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1. A Rebellious Nation

¹ The vision concerning Judah and Jerusalem that Isaiah son of Amoz saw during the reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah, kings of Judah.

A Rebellious Nation

    ² Hear me, you heavens! Listen, earth!
   For the LORD has spoken:
“I reared children and brought them up,
   but they have rebelled against me.
³ The ox knows its master,
   the donkey its owner’s manger,
but Israel does not know,
   my people do not understand.”

    ⁴ Woe to the sinful nation,
   a people whose guilt is great,
a brood of evildoers,
   children given to corruption!
They have forsaken the LORD;
   they have spurned the Holy One of Israel
   and turned their backs on him.

    ⁵ Why should you be beaten anymore?
   Why do you persist in rebellion?
Your whole head is injured,
   your whole heart afflicted.
⁶ From the sole of your foot to the top of your head
   there is no soundness—
only wounds and welts
   and open sores,
not cleansed or bandaged
   or soothed with olive oil.

    ⁷ Your country is desolate,
   your cities burned with fire;
your fields are being stripped by foreigners
   right before you,
   laid waste as when overthrown by strangers.
⁸ Daughter Zion is left
   like a shelter in a vineyard,
like a hut in a cucumber field,
   like a city under siege.
⁹ Unless the LORD Almighty
   had left us some survivors,
we would have become like Sodom,
   we would have been like Gomorrah.

    ¹⁰ Hear the word of the LORD,
   you rulers of Sodom;
listen to the instruction of our God,
   you people of Gomorrah!
¹¹ “The multitude of your sacrifices—
   what are they to me?” says the LORD.
“I have more than enough of burnt offerings,
   of rams and the fat of fattened animals;
I have no pleasure
   in the blood of bulls and lambs and goats.
¹² When you come to appear before me,
   who has asked this of you,
   this trampling of my courts?
¹³ Stop bringing meaningless offerings!
   Your incense is detestable to me.
New Moons, Sabbaths and convocations—
   I cannot bear your worthless assemblies.
¹⁴ Your New Moon feasts and your appointed festivals
   I hate with all my being.
They have become a burden to me;
   I am weary of bearing them.
¹⁵ When you spread out your hands in prayer,
   I hide my eyes from you;
even when you offer many prayers,
   I am not listening.

Your hands are full of blood!

    ¹⁶ Wash and make yourselves clean.
   Take your evil deeds out of my sight;
   stop doing wrong.
¹⁷ Learn to do right; seek justice.
   Defend the oppressed. Or justice. / Correct the oppressor
Take up the cause of the fatherless;
   plead the case of the widow.

    ¹⁸ “Come now, let us settle the matter,”
   says the LORD.
“Though your sins are like scarlet,
   they shall be as white as snow;
though they are red as crimson,
   they shall be like wool.
¹⁹ If you are willing and obedient,
   you will eat the good things of the land;
²⁰ but if you resist and rebel,
   you will be devoured by the sword.” For the mouth of the LORD has spoken.

    ²¹ See how the faithful city
   has become a prostitute!
She once was full of justice;
   righteousness used to dwell in her—
   but now murderers!
²² Your silver has become dross,
   your choice wine is diluted with water.
²³ Your rulers are rebels,
   partners with thieves;
they all love bribes
   and chase after gifts.
They do not defend the cause of the fatherless;
   the widow’s case does not come before them.

    ²⁴ Therefore the Lord, the LORD Almighty,
   the Mighty One of Israel, declares:
“Ah! I will vent my wrath on my foes
   and avenge myself on my enemies.
²⁵ I will turn my hand against you; That is, against Jerusalem
   I will thoroughly purge away your dross
   and remove all your impurities.
²⁶ I will restore your leaders as in days of old,
   your rulers as at the beginning.
Afterward you will be called
   the City of Righteousness,
   the Faithful City.”

    ²⁷ Zion will be delivered with justice,
   her penitent ones with righteousness.
²⁸ But rebels and sinners will both be broken,
   and those who forsake the LORD will perish.

    ²⁹ “You will be ashamed because of the sacred oaks
   in which you have delighted;
you will be disgraced because of the gardens
   that you have chosen.
³⁰ You will be like an oak with fading leaves,
   like a garden without water.
³¹ The mighty man will become tinder
   and his work a spark;
both will burn together,
   with no one to quench the fire.”

8. And the daughter of Zion shall be left ²⁰²⁰ Residua manebit. as a cottage in a vineyard He alludes to a custom which exists in France, that the vinekeepers rear a cottage for themselves when the grapes begin to ripen. His next comparison, which is closely allied to the former, is taken from a custom of that nation of protecting also gardens of cucumbers ²¹²¹ A lively French traveler, Tavernier, who flourished about the middle of the seventeenth century, in describing the eastern shores of the Mediterranean Sea, gives the following account: — “There we see large beds of melons and of cucumbers, but especially of the latter, of which the inhabitants of the Levant are particularly fond. Most frequently they eat them without peeling, and afterwards drink a glass of water. Throughout the whole of Asia this is the ordinary food of the common people for three or four months. The whole family lives on it; and when a child asks for something to eat, instead of giving it bread, as in France and other places is the custom, in the Levant they offer it a cucumber, which it eats raw just as it has been fresh pulled. Cucumbers in the Levant have a peculiarly excellent flavour, and though they are eaten raw they never do any injury.” — Ed. by means of men who kept watch during the night. He next explains what he intended to convey by both comparisons.

Like a besieged city This may be explained in two ways; either that the whole country will be wasted, with the solitary exception of the city, which shall be left standing like a cottage, or that the city itself will be destroyed. The former interpretation is adopted by the Jews, and they understand this passage to relate to the siege of Sennacherib; but I think that it has a wider signification, and embraces other calamities which followed afterwards. This may indeed refer to the neighboring country, from the misery and devastation of which it was impossible but that the city should sustain much damage; but I consider the Prophet’s meaning to be, that the evils of which he speaks shall reach even to the city itself, until, broken and ruined, it shall wear the aspect of a mean cottage

The daughter of Zion is the name here given to Jerusalem, in accordance with what is customary in Scripture to give the designation of daughter to any nation, in the same manner as the daughter of Babylon (Isaiah 47:1) and the daughter of Tyre (Psalm 45:12) are names given to the Tyrians and Babylonians. Zion is the name here employed rather than Jerusalem, on account of the dignity of the temple; and this figure of speech, by which a part is taken for the whole, is frequently employed.