Woe to the Oppressors
1 Woe to those who qdevise wickedness
and work evil on their beds!
When the morning dawns, they perform it,
because it is in the power of their hand.
2 They covet fields and seize them,
and rhouses, and take them away;
they oppress a man and his house,
a man and his inheritance.
3 Therefore thus says the Lord:
behold, against this family I am devising disaster,1
from which you cannot remove your necks,
and you shall not walk haughtily,
sfor it will be a time of disaster.
4 In that day they shall ttake up a taunt song against you
and moan bitterly,
and say, u“We are utterly ruined;
he changes the portion of my people;
how he removes it from me!
To an apostate he allots our fields.”
5 Therefore you will have none to cast the line by lot
in the assembly of the Lord.
6 v“Do not preach”—thus they preach—
“one should not preach of such things;
disgrace will not overtake us.”
7 Should this be said, O house of Jacob?
Has the Lord grown impatient?2
Are these his deeds?
Do not my words do good
to him who walks uprightly?
8 But lately my people have risen up as an enemy;
you strip the rich robe from those who pass by trustingly
with no thought of war.3
9 The women of my people you drive out
from their delightful houses;
from their young children you take away
my splendor forever.
10 Arise and go,
for this is no place to rest,
because of uncleanness that destroys
with a grievous destruction.
11 If a man should go about and utter wind and lies,
saying, “I will preach to you of wine and strong drink,”
whe would be the preacher for this people!
12 I will surely assemble all of you, O Jacob;
I will xgather the yremnant of Israel;
I will set them together
like sheep in a fold,
like a flock in its pasture,
a noisy multitude of men.
13 He who opens the breach goes up before them;
they break through and pass the gate,
going out by it.
Their king passes on before them,
the Lord at their head.
Rulers and Prophets Denounced
1 And I said:
Hear, you heads of Jacob
and rulers of the house of Israel!
Is it not for you to zknow justice?—
2 you who hate the good and love the evil,
who tear the skin from off my people4
and their flesh from off their bones,
3 who aeat the flesh of my people,
and flay their skin from off them,
and break their bones in pieces
and chop them up blike meat in a pot,
like flesh in a cauldron.
4 Then they will cry to the Lord,
cbut he will not answer them;
dhe will hide his face from them at that time,
because they have made their deeds evil.
5 Thus says the Lord concerning the prophets
who elead my people astray,
who cry f“Peace”
when they have something to eat,
but declare war against him
who puts nothing into their mouths.
6 Therefore it shall be night to you, without vision,
and darkness to you, without divination.
The sun shall go down on the prophets,
and the day shall be black over them;
7 the seers shall be disgraced,
and the diviners put to shame;
they shall all gcover their lips,
for there is no answer from God.
8 But as for me, I am filled with power,
with the Spirit of the Lord,
and with justice and might,
to hdeclare to Jacob his transgression
and to Israel his sin.
9 Hear this, you heads of the house of Jacob
and rulers of the house of Israel,
who detest justice
and make crooked all that is straight,
10 who ibuild Zion with blood
and Jerusalem with iniquity.
11 Its heads give judgment for a jbribe;
its priests teach for a price;
its prophets practice divination for money;
yet they lean on the Lord and say,
“Is not the Lord in the midst of us?
kNo disaster shall come upon us.”
12 Therefore because of you
lZion shall be plowed as a field;
Jerusalem shall become a heap of ruins,
and the mountain of the house a wooded height.
Isaiah Sent to King Ahaz
1 hIn the days of iAhaz the son of Jotham, son of Uzziah, king of Judah, jRezin the king of Syria and kPekah the son of Remaliah the king of Israel came up to Jerusalem to wage war against it, but could not yet mount an attack against it. 2 When the house of David was told, “Syria is in league with1 Ephraim,” the heart of Ahaz2 and the heart of his people shook as the trees of the forest shake before the wind.
3 And the Lord said to Isaiah, “Go out to meet Ahaz, you and Shear-jashub3 your son, at the end of the conduit of the upper pool on the highway to the lWasher’s Field. 4 And say to him, ‘Be careful, be quiet, do not fear, and do not let your heart be faint because of these two smoldering stumps of firebrands, at the fierce anger of Rezin and Syria and the son of Remaliah. 5 Because Syria, with Ephraim and the son of Remaliah, has devised evil against you, saying, 6 “Let us go up against Judah and terrify it, and let us conquer it4 for ourselves, and set up the son of Tabeel as king in the midst of it,” 7 thus says the Lord God:
“‘It shall not stand,
and it shall not come to pass.
8 For the head of Syria is Damascus,
and the head of Damascus is Rezin.
And within sixty-five years
mEphraim will be shattered from being a people.
9 And the head of Ephraim is Samaria,
and the head of Samaria is the son of Remaliah.
If you5 are not firm in nfaith,
you will not be firm at all.’”
The Sign of Immanuel
10 Again the Lord spoke to Ahaz: 11 “Ask a sign of the Lord your6 God; let it be deep as Sheol or high as heaven.” 12 But Ahaz said, “I will not ask, and I will not put the Lord to the test.” 13 And he7 said, “Hear then, O house of David! Is it too little for you to weary men, that you oweary my God also? 14 Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. pBehold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name qImmanuel.8 15 He shall eat curds and honey when he knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good. 16 For rbefore the boy knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land whose two kings you dread will be deserted. 17 The Lord will bring upon you and upon your people and upon your father’s house such days as have not come since sthe day that Ephraim departed from Judah—tthe king of Assyria!”
18 In that day the Lord will uwhistle for the fly that is at the end of the streams of Egypt, and for the bee that is in the land of Assyria. 19 And they will all come and settle in the steep ravines, and vin the clefts of the rocks, and on all the thornbushes, and on all the pastures.9
20 In that day the Lord will shave with a razor that is hired beyond the River10—with the king of Assyria—the head and the hair of the feet, and it will sweep away the beard also.
21 In that day a man will keep alive a young cow and two sheep, 22 and because of the abundance of milk that they give, he will eat curds, for everyone who is left in the land will eat curds and honey.
23 In that day every place where there used to be a thousand vines, worth a thousand shekels11 of silver, will become briers and thorns. 24 With bow and arrows a man will come there, for all the land will be briers and thorns. 25 And as for all the hills that used to be hoed with a hoe, you will not come there for fear of briers and thorns, but they will become a place where cattle are let loose and where sheep tread.
