Isaiah 33

New King James Version

A Prayer in Deep Distress

33 Woe to you ^(A)who plunder, though you have not been plundered;
And you who deal treacherously, though they have not dealt treacherously with you!
^(B)When you cease plundering,
You will be ^(C)plundered;
When you make an end of dealing treacherously,
They will deal treacherously with you.

²O Lord, be gracious to us;
^(D)We have waited for You.
Be ^[a]their arm every morning,
Our salvation also in the time of trouble.
³At the noise of the tumult the people ^(E)shall flee;
When You lift Yourself up, the nations shall be scattered;
⁴And Your plunder shall be gathered
Like the gathering of the caterpillar;
As the running to and fro of locusts,
He shall run upon them.

⁵^(F)The Lord is exalted, for He dwells on high;
He has filled Zion with justice and righteousness.
⁶Wisdom and knowledge will be the stability of your times,
And the strength of salvation;
The fear of the Lord is His treasure.

⁷Surely their valiant ones shall cry outside,
^(G)The ambassadors of peace shall weep bitterly.
⁸^(H)The highways lie waste,
The traveling man ceases.
^(I)He has broken the covenant,
^[b]He has despised the ^[c]cities,
He regards no man.
⁹^(J)The earth mourns and languishes,
Lebanon is shamed and shriveled;
Sharon is like a wilderness,
And Bashan and Carmel shake off their fruits.

Impending Judgment on Zion

¹⁰“Now^(K) I will rise,” says the Lord;
“Now I will be exalted,
Now I will lift Myself up.
¹¹^(L)You shall conceive chaff,
You shall bring forth stubble;
Your breath, as fire, shall devour you.
¹²And the people shall be like the burnings of lime;
^(M)Like thorns cut up they shall be burned in the fire.
¹³Hear, ^(N)you who are afar off, what I have done;
And you who are near, acknowledge My might.”

¹⁴The sinners in Zion are afraid;
Fearfulness has seized the hypocrites:
“Who among us shall dwell with the devouring ^(O)fire?
Who among us shall dwell with everlasting burnings?”
¹⁵He who ^(P)walks righteously and speaks uprightly,
He who despises the gain of oppressions,
Who gestures with his hands, refusing bribes,
Who stops his ears from hearing of bloodshed,
And ^(Q)shuts his eyes from seeing evil:
¹⁶He will dwell on ^[d]high;
His place of defense will be the fortress of rocks;
Bread will be given him,
His water will be sure.

The Land of the Majestic King

¹⁷Your eyes will see the King in His ^(R)beauty;
They will see the land that is very far off.
¹⁸Your heart will meditate on terror:
^(S)“Where is the scribe?
Where is he who weighs?
Where is he who counts the towers?”
¹⁹^(T)You will not see a fierce people,
^(U)A people of obscure speech, beyond perception,
Of a ^[e]stammering tongue that you cannot understand.

²⁰^(V)Look upon Zion, the city of our appointed feasts;
Your eyes will see ^(W)Jerusalem, a quiet home,
A tabernacle that will not be taken down;
^(X)Not one of ^(Y)its stakes will ever be removed,
Nor will any of its cords be broken.
²¹But there the majestic Lord will be for us
A place of broad rivers and streams,
In which no ^[f]galley with oars will sail,
Nor majestic ships pass by
²²(For the Lord is our ^(Z)Judge,
The Lord is our ^(AA)Lawgiver,
^(AB)The Lord is our King;
He will save us);
²³Your tackle is loosed,
They could not strengthen their mast,
They could not spread the sail.

Then the prey of great plunder is divided;
The lame take the prey.
²⁴And the inhabitant will not say, “I am sick”;
^(AC)The people who dwell in it will be forgiven their iniquity.

Footnotes

Isaiah 33:2 LXX omits their; Syr., Tg., Vg. our
Isaiah 33:8 Tg. They have been removed from their cities
Isaiah 33:8 So with MT, Vg.; DSS witnesses; LXX omits cities
Isaiah 33:16 Lit. heights
Isaiah 33:19 Unintelligible speech
Isaiah 33:21 ship

Isaiah 34

New King James Version

Judgment on the Nations

34 Come ^(A)near, you nations, to hear;
And heed, you people!
^(B)Let the earth hear, and all that is in it,
The world and all things that come forth from it.
²For the indignation of the Lord is against all nations,
And His fury against all their armies;
He has utterly destroyed them,
He has given them over to the ^(C)slaughter.
³Also their slain shall be thrown out;
^(D)Their stench shall rise from their corpses,
And the mountains shall be melted with their blood.
⁴^(E)All the host of heaven shall be dissolved,
And the heavens shall be rolled up like a scroll;
^(F)All their host shall fall down
As the leaf falls from the vine,
And as ^(G)fruit falling from a fig tree.

⁵“For ^(H)My sword shall be bathed in heaven;
Indeed it ^(I)shall come down on Edom,
And on the people of My curse, for judgment.
⁶The ^(J)sword of the Lord is filled with blood,
It is made ^[a]overflowing with fatness,
With the blood of lambs and goats,
With the fat of the kidneys of rams.
For ^(K)the Lord has a sacrifice in Bozrah,
And a great slaughter in the land of Edom.
⁷The wild oxen shall come down with them,
And the young bulls with the mighty bulls;
Their land shall be soaked with blood,
And their dust ^[b]saturated with fatness.”

⁸For it is the day of the Lord’s ^(L)vengeance,
The year of recompense for the cause of Zion.
⁹^(M)Its streams shall be turned into pitch,
And its dust into brimstone;
Its land shall become burning pitch.
¹⁰It shall not be quenched night or day;
^(N)Its smoke shall ascend forever.
^(O)From generation to generation it shall lie waste;
No one shall pass through it forever and ever.
¹¹^(P)But the ^[c]pelican and the ^[d]porcupine shall possess it,
Also the owl and the raven shall dwell in it.
And ^(Q)He shall stretch out over it
The line of confusion and the stones of emptiness.
¹²They shall call its nobles to the kingdom,
But none shall be there, and all its princes shall be nothing.

¹³And ^(R)thorns shall come up in its palaces,
Nettles and brambles in its fortresses;
^(S)It shall be a habitation of jackals,
A courtyard for ostriches.
¹⁴The wild beasts of the desert shall also meet with the ^[e]jackals,
And the wild goat shall bleat to its companion;
Also ^[f]the night creature shall rest there,
And find for herself a place of rest.
¹⁵There the arrow snake shall make her nest and lay eggs
And hatch, and gather them under her shadow;
There also shall the hawks be gathered,
Every one with her mate.

¹⁶“Search from ^(T)the book of the Lord, and read:
Not one of these shall fail;
Not one shall lack her mate.
For My mouth has commanded it, and His Spirit has gathered them.
¹⁷He has cast the lot for them,
And His hand has divided it among them with a measuring line.
They shall possess it forever;
From generation to generation they shall dwell in it.”