Isaiah 27–28

Chapter 27

¹In that day Jehovah, with his sore and great and strong sword, will visit leviathan the fleeing serpent, and leviathan the crooked serpent; and he will slay the monster that is in the sea. ²In that day there shall be a vineyard of pure wine; sing concerning it: ³I Jehovah keep it, I will water it every moment; lest any harm it, I will keep it night and day. ⁴Fury is not in me. Oh that I had briars and thorns in battle against me! I would march against them, I would burn them together. ⁵Or let him take hold of my strength; let him make peace with me: yea, let him make peace with me. ⁶In the future Jacob shall take root; Israel shall blossom and bud, and they shall fill the face of the world with fruit.

⁷Hath he smitten him according to the smiting of those that smote him? Is he slain according to the slaughter of those slain by him? ⁸In measure, when sending her away, didst thou contend with her: he hath taken her away with his rough wind in the day of the east wind. ⁹By this, therefore, shall the iniquity of Jacob be purged; and this is all the fruit of the taking away of his sin: when he shall make all the stones of the altar as chalkstones that are crumbled in pieces, —the Asherahs and the sun-images shall not stand. ¹⁰For the fortified city is solitary, a habitation abandoned and forsaken like a wilderness; there shall the calf feed, and there shall he lie down, and consume its boughs. ¹¹When its branches are withered they shall be broken off; women shall come and set them on fire. For it is a people of no intelligence; therefore he that made them will not have mercy on them, and he who formed them will shew them no favour. ¹²And it shall come to pass in that day, that Jehovah shall beat out from the flood of the river unto the torrent of Egypt, and ye shall be gathered one by one, ye children of Israel. ¹³And it shall come to pass in that day, that the great trumpet shall be blown; and they shall come that were perishing in the land of Assyria, and the outcasts in the land of Egypt, and they shall worship Jehovah in the holy mountain at Jerusalem.

Chapter 28

¹Woe to the crown of pride of the drunkards of Ephraim, and to the fading flower of his glorious adornment, 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 storm of hail and a destroying tempest; as a storm of mighty waters overflowing, shall he cast down to the earth with might. ³The crown of pride of the drunkards of Ephraim shall be trodden under feet; ⁴and the fading flower of his glorious adornment which is on the head of the fat valley shall be like an early fig before the summer: as soon as he that seeth it perceiveth it, scarcely is it in his hand, he swalloweth it down. ⁵In that day will Jehovah of hosts be for a crown of glory, and for a diadem of beauty, unto the remnant of his people; ⁶and for a spirit of judgment to him that sitteth in judgment, and for strength to them that turn the battle to the gate. ⁷But these also have erred through wine, and through strong drink are they gone astray. The priest and the prophet have erred through strong drink; they are overpowered by wine, they are gone astray through strong drink; they have erred in vision, they have stumbled in judgment. ⁸For all tables are full of filthy vomit, so that there is no more place.

⁹Whom shall he teach knowledge? and whom shall he make to understand the report? Them that are weaned from the milk, withdrawn from the breasts? ¹⁰For it is precept upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, there a little. … ¹¹For with stammering lips and a strange tongue will he speak to this people; ¹²to whom he said, This is the rest: cause the weary to rest; and this is the refreshing. But they would not hear. ¹³And the word of Jehovah was unto them precept upon precept, precept upon precept, line upon line, line upon line, here a little, there a little: that they might go, and fall backward, and be broken, and snared, and taken.

¹⁴Therefore hear the word of Jehovah, ye scornful men, that rule this people which is in Jerusalem. ¹⁵For ye have said, We have made a covenant with death, and with Sheol have we made an 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 for foundation in Zion a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner-stone, a sure foundation: he that trusteth shall not make haste. ¹⁷And I will appoint judgment for a line, and righteousness for a 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, ye shall be trodden down by it. ¹⁹As it passeth through it shall take you; for morning by morning shall it pass through, by day and by night; and it shall be terror only to understand the report. ²⁰For the bed is too short to stretch oneself on, and the covering too narrow when he would wrap himself in it. ²¹For Jehovah will rise up as on mount Perazim, he will be moved with anger as in the valley of Gibeon; that he may do his work, his strange work, and perform his act, his unwonted act. ²²Now therefore be ye not scorners, lest your bonds be made strong; for I have heard from the Lord Jehovah of hosts a consumption, and one determined, upon the whole land.

²³Give ear, and hear my voice; hearken, and hear my speech. ²⁴Doth the ploughman plough all day to sow? Is he all day opening and breaking the clods of his land? ²⁵Doth he not, when he hath levelled the face thereof, cast abroad dill, and scatter cummin, and set the wheat in rows, and the barley in an appointed place, and the rye in its border? ²⁶His God doth instruct him in his judgment, he doth teach him. ²⁷For the dill is not threshed with a threshing instrument, neither is a cart-wheel turned about upon the cummin; but dill is beaten out with a staff, and cummin with a rod. ²⁸Bread corn is crushed, because he will not ever be threshing it; and if he drove the wheels of his cart and his horses over it, he would not crush it. ²⁹This also cometh forth from Jehovah of hosts; he is wonderful in counsel, great in wisdom.