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The Fall of Tyre

23 The [mournful, inspired] oracle ([a]a burden to be carried) concerning [b]Tyre:

Wail, O ships of Tarshish,
For Tyre is destroyed, without house, without harbor;
It is reported to them from the land of Cyprus (Kittim).

Be silent, you inhabitants of the coastland,
You [c]merchants of Sidon;
[d]Your messengers crossed the sea

And they were on great waters.
The grain of the [e]Shihor, the harvest of the Nile River, was Tyre’s revenue;
And she was the market of nations.

Be ashamed, O Sidon [mother-city of Tyre, now like a widow bereaved of her children];
For the sea speaks, the stronghold of the sea, saying,
“I have neither labored nor given birth [to children];
I have neither brought up young men nor reared virgins.”

When the report reaches Egypt,
They will be in agony at the report about Tyre.

Cross over to Tarshish [to seek safety as exiles];
Wail, O inhabitants of the coastland [of Tyre].

Is this your jubilant city,
Whose origin dates back to antiquity,
Whose feet used to carry her [far away] to colonize distant places?


Who has planned this against Tyre, the bestower of crowns,
Whose merchants were princes, whose traders were the honored of the earth?

The Lord of hosts has planned it, to defile the pride of all beauty,
To bring into contempt and humiliation all the honored of the earth.
10 
Overflow your land like [the overflow of] the Nile, O Daughter of Tarshish;
There is no more restraint [on you to make you pay tribute to Tyre].
11 
He has stretched out His hand over the sea,
He has shaken the kingdoms;
The Lord has given a command concerning Canaan to destroy her strongholds and her fortresses [like Tyre and Sidon].

12 
He has said, “You shall never again exult [in triumph], O crushed Virgin Daughter of Sidon.
Arise, cross over to Cyprus; even there you will find no rest.”

13 Now look at the land of the Chaldeans (Babylonia)—this is the people which was not; the Assyrians allocated Tyre for desert creatures—they set up their [f]siege towers, they stripped its palaces, they made it a ruin.

14 
Wail, O ships of Tarshish,
For your stronghold [of Tyre] is destroyed.

15 Now in that day Tyre will be forgotten for seventy years, like the days of one king. At the end of seventy years it will happen to Tyre as in the prostitute’s song:

16 
Take a harp, walk around the city,
O forgotten prostitute;
Play the strings skillfully, sing many songs,
That you may be remembered.

17 It will come to pass at the end of seventy years that the Lord will remember Tyre. Then she will return to her prostitute’s wages and will play the [role of a] prostitute [by trading] with all the kingdoms on the face of the earth. 18 But her commercial gain and her prostitute’s wages will be [g]dedicated to the Lord; it will not be treasured or stored up, but her commercial gain will become sufficient food and stately clothing for those who dwell (minister) in the presence of the Lord.

Judgment on the Earth

24 Behold, the Lord [h]lays waste to the earth, devastates it, twists and distorts its face and scatters its inhabitants. And the people will be like the priest, the servant like his master, the maid like her mistress, the buyer like the seller, the lender like the borrower, the creditor like the debtor [as God’s impartial judgment of sin comes on all]. The earth will be completely laid waste and utterly pillaged, for the Lord has spoken this word. The earth dries up and crumbles away, the world dries out and crumbles away, the exalted of the people of the earth fade away. The earth also is polluted [i]by its inhabitants, because they have transgressed laws, violated statutes, and broken the everlasting covenant.(A) Therefore, a curse devours the earth, and those who live on it suffer the punishment of their guilt. Therefore, the inhabitants of the earth are burned [under the curse of God’s wrath], and few people are left.(B)


The new wine mourns,
The vine decays;
All the merry-hearted sigh and groan.

The mirth of the timbrels (tambourines) ceases,
The noise of those who rejoice ends,
The joy of the harp ceases.

They do not drink wine with a song;
Strong drink is bitter to those who drink it.
10 
The city of chaos is broken down;
Every house is shut up so that no one may enter.
11 
There is an outcry in the streets concerning the wine;
All jubilation is darkened,
The joy of the earth is banished.
12 
Horrible desolation is left in the city,
And the gate is battered into ruins.
13 
For so it will be in the midst of the earth among the peoples,
As the shaking of an olive tree,
As the gleanings when the grape harvest is over [and only a little of the fruit remains].
14 
They [who have escaped and remain] raise their voices, they shout for joy;
They rejoice from the [Mediterranean] Sea in the majesty of the Lord.
15 
Therefore honor and glorify the Lord in the east [in the region of light],
The name of the Lord, the God of Israel [honor His name],
In the coastlands and islands of the [Mediterranean] Sea.
16 
From the ends of the earth we hear songs, “Glory and honor to the Righteous One,”
But I say, “I waste away, I waste away. Woe to me!
The treacherous deal treacherously,
Indeed, the treacherous deal very treacherously.”
17 
Terror and pit [of destruction] and snare
Confront you, O inhabitant of the earth.
18 
Then it will be that he who flees at the sound of terror will fall into the pit,
And he who comes up out of the pit will be caught in the snare;
For the windows of heaven are opened, and the foundations of the earth tremble.
19 
The earth is broken completely apart,
The earth is split apart,
The earth is shaken violently.
20 
The earth reels back and forth like a drunkard
And sways like a shack;
Its transgression lies heavily upon it,
And it will fall and not rise again.
21 
So it will happen in that day
That the Lord will visit and punish the host (fallen angels) of heaven on high,
And the kings of the earth on the earth.(C)
22 
They will be gathered together
As prisoners [are gathered] in a dungeon;
They will be shut up in prison,
And after many days they will be visited and punished.(D)
23 
Then the full moon will be embarrassed and the sun ashamed,
For the Lord of hosts will reign on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem,
And His glory and brilliance will shine before His elders.

Song of Praise for God’s Favor

25 O Lord, You are my God;
I will exalt You, I will praise and give thanks to Your name;
For You have done miraculous things,
Plans formed long, long ago, [fulfilled] with perfect faithfulness.

For You have made a city into a heap [of trash],
A fortified city into a ruin;
A palace of [j]foreigners is no longer a city,
It will never be rebuilt.

Therefore a strong people will honor You;
Cities of terrible and violent nations will fear You.

For You have been a stronghold for the helpless,
A stronghold for the poor in his distress,
A shelter from the storm, a shade from the heat;
For the breath of tyrants
Is like a rainstorm against a wall.

Like heat in a dry land, You will subdue the noise of foreigners [rejoicing over their enemies];
Like heat in the shadow of a cloud, the song of the tyrants is [k]silenced.


On this mountain [Zion] the Lord of hosts will prepare a lavish banquet for all peoples [to welcome His reign on earth],
A banquet of aged wines—choice pieces [flavored] with marrow,
Of refined, aged wines.

And on this mountain He will destroy the covering that is [cast] over all peoples,
And the veil [of death] that is woven and spread over all the nations.

He will swallow up death [and abolish it] for all time.
And the Lord God will wipe away tears from all faces,
And He will take away the disgrace of His people from all the earth;
For the Lord has spoken.(E)

It will be said in that day,
“Indeed, this is our God for whom we have waited that He would save us.
This is the Lord for whom we have waited;
Let us shout for joy and rejoice in His salvation.”
10 
For the hand of the Lord will rest on this mountain [Zion],
And Moab will be trampled down in his place
As straw is trampled down in the [filthy] water of a manure pile.
11 
And Moab will spread out his hands in the middle of the filth
As a swimmer spreads out his hands to swim,
But the Lord will humiliate his pride in spite of the [skillful] movements of his hands.
12 
The high fortifications of your walls He will bring down,
Lay low, and cast to the ground, to the dust.

Footnotes

  1. Isaiah 23:1 I.e. an urgent message the prophet is under compulsion to proclaim.
  2. Isaiah 23:1 Ancient Tyre was a Phoenician trading center with two separate urban areas; the major trading center was located on a fortified island and the suburban center was located on the adjacent coast. They were connected by a causeway built by Alexander the Great during his siege of Tyre.
  3. Isaiah 23:2 So some versions; MT reads merchant.
  4. Isaiah 23:2 The DSS so read. MT reads Who crossed the sea, they replenished you.
  5. Isaiah 23:3 An Egyptian name meaning “the pond of Horus”; it is probably a branch of the Nile or an unspecified lake.
  6. Isaiah 23:13 Besieging a heavily fortified (walled) city was an ancient military tactic. The attackers would surround the city and cut off all supplies and communication to or from the inhabitants, then they would use siege towers to tear down the walls. The tower was a massive support structure for a heavy beam or log that was sharpened on one end and hung horizontally. It would be pushed against a wall and worked in such a way as to dislodge the stones that had been stacked to form the wall.
  7. Isaiah 23:18 Tyre was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar in 572 b.c. and lay desolate for seventy years. The new city built on the island was taken by Alexander the Great in 332 b.c. Eventually Christianity prevailed at Tyre. Jesus visited there (Matt 15:21) and so did Paul (Acts 21:3-6). In his commentary on Isaiah Eusebius says that when the church of God was founded in Tyre, much of its wealth was consecrated to God and presented for the support of ministers. This is also the testimony of Jerome, the Latin church father writing in the fourth century.
  8. Isaiah 24:1 The gradual destruction of the earth, as revealed by God to Isaiah, is prophesied in this passage. He sees both the current and the future tragedies which will befall earth.
  9. Isaiah 24:5 Lit under.
  10. Isaiah 25:2 Or strangers.
  11. Isaiah 25:5 Lit humbled.

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