away like a dream,
    like a vision in the night.
⁸ Just as when a hungry man dreams of eating
    and then awakens with an empty stomach,
or as when a thirsty man dreams of drinking
    and then awakens to find his throat still parched,
so will it be with the horde of all the nations
    that make war against Mount Zion.

⁹ If you stupefy yourselves,
    you will remain in a stupor.
If you blind yourselves,
    you will remain blind.
Be drunk, but not on wine;
    stagger, but not from strong drink.
¹⁰ For the Lord has poured out on you
    a spirit of deep sleep;
he has closed your eyes, you prophets,
    and covered your heads, you seers.

^13 [f]Then the Lord said:
    Because this people draws near to me
    only with their words
and honors me only with their lips
    while their hearts are far from me,
and their reverence for me has become
    nothing but a human commandment
    that has been memorized,
¹⁴ therefore, I will continue to deal with this people
    in shocking and amazing ways.
The wisdom of their wise men will perish,
    and the understanding of their discerning men will cease.
¹⁵ Woe to those who go to extreme measures
    to conceal their plans from the Lord,
who perpetrate their evil deeds in the dark,
    saying, “Who sees us? Who knows where we are?”
¹⁶ Such people are truly perverse.
    Is the potter no better than the clay?
Can what is made say of its maker,
    “He did not make me”?
Can a pot say of the potter,
    “He really has no particular skill”?

¹⁷ It will be but a very short time
    before Lebanon will become a fertile field
    and its orchards will be regarded as forests.
¹⁸ On that day the deaf will hear
    the words of a book being read,
and the eyes of the blind will see,
    delivered from gloom and darkness.
¹⁹ The lowly will once again rejoice in the Lord,
    and those who are poor will exult
    in the Holy One of Israel.
²⁰ For the tyrants will be no more
    and the arrogant will cease to exist;
    all those who revel in evil deeds will be destroyed:
²¹ those whose lies cause a man to be judged guilty,
    those who set traps to capture just arbiters
and thereby deprive the innocent
    from being granted justice.
²² Therefore, thus says the Lord,
    the deliverer of Abraham,
    in regard to the house of Jacob:
No longer will the house of Jacob be ashamed,
    nor will their faces grow pale.
²³ For when they see in their midst
    their children, the work of my hands,
    they will acknowledge my name as holy.
They will reverence the Holy One of Jacob
    and stand in awe of the God of Israel.
²⁴ Those who err in spirit will gain understanding,
    and those who are obstinate will receive instruction.

¹ Woe to the rebellious children, says the Lord,
    who devise plans that were not in accord with my will,
who make alliances that were not inspired by me,
    thereby adding sin upon sin.
² They depart for Egypt
    without seeking my counsel,
to take refuge in Pharaoh’s protection
    and to take shelter in Egypt’s shadow.
³ Therefore, Pharaoh’s protection will be your shame,
    and the shelter of Egypt’s shadow
    will be your humiliation.
⁴ For though his princes are at Zoan
    and his envoys have reached Hanes,^[g]
5 everyone has been put to shame
    by a people who cannot be of any use,
who afford them neither help nor profit
    but only shame and disgrace.

Through a land of hardship and distress,
    of the lioness and the roaring lion,
    of the viper and the flying serpent,
they carry their wealth on the backs of donkeys
    and their treasures on the humps of camels
    to a nation that cannot be of help to them.
⁷ For Egypt’s help is vain and futile;
    therefore I have called her
    “Rahab^[h] the Worthless.”
^{8     [i]}And so go forth and in their presence
    write it on a scroll,
    inscribe it on a tablet,
so that it may serve hereafter
    as an eternal witness.
⁹ They are a rebellious people,
    deceitful children,
children who refuse to listen
    to the instruction of the Lord.
¹⁰ To the seers they say,
    “Cease to have visions!”
To the prophets they demand,
    “Do not prophesy to us what is right;
    reveal to us pleasant things; prophesy illusions.
¹¹ Cease with your warnings;
    turn aside from the straight path.
We wish to hear nothing further
    about the Holy One of Israel.”

Because you have rejected this warning,
    placing your trust in fraud and deceit
    and relying on them,
¹³ this guilt of yours will become for you
    like a crack appearing in a high wall
that bulges out and continues to widen
    until suddenly, in an instant,
    that wall will come hurtling to the ground.
¹⁴ It will crash and break like an earthenware pot,
    shattered so completely
that among its fragments not a single shard can be found
    to remove an ember from the hearth
    or to scoop out water from a cistern.
¹⁵ For thus says the Lord God,
    the Holy One of Israel:
Your salvation depends upon repentance and tranquility
    and your strength upon quiet trust.
    But you would have none of it.
¹⁶ “No,” you said. “We will flee upon horses.”
    Therefore, you will flee.
“We will ride on swift horses,” you added.
    But your pursuers will be even more swift.
¹⁷ A thousand will tremble at the threat of one;
    if five threaten you, you will flee,
until you are left
    like a flagstaff on the top of a mountain
    or like a banner on a hill.
¹⁸ But even so the Lord is waiting to be gracious to you,
    and he will rise up to grant you his compassion.
For the Lord is a God of justice;
    blessed are all those who wait for him.
¹⁹ O people of Zion who dwell in Jerusalem,
    you will weep no more.
The Lord will be gracious to you
    when you cry out to him for help;
when he hears your call,
    he will answer you.
²⁰ Although the Lord may give you the bread of adversity
    and the water of affliction,
he who is your Teacher will no longer hide himself,
    but with your own eyes you will see your Teacher.
²¹ And when you stray from your path,
    whether to the right or to the left,
you will hear his voice behind you,
    sounding in your ears and saying,
    “This is the way; continue to follow it.”
²² Then you will realize how unclean
    are your silver-plated idols
    and your gold-plated images.
You will cast them away like polluted rags
    and shout at them, “Away with you!”

²³ God will send rain
    for the seed you sow in the ground,
and the crops that the soil brings forth
    will be rich and abundant.
When that day comes,
    your cattle will graze in broad pastures.
²⁴ The oxen and the donkeys that plow the land
    will be fed with fodder
    that has been winnowed with shovel and pitchfork.
²⁵ On every lofty mountain and on every high hill
    there will be streams of water
on the day of the great slaughter
    when the strongholds fall.
²⁶ The light of the moon will match that of the sun,
    and the light of the sun itself
will be seven times brighter than before,
    like the light of seven days compressed into one,
when the Lord binds up the wounds of his people
    and heals the injuries inflicted by his blows.

²⁷ See, the name of the Lord approaches from afar,
    with burning anger and dense clouds of smoke.
His lips are brimming over with anger,
    and his tongue is like a devouring fire.
²⁸ His breath is like a rushing flood
    that reaches up to the neck;
it will winnow the nations with the sieve of destruction
    and place on the jaws of the people
    a bridle that will lead them astray.
²⁹ But as for you, your songs will be
    like those on the night of a holy festival,
and you will experience joy in your hearts
    such as occurs when, to the sound of a flute,
people make a pilgrimage to the mountain of the Lord,
    to the Rock of Israel.
³⁰ Then the Lord will make his majestic voice heard
    and allow his arm to be seen
as it descends in furious anger
    and a flame of devouring fire
    amid cloudbursts and thunderstorms and hail.
³¹ Assyria will be shattered at the voice of the Lord
    as he strikes with his rod.
³² Every stroke that the Lord inflicts upon Assyria
    with his punishing rod
will be accompanied by the sound
    of timbrels and lyres
as he engages in battle
    with his uplifted hand.
³³ The pyre has been ready for a long time,
    prepared for the king.
His pyre is deep and broad,
    with fire and wood in abundance.
And the breath of the Lord, like a steam of sulfur,
    will set it ablaze.^[j]

¹ Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help
    and who rely on horses,
who place their trust in a large number of chariots
    and in the great strength of their horsemen,
but do not look to the Holy One of Israel
    or seek the Lord’s guidance.
² Yet he, too, is wise and can bring disaster,
    and he does not take back his threats.
He will rise up against the house of the wicked
    and against those who come to the support of evildoers.
³ The Egyptians are mortal, not divine;
    their horses are flesh, not spirit.
When the Lord stretches out his hand,
    the helper will stumble and the one helped will fall;
    all of them will perish together.

As a lion or a lion cub
    growls over its prey,
and when a band of shepherds
    gather together to drive it off,
it is not frightened by their shouting
    or daunted by their clamor,
so the Lord of hosts will come down
    to do battle on the heights of Mount Zion.
⁵ Like a hovering bird
    the Lord of hosts will protect Jerusalem;
he will protect and deliver it,
    he will spare and rescue it.
⁶ Come back to the one
    whom you have completely deserted,
    O children of Israel.
⁷ For on that day
    all of you will cast away
your idols of silver and your false gods of gold
    which your own sinful hands have made.

⁸ Then Assyria will fall by a sword not brandished by a man
    and be devoured by a sword that no human yields;
he will flee before the sword,
    and his young warriors will endure forced labor.
⁹ His stronghold will be abandoned in terror,
    and his commanders will panic and desert him.
Thus says the Lord whose fire is in Zion
    and whose furnace burns in Jerusalem.

¹ Behold, a king will reign with righteousness
    and princes will rule with justice.
² Each of them will be like a shelter from the wind
    and a refuge from the storm,
like streams of water in arid land,
    like the shade of a great rock in a desolate area.
³ Then the eyes of those who see will not be closed,
    and the ears of those who hear will listen attentively.
⁴ The minds of the rash will show good judgment,
    and those who stutter will speak promptly and clearly.
⁵ No longer will a fool be called noble,
    nor will a villain be considered to be honorable.
⁶ For the fool speaks foolishly
    while his heart is planning evil.
He practices ungodliness
    and spreads malicious untruths about the Lord.
He starves the hungry by withholding their food
    and deprives the thirsty of anything to drink.
⁷ The methods of the scoundrel are wicked,
    and he devises infamous schemes
to destroy the poor with his lies
    even when the pleas of the needy are just.
⁸ But the man who is noble plans noble deeds,
    and in that respect he stands firm.

⁹ Listen carefully to what I have to say,
    you women who are so complacent.
Pay attention to my words,
    you who feel so secure.
¹⁰ In little more than a year from now
    you complacent ones will be shaken.
For the vintage will fail
    and there will be no harvest.
¹¹ Tremble, you complacent women;
    shudder, you who feel secure.
Strip yourselves bare,
    with only a loincloth to cover you.
¹² Beat your breasts in mourning
    for the pleasant fields and the fruitful vines,
¹³ for the soil of my people
    overgrown with thorns and briars,
and for all the joyful houses
    in this city of revelry.
¹⁴ The citadel^[k] will be abandoned
    and the crowded streets will be deserted;
the hill and the watchtower will become wasteland forever,
    in which wild asses may frolic and flocks may pasture,
¹⁵ until a spirit from on high
    is poured out upon us,
and the wilderness becomes an orchard
    and the fruitful field becomes a forest.
¹⁶ Then justice will dwell in the wilderness,
    and righteousness will abide in the orchard.
¹⁷ The effect of righteousness will be peace,
    and its result will be quiet and security forever.
¹⁸ My people will abide in a peaceful land,
    in secure dwellings and peaceful resting places.
¹⁹ Even if the forest were to be totally destroyed
    and the city were to be completely leveled,
²⁰ how blessed you will be
    to sow your seed beside every stream
    and to have your cattle and your donkeys roam freely.

¹ Woe to you, O destroyer,
    who yourself have not been destroyed!
Woe to you, O traitor,
    who yourself have not been betrayed!
When you have finished destroying,
    you yourself will be destroyed;
when you have ceased betraying,
    you yourself will be betrayed.
² O Lord, be merciful to us,
    for we have placed our hope in you.
Be our strength every morning,
    our salvation in times of trouble.
³ At the sound of tumult, peoples flee;
    nations scatter when they behold your majesty.
⁴ Your spoil is gathered as if by caterpillars;
    like a swarm of locusts men descend upon it.
⁵ The Lord is exalted, for he dwells on high;
    he has filled Zion with justice and righteousness.
⁶ Her strength will derive from the Lord’s unchanging stability;
    her deliverance will result from wisdom and knowledge;
    her treasure is the fear of the Lord.
⁷ Listen to the valiant cry aloud in the streets for help;
    the ambassadors who seek peace weep bitterly.
⁸ The highways are deserted;
    no longer are there any travelers on the road.
Treaties are broken and their terms are ignored;
    no one is deemed worthy of respect.
⁹ The land languishes in mourning;
    Lebanon withers in its shame.
Sharon has become a desert;
    Bashan and Carmel are stripped bare.^[l]
10 Now I will rise up, says the Lord.
    Now I will be exalted,
    now I will be lifted up.
¹¹ You conceive chaff and give birth to stubble;
    like fire my Spirit will devour you.
¹² The peoples will be burned as though by lime,
    like thorns that have been cut
    and consumed in the fire.
¹³ You who are far away,
    listen to what I have done,
and you who are near,
    acknowledge my strength.
¹⁴ The sinners in Zion are filled with terror;
    trembling has seized the godless.
“Can any of us survive the devouring fire?
    Can any of us survive the everlasting flames?”
¹⁵ Those who walk righteously and speak honestly,
    who refuse to enrich themselves by extortion,
who reject any bribes offered to them
    and stop their ears from listening to plans for murder
    and shut their eyes from looking on evil—
¹⁶ these people will dwell on the heights;
    their refuge will be rocky cliffs,
where they will have an abundance of food and water.

¹⁷ Your eyes will behold the king in his splendor
    and gaze upon a land that stretches far and wide.
¹⁸ Your mind will then meditate on the terror.
    “Where is the man who did the counting?
Where is the man who weighed the tribute?
    Where is the man who counted the towers?”
¹⁹ No longer will you encounter the insolent people,
    those who employ an obscure speech
    that you cannot understand
and who stammer in a language
    that you are unable to comprehend.
²⁰ Gaze upon Zion,
    the city of our sacred feasts.
Your eyes will behold Jerusalem as a quiet abode,
    as a tent that will not be moved,
whose stakes will never be pulled up
    and none of whose ropes will be broken.
²¹ There we will behold the Lord in all his majesty,
    in a place of rivers and broad streams,
upon which no enemy galleys with oars can go
    or a majestic ship can sail.
²² For the Lord is our judge,
    the Lord is our lawgiver.
The Lord is our king;
    he is the one who will save us.
²³ If the rigging of an enemy ship is loose,
    unable to hold the mast in place
    or to keep the sails spread out,
then abundant spoils will be divided;
    even the lame will carry off the plunder.
²⁴ No inhabitant will say, “I am sick,”
    for the people who live there
    will be forgiven for their sins.