Isaiah 8–10

Chapter 8

¹And Jehovah said to me, Take thee a great tablet, and write thereon with a man’s style, concerning Maher-shalal-hash-baz. ²And I took unto me to witness, sure witnesses, Urijah the priest, and Zechariah the son of Jeberechiah. ³And I came near to the prophetess, and she conceived and bore a son; and Jehovah said unto me, Call his name, Maher-shalal-hash-baz. ⁴For before the lad knoweth to cry, My father! and, My mother! the riches of Damascus and the spoil of Samaria shall be taken away before the king of Assyria. ⁵And Jehovah spoke again to me, saying, ⁶Forasmuch as this people refuseth the waters of Shiloah which flow softly, and rejoiceth in Rezin and in the son of Remaliah, ⁷therefore behold, the Lord will bring up upon them the waters of the river, strong and many, the king of Assyria and all his glory; and he shall mount up over all his channels, and go over all his banks: ⁸and he shall pass through Judah; he shall overflow it and go further, he shall reach even to the neck; and the stretching out of his wings shall fill the breadth of thy land, O Immanuel!

⁹Rage, ye peoples, and be broken in pieces! And give ear, all ye distant parts of the earth: Gird yourselves, and be broken in pieces; gird yourselves, and be broken in pieces! ¹⁰Settle a plan, and it shall come to nought; speak a word, and it shall not stand: for •God is with us. ¹¹For Jehovah spoke thus to me with a strong hand, and he instructed me not to walk in the way of this people, saying, ¹²Ye shall not say, Conspiracy, of everything of which this people saith, Conspiracy; and fear ye not their fear, and be not in dread. ¹³Jehovah of hosts, him shall ye sanctify; and let him be your fear, and let him be your dread. ¹⁴And he will be for a sanctuary; and for a stone of stumbling, and for a rock of offence to both the houses of Israel, for a gin and for a snare to the inhabitants of Jerusalem. ¹⁵And many among them shall stumble, and fall, and be broken, and snared, and taken.

¹⁶Bind up the testimony, seal the law among my disciples. ¹⁷And I will wait for Jehovah, who hideth his face from the house of Jacob; and I will look for him. ¹⁸Behold, I and the children that Jehovah hath given me are for signs and for wonders in Israel, from Jehovah of hosts, who dwelleth in mount Zion. ¹⁹And when they shall say unto you, Seek unto the necromancers and unto the soothsayers, who chirp and who mutter, say, Shall not a people seek unto their God? Will they go for the living unto the dead? ²⁰To the law and the testimony! If they speak not according to this word, for them there is no daybreak. ²¹And they shall pass through it, hard pressed and hungry; and it shall come to pass when they are hungry, they will fret themselves, and curse their king and their God, and will gaze upward: ²²and they will look to the earth; and behold, trouble and darkness, gloom of anguish; and they shall be driven into thick darkness.

Chapter 9

¹Nevertheless the darkness shall not be as when the distress was in the land, at the time he at first lightly, and afterwards heavily, visited the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, —the way of the sea, beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the nations: ²the people that walked in darkness have seen a great light; they that dwelt in the land of the shadow of death, upon them light hath shone. ³Thou hast multiplied the nation, hast increased its joy: they joy before thee like to the joy in harvest; as men rejoice when they divide the spoil. ⁴For thou hast broken the yoke of his burden and the staff of his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor, as in the day of Midian. ⁵For every boot of him that is shod for the tumult, and the garment rolled in blood, shall be for burning, fuel for fire. ⁶For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder; and his name is called Wonderful, Counsellor, Mighty •God, Father of Eternity, Prince of Peace. ⁷Of the increase of his government and of peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it, and to uphold it with judgment and with righteousness, from henceforth even for ever. The zeal of Jehovah of hosts will perform this.

⁸The Lord sent a word unto Jacob, and it lighteth upon Israel. ⁹And all the people shall know it, Ephraim and the inhabitant of Samaria, that say in pride and stoutness of heart, ¹⁰The bricks are fallen down, but we will build with hewn stones; the sycamore trees are cut down, but we will replace them with cedars. ¹¹And Jehovah will set up the adversaries of Rezin against him, and arm his enemies, ¹²the Syrians on the east, and the Philistines on the west; and they shall devour Israel with open mouth. For all this his anger is not turned away, and his hand is stretched out still. ¹³But the people turneth not unto him that smiteth them, and they do not seek Jehovah of hosts. ¹⁴And Jehovah will cut off from Israel head and tail, palm-branch and rush, in one day: ¹⁵the ancient and honourable, he is the head; and the prophet that teacheth lies, he is the tail. ¹⁶For the guides of this people mislead them; and they that are guided by them are swallowed up. ¹⁷Therefore the Lord will not rejoice in their young men, neither will he have mercy on their fatherless and on their widows; for every one is a hypocrite and an evildoer, and every mouth speaketh folly. For all this his anger is not turned away, and his hand is stretched out still. ¹⁸For wickedness burneth as a fire: it devoureth briars and thorns, and kindleth in the thickets of the forest, and they go rolling up like a pillar of smoke. ¹⁹Through the wrath of Jehovah of hosts is the land burned up, and the people is as fuel for fire: a man spareth not his brother; ²⁰and he snatcheth on the right hand, and is hungry, and eateth on the left hand; and they are not satisfied. They eat every man the flesh of his own arm: ²¹Manasseh, Ephraim, and Ephraim, Manasseh; and they together are against Judah. For all this his anger is not turned away, and his hand is stretched out still.

Chapter 10

¹Woe unto them that decree iniquitous decrees, and to the writers that prescribe oppression, ²to turn away the poor from judgment, and to take away the right from the afflicted of my people; that widows may be their prey, and that they may rob the fatherless! ³And what will ye do in the day of visitation, and in the sudden destruction which shall come from far? To whom will ye flee for help, and where will ye leave your glory? ⁴They can but crouch under the prisoners, and they shall fall under the slain. For all this his anger is not turned away, and his hand is stretched out still.

⁵Ah! the Assyrian! the rod of mine anger! and the staff in their hand is mine indignation. ⁶I will send him against a hypocritical nation, and against the people of my wrath will I give him a charge; to take the spoil, and to seize the prey, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets. ⁷But he meaneth not so, neither doth his heart think so; for it is in his heart to extirpate and cut off nations not a few. ⁸For he saith, Are not my princes all kings? ⁹Is not Calno as Karkemish? Is not Hamath as Arpad? Is not Samaria as Damascus? ¹⁰As my hand hath found the kingdoms of the idols, —and their graven images exceeded those of Jerusalem and Samaria, ¹¹—shall I not, as I have done unto Samaria and her idols, so do to Jerusalem and her images? ¹²And it shall come to pass, when the Lord hath performed his whole work upon mount Zion and upon Jerusalem, I will punish the fruit of the stoutness of heart of the king of Assyria, and the glory of his high looks. ¹³For he saith, By the strength of my hand I have done it, and by my wisdom, for I am intelligent; and I have removed the bounds of the peoples, and have robbed their treasures, and, like a valiant man, I have brought down them that sit on thrones; ¹⁴and my hand hath found as a nest the riches of the peoples, and as one gathereth forsaken eggs, have I gathered all the earth; and there was none that moved the wing, or opened the mouth, or chirped. ¹⁵—Shall the axe boast itself against him that heweth therewith? shall the saw magnify itself against him that wieldeth it? As if the rod should wield them that lift it up; as if the staff should lift up him who is not wood! ¹⁶Therefore shall the Lord, Jehovah of hosts, send among his fat ones leanness, and under his glory he shall kindle a burning, like the burning of a fire: ¹⁷and the light of Israel shall be for a fire, and his Holy One for a flame; and it shall burn and devour his thorns and his briars in one day, ¹⁸and it shall consume the glory of his forest, and of his fruitful field, both soul and body; and they shall be as when a sick man fainteth. ¹⁹And the remainder of the trees of his forest shall be few: yea, a child might write them.

²⁰And it shall come to pass in that day, that the remnant of Israel and such as are escaped of the house of Jacob shall no more again rely upon him that smote them; but they shall rely upon Jehovah, the Holy One of Israel, in truth. ²¹The remnant shall return, the remnant of Jacob, unto the mighty •God. ²²For though thy people Israel be as the sand of the sea, only a remnant of them shall return: the consumption determined shall overflow in righteousness. ²³For a consumption, and one determined, will the Lord, Jehovah of hosts, accomplish in the midst of all the land.

²⁴Therefore thus saith the Lord, Jehovah of hosts: O my people that dwellest in Zion, be not afraid of the Assyrian; he shall smite thee with a rod, and shall lift up his staff against thee, after the manner of Egypt: ²⁵for yet a very little while, and the indignation shall be accomplished, and mine anger, in their destruction. ²⁶And Jehovah of hosts will stir up a scourge against him, according to the slaughter of Midian at the rock of Oreb; and his rod shall be upon the sea, and he will lift it up after the manner of…