Isaiah 30

Do Not Go Down to Egypt

1 Ah, astubborn children,” declares the Lord,
b“who carry out a plan, but not mine,
and who make can alliance,
Hebrew  who weave a web
but not of my Spirit,
that they may add sin to sin;
2 ewho set out to go down to Egypt,
without asking for my direction,
to take refuge in the protection of Pharaoh
and to seek shelter in the shadow of Egypt!
3 fTherefore shall the protection of Pharaoh turn to your shame,
and the shelter in the shadow of Egypt to your humiliation.
4For though his officials are at gZoan
and hhis envoys reach iHanes,
5everyone comes to shame
through ja people that cannot profit them,
that brings neither help nor profit,
but shame and disgrace.”
6An koracle on lthe beasts of mthe Negeb.

Through a land of trouble and anguish,
from where come the lioness and the lion,
the adder and the nflying fiery serpent,
they carry their riches on the backs of donkeys,
and their treasures on the humps of camels,
to a people that cannot profit them.
7Egypt’s ohelp is worthless and empty;
therefore I have called her
pRahab who sits still.”

A Rebellious People

8 And now, go, qwrite it before them on a tablet
and inscribe it in a book,
that it may be for the time to come
as a witness forever.
Some Hebrew manuscripts, Syriac, Targum, Vulgate, and Greek versions; Masoretic Text  forever and ever

9 sFor they are a rebellious people,
lying children,
children unwilling to hear
the instruction of the Lord;
10 twho say to uthe seers, “Do not see,”
and to the prophets, “Do not prophesy to us what is right;
speak to us vsmooth things,
prophesy illusions,
11leave the way, turn aside from the path,
let us hear no more about the Holy One of Israel.”
12Therefore thus says the Holy One of Israel,
Because you despise this word
and trust in woppression and perverseness
and rely on them,
13therefore this iniquity shall be to you
xlike a breach in a high wall, bulging out and about to collapse,
whose breaking comes suddenly, in an instant;
14and its breaking is ylike that of a potter’s vessel
that is smashed so ruthlessly
that among its fragments not a shard is found
with which to take fire from the hearth,
or to dip up water out of the cistern.”
15 For thus said the Lord God, the Holy One of Israel,
“In zreturning
Or repentance
and abrest you shall be saved;
in quietness and in trust shall be your strength.”
But you were unwilling,
16and you said,
No! We will flee upon achorses”;
therefore you shall flee away;
and, “We will ride upon swift steeds”;
therefore your pursuers shall be swift.
17 adA thousand shall flee at the threat of one;
at the threat of five you shall flee,
till you are left
like a flagstaff on the top of a mountain,
like a signal on a hill.

The Lord Will Be Gracious

18 Therefore the Lord aewaits to be gracious to you,
and therefore he afexalts himself to show mercy to you.
For the Lord is a God of justice;
agblessed are all those who wait for him.
19For a people shall dwell ahin Zion, in Jerusalem; you shall weep no more. He will surely be gracious to you at the sound of your cry. As soon as he hears it, he answers you. 20And though the Lord give you the aibread of adversity and the ajwater of affliction, akyet your Teacher will not hide himself anymore, but your eyes shall see your Teacher. 21 alAnd your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, “This is amthe way, walk in it,” when you turn to the right or when you turn to the left. 22Then you will defile your carved idols overlaid with silver and your gold-plated metal images. anYou will scatter them as unclean things. You will say to them, “Be gone!”

23 aoAnd he will give aprain for the seed with which you sow the ground, and bread, the produce of the ground, which will be rich and plenteous. aqIn that day your livestock will graze in large pastures, 24and arthe oxen and the donkeys that work the ground will eat seasoned fodder, which has been winnowed with shovel and fork. 25And ason every lofty mountain and every high hill there will be brooks running with water, in the day of the great slaughter, atwhen the towers fall. 26 auMoreover, the light of the moon will be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun will be sevenfold, as the light of seven days, in the day when avthe Lord binds up awthe brokenness of his people, and heals the wounds inflicted by his blow.

27 Behold, the name of the Lord comes from afar,
burning with his anger, and in thick rising smoke;
Hebrew  in weight of uplifted clouds

his lips are full of fury,
and his tongue is like a devouring fire;
28 ayhis breath is azlike an overflowing stream
that reaches up to the neck;
to sift the nations with the sieve of destruction,
and to place on the jaws of the peoples baa bridle that leads astray.
29You shall have a song as in the night when a holy feast is kept, and gladness of heart, bbas when one sets out to the sound of the flute to go to bcthe mountain of the Lord, to bdthe Rock of Israel. 30And the Lord bewill cause his majestic voice to be heard and the descending blow of his arm to be seen, in furious anger bfand a flame of devouring fire, with a cloudburst bgand storm and hailstones. 31The Assyrians will be terror-stricken at the voice of the Lord, bhwhen he strikes with his rod. 32And every stroke of the appointed staff that the Lord lays on them biwill be to the sound of tambourines and lyres. bjBattling with brandished arm, he will fight with them. 33For bka burning place
Or  For Topheth
has long been prepared; indeed, for the king it is made ready, bmits pyre made deep and wide, with fire and wood in abundance; bnthe breath of the Lord, like a stream of sulfur, kindles it.

Isaiah 31

Woe to Those Who Go Down to Egypt

1 Woe to bothose who go down to Egypt for help
and rely on horses,
who bptrust in chariots because they are many
and in horsemen because they are very strong,
but bqdo not look to the Holy One of Israel
or consult the Lord!
2And bryet he is wise and brings disaster;
bshe does not call back his words,
but btwill arise against the house of the evildoers
and against the helpers of buthose who work iniquity.
3The Egyptians are man, and not God,
and their horses bvare flesh, and not spirit.
When the Lord stretches out his hand,
the helper will stumble, and he who is helped will fall,
and they will all perish together.
4 For thus the Lord said to me,
bw“As a lion or a young lion growls over his prey,
and when a band of shepherds is called out against him
he is not terrified by their shouting
or daunted at their noise,
bxso the Lord of hosts will come down
to fight
The Hebrew words for  hosts and  to fight sound alike
on Mount Zion and on its hill.
5 bzLike birds hovering, so the Lord of hosts
will protect Jerusalem;
he will protect and deliver it;
he will spare and rescue it.”
6 caTurn to him from whom people
Hebrew they
have ccdeeply revolted, O children of Israel.
7For in that day cdeveryone shall cast away his idols of silver and his idols of gold, which your hands have sinfully made for you.

8 ce“And the Assyrian shall fall by a sword, not of man;
and a sword, not of man, shall devour him;
and he shall flee from the sword,
and his young men shall be cfput to forced labor.
9 cgHis rock shall pass away in terror,
and his officers desert the standard in panic,”
declares the Lord, whose chfire is in Zion,
and whose cifurnace is in Jerusalem.
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