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Injustice and Oppression to Be Punished

See, the L ord’s hand is not too short to save,

nor his ear too dull to hear.

Rather, your iniquities have been barriers

between you and your God,

and your sins have hidden his face from you

so that he does not hear.

For your hands are defiled with blood,

and your fingers with iniquity;

your lips have spoken lies,

your tongue mutters wickedness.

No one brings suit justly,

no one goes to law honestly;

they rely on empty pleas, they speak lies,

conceiving mischief and begetting iniquity.

They hatch adders’ eggs,

and weave the spider’s web;

whoever eats their eggs dies,

and the crushed egg hatches out a viper.

Their webs cannot serve as clothing;

they cannot cover themselves with what they make.

Their works are works of iniquity,

and deeds of violence are in their hands.

Their feet run to evil,

and they rush to shed innocent blood;

their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity,

desolation and destruction are in their highways.

The way of peace they do not know,

and there is no justice in their paths.

Their roads they have made crooked;

no one who walks in them knows peace.

Therefore justice is far from us,

and righteousness does not reach us;

we wait for light, and lo! there is darkness;

and for brightness, but we walk in gloom.

We grope like the blind along a wall,

groping like those who have no eyes;

we stumble at noon as in the twilight,

among the vigorous as though we were dead.

We all growl like bears;

like doves we moan mournfully.

We wait for justice, but there is none;

for salvation, but it is far from us.

For our transgressions before you are many,

and our sins testify against us.

Our transgressions indeed are with us,

and we know our iniquities:

transgressing, and denying the L ord,

and turning away from following our God,

talking oppression and revolt,

conceiving lying words and uttering them from the heart.

Justice is turned back,

and righteousness stands at a distance;

for truth stumbles in the public square,

and uprightness cannot enter.

Truth is lacking,

and whoever turns from evil is despoiled.

The L ord saw it, and it displeased him

that there was no justice.

He saw that there was no one,

and was appalled that there was no one to intervene;

so his own arm brought him victory,

and his righteousness upheld him.

He put on righteousness like a breastplate,

and a helmet of salvation on his head;

he put on garments of vengeance for clothing,

and wrapped himself in fury as in a mantle.

According to their deeds, so will he repay;

wrath to his adversaries, requital to his enemies;

to the coastlands he will render requital.

So those in the west shall fear the name of the L ord,

and those in the east, his glory;

for he will come like a pent-up stream

that the wind of the L ord drives on.

And he will come to Zion as Redeemer,

to those in Jacob who turn from transgression, says the L ord.

²¹ And as for me, this is my covenant with them, says the L ord: my spirit that is upon you, and my words that I have put in your mouth, shall not depart out of your mouth, or out of the mouths of your children, or out of the mouths of your children’s children, says the L ord, from now on and forever.

New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

3. For your hands. He now brings forward their actions, that they may not practice evasion, or call in question what are those sins which have “caused the separation.” He therefore takes away from them every excuse, by bringing forward particular instances, as if their shameful life were exhibited on an open stage. Now, he speaks in the second person, because, like an advocate, he argues and pleads the cause of God, and therefore speaks of himself as not belonging to the rank of the wicked, with whom he did not wish to be classed, though he was not entirely free from sin, but feared and served God, and enjoyed liberty of conscience. No man could be at liberty to condemn others, who was involved in the guilt of the same vices; and no man could be qualified for pleading the cause of God, who deprived himself of his right by living wickedly. We must be unlike those whom we reprove, if we do not wish to expose our doctrine to ridicule, and to be reckoned impudent; and, on the other band, when we serve God with a pure conscience, our doctrine obtains weight and authority, and holds even adversaries to be more fully convicted.

Are polluted with blood. The picture which he gives of the wicked life of the people is not superfluous; for men seek various subterfuges, and cannot be reduced to a state of obedience, unless they have previously acknowledged their sins. By mentioning blood, he does not mean that murders have been everywhere committed; but by this word he describes the cruelty, extortions, violence, and enormities, which were perpetrated by hypocrites against the poor and defenseless; for they had not to deal with robbers and assassins, but with the king and the nobles, who were highly respected and honored. He calls them manslayers, because they cruelly harassed the innocent, and seized by force and violence the property of others; and so, immediately afterwards he uses the word “iniquity” instead of “blood.”

And your fingers with iniquity. Though he appears to extend the discourse farther, yet it is a repetition, or rather, a reduplication, such as is frequently employed by Hebrew writers, accompanied by amplification; for he expresses more by “fingers” than by “hands;“ as if he had said that not even the smallest part was free from unjust violence. ¹³⁰¹³⁰ “Que la moindre partie de leur corps est souillee d’extorsion.” “That the smallest part of their body is tainted with extortion.”

Your lips have uttered falsehood. Next, he takes notice of one kind of wickedness, that is, when men deceive each other by tricks, or falsehood, or perjury; for that iniquity by which we wound our neighbors is most frequently defended either by cruelty as a bodyguard, or by cheating and falsehood. Here the Prophet takes a rapid view of the second table, and, from the crimes which they commit against it, he shows that they are wicked and destitute of all fear of God; for cruelty and treachery, by which human society is infringed, proceed from contempt of God. Thus from “the hands,” that is, from extortion and violence, he descends to falsehoods and deceitful practices, to perjuries and crafty devices, by which we take advantage of our neighbors.

¹³⁰ “Que la moindre partie de leur corps est souillee d’extorsion.” “That the smallest part of their body is tainted with extortion.”