Isaiah 17–23

Chapter 17

¹An oracle concerning Damascus.

Behold, Damascus will cease to be a city,

and will become a heap of ruins.

²Her cities will be deserted for ever;^e

they will be for flocks,

which will lie down, and none will make them afraid.

³The fortress will disappear from Ephraim,

and the kingdom from Damascus;

and the remnant of Syria will be

like the glory of the children of Israel, says the Lord of hosts.

⁴And in that day

the glory of Jacob will be brought low,

and the fat of his flesh will grow lean.

⁵And it shall be as when the reaper gathers standing grain

and his arm harvests the ears,

and as when one gleans the ears of grain

in the Valley of Rephaim.

⁶Gleanings will be left in it,

as when an olive tree is beaten—

two or three berries

in the top of the highest bough,

four or five

on the branches of a fruit tree, says the Lord God of Israel.

⁷In that day men will regard their Maker, and their eyes will look to the Holy One of Israel; ⁸they will not have regard for the altars, the work of their hands, and they will not look to what their own fingers have made, either the Asherim or the altars of incense.

⁹In that day their strong cities will be like the deserted places of the Hivites and the Amorites, which they deserted because of the children of Israel, and there will be desolation.

¹⁰For you have forgotten the God of your salvation,

and have not remembered the Rock of your refuge;

therefore, though you plant pleasant plants

and set out slips of an alien god,

¹¹though you make them grow on the day that you plant them,

and make them blossom in the morning that you sow;

yet the harvest will flee away

in a day of grief and incurable pain.

¹²Ah, the thunder of many peoples,

they thunder like the thundering of the sea!

Ah, the roar of nations,

they roar like the roaring of mighty waters!

¹³The nations roar like the roaring of many waters,

but he will rebuke them, and they will flee far away,

chased like chaff on the mountains before the wind

and whirling dust before the storm.

¹⁴At evening time, behold, terror!

Before morning, they are no more!

This is the portion of those who despoil us,

and the lot of those who plunder us.

Chapter 18

¹Ah, land of whirring wings which is beyond the rivers of Ethiopia;

²which sends ambassadors by the Nile,

in vessels of papyrus upon the waters!

Go, you swift messengers,

to a nation, tall and smooth,

to a people feared near and far, a nation mighty and conquering,

whose land the rivers divide.

³All you inhabitants of the world,

you who dwell on the earth,

when a signal is raised on the mountains, look!

When a trumpet is blown, hear!

⁴For thus the Lord said to me:

“I will quietly look from my dwelling

like clear heat in sunshine,

like a cloud of dew in the heat of harvest.”

⁵For before the harvest, when the blossom is over,

and the flower becomes a ripening grape,

he will cut off the shoots with pruning hooks,

and the spreading branches he will hew away.

⁶They shall all of them be left

to the birds of prey of the mountains

and to the beasts of the earth.

And the birds of prey will summer upon them,

and all the beasts of the earth will winter upon them.

⁷At that time gifts will be brought to the Lord of hosts

from a people tall and smooth,

from a people feared near and far,

a nation mighty and conquering,

whose land the rivers divide, to Mount Zion, the place of the name of the Lord of hosts.

Chapter 19

¹An oracle concerning Egypt.

Behold, the Lord is riding on a swift cloud

and comes to Egypt;

and the idols of Egypt will tremble at his presence,

and the heart of the Egyptians will melt within them.

²And I will stir up Egyptians against Egyptians,

and they will fight, every man against his brother

and every man against his neighbor,

city against city, kingdom against kingdom;

³and the spirit of the Egyptians within them will be emptied out,

and I will confound their plans;

and they will consult the idols and the sorcerers,

and the mediums and the wizards;

⁴and I will give over the Egyptians

into the hand of a hard master;

and a fierce king will rule over them,

says the Lord, the Lord of hosts.

⁵And the waters of the Nile will be dried up,

and the river will be parched and dry;

⁶and its canals will become foul,

and the branches of Egypt’s Nile will diminish and dry up,

reeds and rushes will rot away.

⁷There will be bare places by the Nile,

on the brink of the Nile,

and all that is sown by the Nile will dry up,

be driven away, and be no more.

⁸The fishermen will mourn and lament,

all who cast hook in the Nile;

and they will languish

who spread nets upon the water.

⁹The workers in combed flax will be in despair,

and the weavers of white cotton.

¹⁰Those who are the pillars of the land will be crushed,

and all who work for hire will be grieved.

¹¹The princes of Zoan are utterly foolish;

the wise counselors of Pharaoh give stupid counsel.

How can you say to Pharaoh,

“I am a son of the wise,

a son of ancient kings”?

¹²Where then are your wise men?

Let them tell you and make known what the Lord of hosts has purposed against Egypt.

¹³The princes of Zoan have become fools,

and the princes of Memphis are deluded;

those who are the cornerstones of her tribes

have led Egypt astray.

¹⁴The Lord has mingled within her a spirit of confusion;

and they have made Egypt stagger in all her doings

as a drunken man staggers in his vomit.

¹⁵And there will be nothing for Egypt

which head or tail, palm branch or reed, may do.

¹⁶In that day the Egyptians will be like women, and tremble with fear before the hand which the Lord of hosts shakes over them. ¹⁷And the land of Judah will become a terror to the Egyptians; every one to whom it is mentioned will fear because of the purpose which the Lord of hosts has purposed against them.

¹⁸In that day there will be five cities in the land of Egypt which speak the language of Canaan and swear allegiance to the Lord of hosts. One of these will be called the City of the Sun.

¹⁹In that day there will be an altar to the Lord in the midst of the land of Egypt, and a pillar to the Lord at its border. ²⁰It will be a sign and a witness to the Lord of hosts in the land of Egypt; when they cry to the Lord because of oppressors he will send them a savior, and will defend and deliver them. ²¹And the Lord will make himself known to the Egyptians; and the Egyptians will know the Lord in that day and worship with sacrifice and burnt offering, and they will make vows to the Lord and perform them. ²²And the Lord will smite Egypt, smiting and healing, and they will return to the Lord, and he will heed their supplications and heal them.

²³In that day there will be a highway from Egypt to Assyria, and the Assyrian will come into Egypt, and the Egyptian into Assyria, and the Egyptians will worship with the Assyrians.

²⁴In that day Israel will be the third with Egypt and Assyria, a blessing in the midst of the earth, ²⁵whom the Lord of hosts has blessed, saying, “Blessed be Egypt my people, and Assyria the work of my hands, and Israel my heritage.”

Chapter 20

¹In the year that the commander in chief, who was sent by Sargon the king of Assyria, came to Ashdod and fought against it and took it,— ²at that time the Lord had spoken by Isaiah the son of Amoz, saying, “Go, and loose the sackcloth from your loins and take off your shoes from your feet,” and he had done so, walking naked and barefoot— ³the Lord said, “As my servant Isaiah has walked naked and barefoot for three years as a sign and a portent against Egypt and Ethiopia, ⁴so shall the king of Assyria lead away the Egyptians captives and the Ethiopians exiles, both the young and the old, naked and barefoot, with buttocks uncovered, to the shame of Egypt. ⁵Then they shall be dismayed and confounded because of Ethiopia their hope and of Egypt their boast. ⁶And the inhabitants of this coastland will say in that day, ‘Behold, this is what has happened to those in whom we hoped and to whom we fled for help to be delivered from the king of Assyria! And we, how shall we escape?’ ”

Chapter 21

¹The oracle concerning the wilderness of the sea.

As whirlwinds in the Negeb sweep on,

it comes from the desert,

from a terrible land.

²A stern vision is told to me;

the plunderer plunders,

and the destroyer destroys.

Go up, O Elam,

lay siege, O Media;

all the sighing she has caused

I bring to an end.

³Therefore my loins are filled with anguish;

pangs have seized me,

like the pangs of a woman in travail;

I am bowed down so that I cannot hear,

I am dismayed so that I cannot see.

⁴My mind reels, horror has appalled me;

the twilight I longed for

has been turned for me into trembling.

⁵They prepare the table,

they spread the rugs,

they eat, they drink.

Arise, O princes,

oil the shield!

⁶For thus the Lord said to me:

“Go, set a watchman,

let him announce what he sees.

⁷When he sees riders, horsemen in pairs,

riders on asses, riders on camels,

let him listen diligently,

very diligently.”

⁸Then he who saw^g cried:

“Upon a watchtower I stand, O Lord,

continually by day,

and at my post I am stationed

whole nights.

⁹And, behold, here come riders,

horsemen in pairs!”

And he answered,

“Fallen, fallen is Babylon;

and all the images of her gods

he has shattered to the ground.”

¹⁰O my threshed and winnowed one,

what I have heard from the Lord of hosts,

the God of Israel, I announce to you.

¹¹The oracle concerning Dumah.

One is calling to me from Seir,

“Watchman, what of the night?

Watchman, what of the night?”

¹²The watchman says:

“Morning comes, and also the night.

If you will inquire, inquire;

come back again.”

¹³The oracle concerning Arabia.

In the thickets in Arabia you will lodge,

O caravans of Dedanites.

¹⁴To the thirsty bring water,

meet the fugitive with bread,

O inhabitants of the land of Tema.

¹⁵For they have fled from the swords,

from the drawn sword,

from the bent bow,

and from the press of battle.

¹⁶For thus the Lord said to me, “Within a year, according to the years of a hireling, all the…