Isaiah 56–59

1Yahweh says: “Maintain justice and do what is right, for my salvation is near and my righteousness will soon be revealed.

2Blessed is the man who does this, and the son of man who holds it fast; who keeps the Sabbath without profaning it and keeps his hand from doing any evil.”

3Let no foreigner who has joined himself to Yahweh speak, saying, “Yahweh will surely separate me from his people.” Do not let the eunuch say, “Behold, I am a dry tree.”

4For Yahweh says, “To the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths, choose the things that please me, and hold fast to my covenant,

5I will give them in my house and within my walls a memorial and a name better than of sons and of daughters. I will give them an everlasting name that will not be cut off.

6Also the foreigners who join themselves to Yahweh to serve him, and to love Yahweh’s name, to be his servants, everyone who keeps the Sabbath from profaning it, and holds fast my covenant,

7I will bring these to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer. Their burnt offerings and their sacrifices will be accepted on my altar; for my house will be called a house of prayer for all peoples.”

8The Lord Yahweh, who gathers the outcasts of Israel, says, “I will yet gather others to him, in addition to his own who are gathered.”

9All you animals of the field, come to devour, all you animals in the forest.

10His watchmen are blind. They are all without knowledge. They are all mute dogs. They can’t bark— dreaming, lying down, loving to slumber.

11Yes, the dogs are greedy. They can never have enough. They are shepherds who can’t understand. They have all turned to their own way, each one to his gain, from every quarter.

12“Come,” they say, “I will get wine, and we will fill ourselves with strong drink; and tomorrow will be as today, great beyond measure.”

1The righteous perish, and no one lays it to heart. Merciful men are taken away, and no one considers that the righteous is taken away from the evil.

2He enters into peace. They rest in their beds, each one who walks in his uprightness.

3“But draw near here, you sons of a sorceress, you offspring of adulterers and prostitutes.

4Whom do you mock? Against whom do you make a wide mouth and stick out your tongue? Aren’t you children of disobedience and offspring of falsehood,

5you who inflame yourselves among the oaks, under every green tree; who kill the children in the valleys, under the clefts of the rocks?

6Among the smooth stones of the valley is your portion. They, they are your lot. You have even poured a drink offering to them. You have offered an offering. Shall I be appeased for these things?

7On a high and lofty mountain you have set your bed. You also went up there to offer sacrifice.

8You have set up your memorial behind the doors and the posts, for you have exposed yourself to someone besides me, and have gone up. You have enlarged your bed and made you a covenant with them. You loved what you saw on their bed.

9You went to the king with oil, increased your perfumes, sent your ambassadors far off, and degraded yourself even to Sheol.

10You were wearied with the length of your ways; yet you didn’t say, ‘It is in vain.’ You found a reviving of your strength; therefore you weren’t faint.

11“Whom have you dreaded and feared, so that you lie, and have not remembered me, nor laid it to your heart? Haven’t I held my peace for a long time, and you don’t fear me?

12I will declare your righteousness; and as for your works, they will not benefit you.

13When you cry, let those whom you have gathered deliver you, but the wind will take them. A breath will carry them all away, but he who takes refuge in me will possess the land, and will inherit my holy mountain.”

14He will say, “Build up, build up, prepare the way! Remove the stumbling-block out of the way of my people.”

15For the high and lofty One who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy, says: “I dwell in the high and holy place, with him also who is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite.

16For I will not contend forever, neither will I always be angry; for the spirit would faint before me, and the souls whom I have made.

17I was angry because of the iniquity of his covetousness and struck him. I hid myself and was angry; and he went on backsliding in the way of his heart.

18I have seen his ways, and will heal him. I will lead him also, and restore comforts to him and to his mourners.

19I create the fruit of the lips: Peace, peace, to him who is far off and to him who is near,” says Yahweh; “and I will heal them.”

20But the wicked are like the troubled sea; for it can’t rest and its waters cast up mire and mud.

21“There is no peace”, says my God, “for the wicked.”

1“Cry aloud! Don’t spare! Lift up your voice like a trumpet! Declare to my people their disobedience, and to the house of Jacob their sins.

2Yet they seek me daily, and delight to know my ways. As a nation that did righteousness, and didn’t forsake the ordinance of their God, they ask of me righteous judgments. They delight to draw near to God.

3‘Why have we fasted,’ they say, ‘and you don’t see? Why have we afflicted our soul, and you don’t notice?’ “Behold, in the day of your fast you find pleasure, and oppress all your laborers.

4Behold, you fast for strife and contention, and to strike with the fist of wickedness. You don’t fast today so as to make your voice to be heard on high.

5Is this the fast that I have chosen? A day for a man to humble his soul? Is it to bow down his head like a reed, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under himself? Will you call this a fast, and an acceptable day to Yahweh?

6“Isn’t this the fast that I have chosen: to release the bonds of wickedness, to undo the straps of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and that you break every yoke?

7Isn’t it to distribute your bread to the hungry, and that you bring the poor who are cast out to your house? When you see the naked, that you cover him; and that you not hide yourself from your own flesh?

8Then your light will break out as the morning, and your healing will appear quickly; then your righteousness shall go before you, and Yahweh’s glory will be your rear guard.

9Then you will call, and Yahweh will answer. You will cry for help, and he will say, ‘Here I am.’ “If you take away from among you the yoke, finger pointing, and speaking wickedly;

10and if you pour out your soul to the hungry, and satisfy the afflicted soul, then your light will rise in darkness, and your obscurity will be as the noonday;

11and Yahweh will guide you continually, satisfy your soul in dry places, and make your bones strong. You will be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water whose waters don’t fail.

12Those who will be of you will build the old waste places. You will raise up the foundations of many generations. You will be called Repairer of the Breach, Restorer of Paths with Dwellings.

13“If you turn away your foot from the Sabbath, from doing your pleasure on my holy day, and call the Sabbath a delight, and the holy of Yahweh honorable, and honor it, not doing your own ways, nor finding your own pleasure, nor speaking your own words,

14then you will delight yourself in Yahweh, and I will make you to ride on the high places of the earth, and I will feed you with the heritage of Jacob your father;” for Yahweh’s mouth has spoken it.

1Behold, Yahweh’s hand is not shortened, that it can’t save; nor his ear dull, that it can’t hear.

2But your iniquities have separated you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear.

3For your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity. Your lips have spoken lies. Your tongue mutters wickedness.

4No one sues in righteousness, and no one pleads in truth. They trust in vanity and speak lies. They conceive mischief and give birth to iniquity.

5They hatch adders’ eggs and weave the spider’s web. He who eats of their eggs dies; and that which is crushed breaks out into a viper.

6Their webs won’t become garments. They won’t cover themselves with their works. Their works are works of iniquity, and acts of violence are in their hands.

7Their feet run to evil, and they hurry to shed innocent blood. Their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity. Desolation and destruction are in their paths.

8They don’t know the way of peace; and there is no justice in their ways. They have made crooked paths for themselves; whoever goes in them doesn’t know peace.

9Therefore justice is far from us, and righteousness doesn’t overtake us. We look for light, but see darkness; for brightness, but we walk in obscurity.

10We grope for the wall like the blind. Yes, we grope as those who have no eyes. We stumble at noon as if it were twilight. Among those who are strong, we are like dead men.

11We all roar like bears and moan sadly like doves. We look for justice, but there is none, for salvation, but it is far off from us.

12For our transgressions are multiplied before you, and our sins testify against us; for our transgressions are with us, and as for our iniquities, we know them:

13transgressing and denying Yahweh, and turning away from following our God, speaking oppression and revolt, conceiving and uttering from the heart words of falsehood.

14Justice is turned away backward, and righteousness stands far away; for truth has fallen in the street, and uprightness can’t enter.

15Yes, truth is lacking; and he who departs from evil makes himself a prey. Yahweh saw it, and it displeased him that there was no justice.

16He saw that there was no man, and wondered that there was no intercessor. Therefore his own arm brought salvation to him; and his righteousness sustained him.

17He put on righteousness as a breastplate, and a helmet of salvation on his head. He put on garments of vengeance for clothing, and was clad with zeal as a mantle.

18According to their deeds, he will repay as appropriate: wrath to his adversaries, recompense to his enemies. He will repay the islands their due.

19So they will fear Yahweh’s name from the west, and his glory from the rising of the sun; for he will come as a rushing stream, which Yahweh’s breath drives.

20“A Redeemer will come to Zion, and to those who turn from disobedience in Jacob,” says Yahweh.

21“As for me, this is my covenant with them,” says Yahweh. “My Spirit who is on you, and my words which I have put in your mouth shall not depart out of your mouth, nor out of the mouth of your offspring, nor out of the mouth of your offspring’s offspring,” says Yahweh, “from now on and forever.”