instead of a robe, a wearing of sackcloth;
and branding instead of beauty.
25 Your men shall fall by the sword,
and your mighty in the war.
26 Her gates shall lament and mourn.
She shall be desolate and sit on the ground.
4
1 Seven women shall take hold of one man in that day, saying, “We will eat our own bread, and wear our own clothing. Just let us be called by your name. Take away our reproach.”
2 In that day, the LORD’s branch will be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit of the land will be the beauty and glory of the survivors of Israel. 3 It will happen that he who is left in Zion and he who remains in Jerusalem shall be called holy, even everyone who is written among the living in Jerusalem, 4 when the Lord shall have washed away the filth of the daughters of Zion, and shall have purged the blood of Jerusalem from within it, by the spirit of justice and by the spirit of burning. 5 The LORD will create over the whole habitation of Mount Zion and over her assemblies, a cloud and smoke by day, and the shining of a flaming fire by night, for over all the glory will be a canopy. 6 There will be a pavilion for a shade in the daytime from the heat, and for a refuge and for a shelter from storm and from rain.
5
1 Let me sing for my well beloved a song of my beloved about his vineyard.
My beloved had a vineyard on a very fruitful hill.
2 He dug it up,
gathered out its stones,
planted it with the choicest vine,
built a tower in the middle of it,
and also cut out a wine press in it.
He looked for it to yield grapes,
but it yielded wild grapes.
3 “Now, inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah,
please judge between me and my vineyard.
4 What could have been done more to my vineyard, that I have not done in it?
Why, when I looked for it to yield grapes, did it yield wild grapes?
5 Now I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard.
I will take away its hedge, and it will be eaten up.
I will break down its wall, and it will be trampled down.
6 I will lay it a wasteland.
It won’t be pruned or hoed,
but it will grow briers and thorns.
I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain on it.”
7 For the vineyard of the LORD of Hosts is the house of Israel,
and the men of Judah his pleasant plant.
He looked for justice, but behold, oppression,
for righteousness, but behold, a cry of distress.
8 Woe to those who join house to house,
who lay field to field, until there is no room,
and you are made to dwell alone in the middle of the land!
9 In my ears, the LORD of Hosts says: “Surely many houses will be desolate,
even great and beautiful, unoccupied.
10 For ten acres† of vineyard shall yield one bath,‡
and a homer§ of seed shall yield an efah.”†
11 Woe to those who rise up early in the morning, that they may follow strong drink,
who stay late into the night, until wine inflames them!
12 The harp, lyre, tambourine, and flute, with wine, are at their feasts;
but they don’t respect the work of the LORD,
neither have they considered the operation of his hands.
13 Therefore my people go into captivity for lack of knowledge.
Their honorable men are famished,
and their multitudes are parched with thirst.
14 Therefore Sheol‡ has enlarged its desire,
and opened its mouth without measure;
and their glory, their multitude, their pomp, and he who rejoices among them, descend into it.
15 So man is brought low,
mankind is humbled,
and the eyes of the arrogant ones are humbled;
16 but the LORD of Hosts is exalted in justice,
and God the Holy One is sanctified in righteousness.
17 Then the lambs will graze as in their pasture,
and strangers will eat the ruins of the rich.
18 Woe to those who draw iniquity with cords of falsehood,
and wickedness as with cart rope,
19 who say, “Let him make haste, let him hasten his work, that we may see it;
let the counsel of the Holy One of Israel draw near and come,
that we may know it!”
20 Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil;
who put darkness for light,
and light for darkness;
who put bitter for sweet,
and sweet for bitter!
21 Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes,
and prudent in their own sight!
22 Woe to those who are mighty to drink wine,
and champions at mixing strong drink;
23 who acquit the guilty for a bribe,
but deny justice for the innocent!
24 Therefore as the tongue of fire devours the stubble,
and as the dry grass sinks down in the flame,
so their root shall be as rottenness,
and their blossom shall go up as dust,
because they have rejected the law of the LORD of Hosts,
and despised the word of the Holy One of Israel.
25 Therefore the LORD’s anger burns against his people,
and he has stretched out his hand against them and has struck them.
The mountains tremble,
and their dead bodies are as refuse in the middle of the streets.
For all this, his anger is not turned away,
but his hand is still stretched out.
26 He will lift up a banner to the nations from far away,
and he will whistle for them from the end of the earth.
Behold, they will come speedily and swiftly.
27 No one shall be weary nor stumble among them;
no one shall slumber nor sleep,
neither shall the belt of their waist be untied,
nor the strap of their sandals be broken,
28 whose arrows are sharp,
and all their bows bent.
Their horses’ hoofs will be like flint,
and their wheels like a whirlwind.
29 Their roaring will be like a lioness.
They will roar like young lions.
Yes, they shall roar,
and seize their prey and carry it off,
and there will be no one to deliver.
30 They will roar against them in that day like the roaring of the sea.
If one looks to the land, behold, darkness and distress.
The light is darkened in its clouds.
6
1 In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lifted up; and his train filled the temple. 2 Above him stood the seraphim. Each one had six wings. With two he covered his face. With two he covered his feet. With two he flew. 3 One called to another, and said,
“Holy, holy, holy, is the LORD of Hosts!
The whole earth is full of his glory!”
4 The foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of him who called, and the house was filled with smoke. 5 Then I said, “Woe is me! For I am undone, because I am a man of unclean lips and I live among a people of unclean lips, for my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of Hosts!”
6 Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with the tongs from off the altar. 7 He touched my mouth with it, and said, “Behold, this has touched your lips; and your iniquity is taken away, and your sin forgiven.”
8 I heard the Lord’s voice, saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?”
Then I said, “Here I am. Send me!”
9 He said, “Go, and tell this people,
‘You hear indeed,
but don’t understand.
You see indeed,
but don’t perceive.’
10 Make the heart of this people fat.
Make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes;
lest they see with their eyes,
hear with their ears,
understand with their heart,
and turn again, and be healed.”
11 Then I said, “Lord, how long?”
He answered,
“Until cities are waste without inhabitant,
houses without man,
the land becomes utterly waste,
12 and the LORD has removed men far away,
and the forsaken places are many within the land.
13 If there is a tenth left in it,
that also will in turn be consumed,
as a terebinth, and as an oak whose stump remains when they are cut down,
so the holy seed is its stump.”
7
1 In the days of Ahaz the son of Jotham, the son of Uzziah, king of Judah, Rezin the king of Syria and Pekah the son of Remaliah, king of Israel, went up to Jerusalem to war against it, but could not prevail against it. 2 David’s house was told, “Syria is allied with Ephraim.” His heart trembled, and the heart of his people, as the trees of the forest tremble with the wind.
3 Then the LORD said to Isaiah, “Go out now to meet Ahaz, you, and Shearjashub your son, at the end of the conduit of the upper pool, on the highway of the fuller’s field. 4 Tell him, ‘Be careful, and keep calm. Don’t be afraid, neither let your heart be faint because of these two tails of smoking torches, for the fierce anger of Rezin and Syria, and of the son of Remaliah. 5 Because Syria, Ephraim, and the son of Remaliah, have plotted evil against you, saying, 6 “Let’s go up against Judah, and tear it apart, and let’s divide it among ourselves, and set up a king within it, even the son of Tabeel.” 7 This is what the Lord GOD says: “It shall not stand, neither shall it happen.” 8 For the head of Syria is Damascus, and the head of Damascus is Rezin. Within sixty-five years Ephraim shall be broken in pieces, so that it shall not be a people. 9 The head of Ephraim is Samaria, and the head of Samaria is Remaliah’s son. If you will not believe, surely you shall not be established.’ ”
10 The LORD spoke again to Ahaz, saying, 11 “Ask a sign of the LORD your God;
