Isaiah 29
1“Ah, Ariel, Ariel,City where David camped!Add year to year,Let festivals come in their cycles!
2And I will harass Ariel,And there shall be sorrow and sighing.She shall be to Me like Ariel.
3And I will camp against you round about; I will lay siege to you with a mound, And I will set up siegeworks against you.
4And you shall speak from lower than the ground,Your speech shall be humbler than the sod;Your speech shall sound like a ghost’s from the ground,Your voice shall chirp from the sod.
5And like fine dust shall beThe multitude of your strangers; And like flying chaff,The multitude of tyrants.”And suddenly, in an instant,
6She shall be remembered of GOD of HostsWith roaring, and shaking, and deafening noise,Storm, and tempest, and blaze of consuming fire.
7Then, like a dream, a vision of the night,Shall be the multitude of nationsThat war upon Ariel,And all her besiegers, and the siegeworks against her,And those who harass her.
8Like someone hungry who dreams of eating,But wakes up still hungry;And like someone thirsty who dreams of drinking,But wakes faintAnd utterly parched—So shall be all the multitude of nationsThat war upon Mount Zion.
9Act stupid and be stupefied!Act blind and be blinded!(They are drunk, but not from wine,They stagger, but not from liquor.)
10For GOD has spread over youA spirit of deep sleep,And has shut your eyes, the prophets,And covered your heads, the seers;
11So that all prophecy has been to youLike the words of a sealed document.If it is handed to one who can read with a request to read it, the response will be, “I can’t, because it is sealed”;
12and if the document is handed with the same request to one who cannot read, the response will be, “I can’t read.”
13My Sovereign said:Because that people has approached [Me] with its mouthAnd honored Me with its lips,But has kept its heart far from Me,And its worship of Me has beenA social obligation, learned by rote—
14Truly, I shall further baffle that peopleWith bafflement upon bafflement;And the wisdom of its wise shall fail,And the prudence of its prudent shall vanish.
15Ha! Those who would hide their plansDeep from GOD!Who do their work in dark placesAnd say, “Who sees us, who takes note of us?”
16How perverse of you!Should the potter be accounted as the clay? Should what is made say of its Maker,“This One did not make me,”And what is formed say of the One who formed it,“That One did not understand”?
17Surely, in a little while,Lebanon will be transformed into farmland,And farmland accounted as mere brush.
18In that day, the deaf shall hear even written words,And the eyes of the blind shall seeEven in darkness and obscurity.
19Then the humble shall have increasing joy through GOD,And the neediest of people shall exultIn the Holy One of Israel.
20For the tyrant shall be no more,The scoffer shall cease to be;And those diligent for evil shall be wiped out,
21Who cause people to lose their lawsuits,Laying a snare for the arbiter at the gate,And wronging by falsehoodOne who was in the right.
22Assuredly, thus said GOD to the House of Jacob, Who redeemed Abraham: No more shall Jacob be shamed,No longer his face grow pale.
23For when he—that is, his progeny—behold what My hands have wrought in his midst, they will hallow My name.They will hallow the Holy One of JacobAnd stand in awe of the God of Israel.
24And the confused shall acquire insightAnd grumblers accept instruction.