Isaiah 27–28

27In that day Jehovah with his hard and great and strong sword will punish leviathan the swift serpent, and leviathan the crooked serpent; and he will slay the monster that is in the sea.

²In that day: A vineyard of wine, sing ye unto it. ³I Jehovah am its keeper; I will water it every moment: lest any hurt it, I will keep it night and day. ⁴Wrath is not in me: would that the briers and thorns were against me in battle! I would march upon them, I would burn them together. ⁵Or else let him take hold of my strength, that he may make peace with me; yea, let him make peace with me. ⁶In days to come shall Jacob take root; Israel shall blossom and bud; and they shall fill the face of the world with fruit.

⁷Hath he smitten them as he smote those that smote them? or are they slain according to the slaughter of them that were slain by them? ⁸In measure, when thou sendest them away, thou dost contend with them; he hath removed them with his rough blast in the day of the east wind. ⁹Therefore by this shall the iniquity of Jacob be forgiven, and this is all the fruit of taking away his sin: that he maketh all the stones of the altar as chalkstones that are beaten in sunder, so that the Asherim and the sun-images shall rise no more. ¹⁰For the fortified city is solitary, a habitation deserted and forsaken, like the wilderness: there shall the calf feed, and there shall he lie down, and consume the branches thereof. ¹¹When the boughs thereof are withered, they shall be broken off; the women shall come, and set them on fire; for it is a people of no understanding: therefore he that made them will not have compassion upon them, and he that formed them will show them no favor.

¹²And it shall come to pass in that day, that Jehovah will beat off his fruit from the flood of the River unto the brook of Egypt; and ye shall be gathered one by one, O ye children of Israel.

¹³And it shall come to pass in that day, that a great trumpet shall be blown; and they shall come that were ready to perish in the land of Assyria, and they that were outcasts in the land of Egypt; and they shall worship Jehovah in the holy mountain at Jerusalem.

28Woe to the crown of pride of the drunkards of Ephraim, and to the fading flower of his glorious beauty, which is on the head of the fat valley of them that are overcome with wine! ²Behold, the Lord hath a mighty and strong one; as a tempest of hail, a destroying storm, as a tempest of mighty waters overflowing, will he cast down to the earth with the hand. ³The crown of pride of the drunkards of Ephraim shall be trodden under foot: ⁴and the fading flower of his glorious beauty, which is on the head of the fat valley, shall be as the first-ripe fig before the summer; which when he that looketh upon it seeth, while it is yet in his hand he eateth it up. ⁵In that day will Jehovah of hosts become a crown of glory, and a diadem of beauty, unto the residue of his people; ⁶and a spirit of justice to him that sitteth in judgment, and strength to them that turn back the battle at the gate.

⁷And even these reel with wine, and stagger with strong drink; the priest and the prophet reel with strong drink, they are swallowed up of wine, they stagger with strong drink; they err in vision, they stumble in judgment. ⁸For all tables are full of vomit and filthiness, so that there is no place clean.

⁹Whom will he teach knowledge? and whom will he make to understand the message? them that are weaned from the milk, and drawn from the breasts? ¹⁰For it is precept upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, there a little.

¹¹Nay, but by men of strange lips and with another tongue will he speak to this people; ¹²to whom he said, This is the rest, give ye rest to him that is weary; and this is the refreshing: yet they would not hear. ¹³Therefore shall the word of Jehovah be unto them precept upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, there a little; that they may go, and fall backward, and be broken, and snared, and taken.

¹⁴Wherefore hear the word of Jehovah, ye scoffers, that rule this people that is in Jerusalem: ¹⁵Because ye have said, We have made a covenant with death, and with Sheol are we at agreement; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, it shall not come unto us; for we have made lies our refuge, and under falsehood have we hid ourselves: ¹⁶therefore thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner-stone of sure foundation: he that believeth shall not be in haste. ¹⁷And I will make justice the line, and righteousness the plummet; and the hail shall sweep away the refuge of lies, and the waters shall overflow the hiding-place. ¹⁸And your covenant with death shall be annulled, and your agreement with Sheol shall not stand; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, then ye shall be trodden down by it. ¹⁹As often as it passeth through, it shall take you; for morning by morning shall it pass through, by day and by night: and it shall be nought but terror to understand the message. ²⁰For the bed is shorter than that a man can stretch himself on it; and the covering narrower than that he can wrap himself in it. ²¹For Jehovah will rise up as in mount Perazim, he will be wroth as in the valley of Gibeon; that he may do his work, his strange work, and bring to pass his act, his strange act. ²²Now therefore be ye not scoffers, lest your bonds be made strong; for a decree of destruction have I heard from the Lord, Jehovah of hosts, upon the whole earth.

²³Give ye ear, and hear my voice; hearken, and hear my speech. ²⁴Doth he that ploweth to sow plow continually? doth he continually open and harrow his ground? ²⁵When he hath levelled the face thereof, doth he not cast abroad the fitches, and scatter the cummin, and put in the wheat in rows, and the barley in the appointed place, and the spelt in the border thereof? ²⁶For his God doth instruct him aright, and doth teach him. ²⁷For the fitches are not threshed with a sharp threshing instrument, neither is a cart wheel turned about upon the cummin; but the fitches are beaten out with a staff, and the cummin with a rod. ²⁸Bread grain is ground; for he will not be always threshing it: and though the wheel of his cart and his horses scatter it, he doth not grind it. ²⁹This also cometh forth from Jehovah of hosts, who is wonderful in counsel, and excellent in wisdom.