Isaiah 59:2–13

²Rather, your iniquities have been barriers^c between you and your God,

and your sins have hidden his face from you, from hearing.

³For your hands are defiled with blood,

and your fingers with iniquity.

Your lips have spoken lies,

your tongue speaks wickedness.

⁴There is nobody who pleads with^d justice,

and there is nobody who judges with honesty.

They rely on nothing

and speak vanity.

They conceive trouble

and beget iniquity;

⁵they hatch viper eggs,

and they weave a spider web.

One who eats their eggs dies,

and that which is pressed is hatched as a serpent.

⁶Their webs cannot become clothing,

and they cannot cover themselves with their works.

Their works are works of iniquity,

and deeds^e of violence are in their hands.

⁷Their feet run to evil,

and they hasten to shed innocent blood.

Their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity;

devastation and destruction are in their highways.

⁸They do not know the way of peace,

and there is no justice in their firm paths.

They have made their paths crooked for themselves;

everyone who walks^f in it knows no peace.

⁹Therefore justice is far from us,

and righteousness does not reach us.

We wait for light, but^g look! there is darkness;

for brightness, but we walk in darkness.

¹⁰We grope like the blind along a wall,

and we grope as without^h eyes.

We stumble at noon as in the twilight;

among the strong we are like the dead.

¹¹We all groan like bears,

and we coo mutteringly like doves.

We wait for justice, butⁱ there is none;

for salvation, but it is far from us.

¹²For our transgressions are numerous before you,

and our sins testify^j against us.

Indeed, our transgressions are with us,

and we know our iniquities:

¹³transgressing and denying Yahweh,

and turning away from following^k our God;

speaking oppression and falsehood,

conceiving and uttering words of deception from the heart.