The Bible, Douay-Rheims, Book 27: Isaias / The Challoner Revision
Author: Unknown
Date: 2005-06-02T00:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Bible. Isaiah

The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Bible, Douay-Rheims, Book 27: Isaias

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Title: The Bible, Douay-Rheims, Book 27: Isaias

Release date: June 1, 2005 [eBook #8327]
Most recently updated: December 26, 2020

Language: English

Credits: This eBook was produced by David Widger from etext #1581 prepared by Dennis McCarthy, Atlanta, Georgia and Tad Book, student, Pontifical North American College, Rome

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BIBLE, DOUAY-RHEIMS, BOOK 27: ISAIAS ***

This eBook was produced by David Widger
from etext #1581 prepared by Dennis McCarthy, Atlanta, Georgia and Tad Book, student, Pontifical North American College, Rome.

THE HOLY BIBLE

Translated from the Latin Vulgate

Diligently Compared with the Hebrew, Greek, and Other Editions in Divers Languages

THE OLD TESTAMENT
First Published by the English College at Douay
A.D. 1609 & 1610

and

THE NEW TESTAMENT
First Published by the English College at Rheims
A.D. 1582

With Annotations

The Whole Revised and Diligently Compared with the Latin Vulgate by Bishop Richard Challoner A.D. 1749-1752

THE PROPHECY OF ISAIAS

This inspired writer is called by the Holy Ghost, the great prophet, (Ecclesiasticus:48.25,) from the greatness of his prophetic spirit, by which he hath foretold so long before, and in so clear a manner, the coming of Christ, the mysteries of our redemption, the calling of the Gentiles, and the glorious establishment, and perpetual flourishing of the church of Christ: insomuch that he may seem to have been rather an evangelist than a prophet. His very name is not without mystery; for Isaias in Hebrew signifies the salvation of the Lord, or Jesus is the Lord. He was, according to the tradition of the Hebrews, of the blood royal of the kings of Juda: and after a most holy life, ended his days by a glorious martyrdom; being sawed in two, at the command of his wicked son in law, King Manasses, for reproving his evil ways.

Isaias Chapter 1

The prophet complains of the sins of Juda and Jerusalem, and exhorts them to a sincere conversion.

1:1. The vision of Isaias the Son of Amos, which he saw concerning Juda and Jerusalem in the days of Ozias, Joathan, Achaz, and Ezechias, kings of Juda.

1:2. Hear, O ye heavens, and give ear, O earth, for the Lord hath spoken. I have brought up children, and exalted them: but they have despised me.

1:3. The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master's crib: but Israel hath not known me, and my people hath not understood.

1:4. Woe to the sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a wicked seed, ungracious children: they have forsaken the Lord, they have blasphemed the Holy One of Israel, they are gone away backwards.

1:5. For what shall I strike you any more, you that increase transgression? the whole head is sick, and the whole heart is sad.

1:6. From the sole of the foot unto the top of the head, there is no soundness therein: wounds and bruises and swelling sores: they are not bound up, nor dressed, nor fomented with oil.

1:7. Your land is desolate, your cities are burnt with fire: your country strangers devour before your face, and it shall be desolate as when wasted by enemies.

1:8. And the daughter of Sion shall be left as a covert in a vineyard, and as a lodge in a garden of cucumbers, and as a city that is laid waste.

1:9. Except the Lord of hosts had left us seed, we had been as Sodom, and we should have been like to Gomorrha.

1:10. Hear the word of the Lord, ye rulers of Sodom, give ear to the law of our God, ye people of Gomorrha.

1:11. To what purpose do you offer me the multitude of your victims, saith the Lord? I am full, I desire not holocausts of rams, and fat of fatlings, and blood of calves, and lambs, and buck goats.

1:12. When you came to appear before me, who required these things at your hands, that you should walk in my courts?

1:13. Offer sacrifice no more in vain: incense is an abomination to me. The new moons, and the sabbaths and other festivals I will not abide, your assemblies are wicked.

1:14. My soul hateth your new moons, and your solemnities: they are become troublesome to me, I am weary of bearing them.

1:15. And when you stretch forth your hands, I will turn away my eyes from you: and when you multiply prayer, I will not hear: for your hands are full of blood.

1:16. Wash yourselves, be clean, take away the evil of your devices from my eyes, cease to do perversely,

1:17. Learn to do well: seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge for the fatherless, defend the widow.

1:18. And then come, and accuse me, saith the Lord: if your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool.

1:19. If you be willing, and will hearken to me, you shall eat the good things of the land.

1:20. But if you will not, and will provoke me to wrath: the sword shall devour you because the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.

1:21. How is the faithful city, that was full of judgment, become a harlot? justice dwelt in it, but now murderers.

1:22. Thy silver is turned into dross: thy wine is mingled with water.

1:23. Thy princes are faithless, companions of thieves: they all love bribes, they run after rewards. They judge not for the fatherless: and the widow's cause cometh not in to them.

1:24. Therefore saith the Lord the God of hosts, the mighty one of Israel: Ah! I will comfort myself over my adversaries: and I will be revenged of my enemies.

1:25. And I will turn my hand to thee, and I will clean purge away thy dross, and I will take away all thy tin.

1:26. And I will restore thy judges as they were before, and thy counsellors as of old. After this thou shalt be called the city of the just, a faithful city.

1:27. Sion shall be redeemed in judgment, and they shall bring her back in justice.

1:28. And he shall destroy the wicked, and the sinners together: and they that have forsaken the Lord, shall be consumed.

1:29. For they shall be confounded for the idols, to which they have sacrificed: and you shall be ashamed of the gardens which you have chosen.

1:30. When you shall be as an oak with the leaves falling off, and as a garden without water.

1:31. And your strength shall be as the ashes of tow, and your work as a spark: and both shall burn together, and there shall be none to quench it.

Isaias Chapter 2

All nations shall flow to the church of Christ. The Jews shall be rejected for their sins. Idolatry shall be destroyed.

2:1. The word that Isaias the son of Amos saw, concerning Juda and Jerusalem.

2:2. And in the last days the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be prepared on the top of mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills, and all nations shall flow unto it.

The last days… The whole time of the new law, from the coming of Christ till the end of the world, is called in the scripture the last days; because no other age or time shall come after it, but only eternity.-Ibid. On the top of mountains, etc… This shews the perpetual visibility of the church of Christ: for a mountain upon the top of mountains cannot be hid.

2:3. And many people shall go, and say: Come and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and to the house of the God of Jacob, and he will teach us his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for the law shall come forth from Sion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.

2:4. And he shall judge the Gentiles, and rebuke many people: and they shall turn their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into sickles: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they be exercised any more to war.

2:5. O house of Jacob, come ye, and let us walk in the light of the Lord.

2:6. For thou hast cast off thy people, the house of Jacob: because they are filled as in times past, and have had soothsayers as the Philistines, and have adhered to strange children.

2:7. Their land is filled with silver and gold: and there is no end of their treasures.

2:8. And their land is filled with horses: and their chariots are innumerable. Their land also is full of idols: they have adored the work of their own hands, which their own fingers have made.

2:9. And man hath bowed himself down, and man hath been debased: therefore forgive them not.

2:10. Enter thou into the rock, and hide thee in the pit from the face of the fear of the Lord, and from the glory of his majesty.

2:11. The lofty eyes of man are humbled, and the haughtiness of men shall be made to stoop: and the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day.

2:12. Because the day of the Lord of hosts shall be upon every one that is proud and highminded, and upon every one that is arrogant, and he shall be humbled.

2:13. And upon all the tall and lofty cedars of Libanus, and upon all the oaks of Basan.

2:14. And upon all the high mountains and upon all the elevated hills.

2:15. And upon every high tower, and every fenced wall.

2:16. And upon all the ships of Tharsis, and upon all that is fair to behold.

2:17. And the loftiness of men shall be bowed down, and the haughtiness of men shall be humbled, and the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day.

2:18. And idols shall be utterly destroyed.

Idols shall be utterly destroyed… or utterly pass away. This was verified by the establishment of Christianity. And by this and other texts of the like nature, the wild system of some modern sectaries is abundantly confuted, who charge the whole Christian church with worshipping idols, for many ages.

2:19. And they shall go into the holes of rocks, and into the caves of the earth from the face of the fear of the Lord, and from the glory of his majesty, when he shall rise up to strike the earth.

2:20. In that day a man shall cast away his idols of silver, and his idols of gold, which he had made for himself to adore, moles and bats.

2:21. And he shall go into the clefts of rocks, and into the holes of stones from the face of the fear of the Lord, and from the glory of his majesty, when he shall rise up to strike the earth.

2:22. Cease ye therefore from the man, whose breath is in his nostrils, for he is reputed high.

Isaias Chapter 3

The confusion and other evils that shall come upon the Jews for their sins. The pride of their women shall be punished.

3:1. For behold the sovereign Lord of hosts shall take away from Jerusalem, and from Juda the valiant and the strong, the whole strength of bread, and the whole strength of water.

3:2. The strong man, and the man of war, the judge, and the prophet and the cunning man, and the ancient.

3:3. The captain over fifty, and the honourable in countenance, and the counsellor, and the architect, and the skilful in eloquent speech.

3:4. And I will give children to be their princes, and the effeminate shall rule over them.

3:5. And the people shall rush one upon another, and every man against his neighbour: the child shall make a tumult against the ancient, and the base against the honourable.

3:6. For a man shall take hold of his brother, one of the house of his father, saying: Thou hast a garment, be thou our ruler, and let this ruin be under thy hand.

3:7. In that day he shall answer, saying: I am no healer, and in my house there is no bread, nor clothing: make me not ruler of the people.

3:8. For Jerusalem is ruined, and Juda is fallen: because their tongue, and their devices are against the Lord, to provoke the eyes of his majesty.

3:9. The shew of their countenance hath answered them: and they have proclaimed abroad their sin as Sodom, and they have not hid it: woe to their souls, for evils are rendered to them.

3:10. Say to the just man that it is well, for he shall eat the fruit of his doings.

3:11. Woe to the wicked unto evil: for the reward of his hands shall be given him.

3:12. As for my people, their oppressors have stripped them, and women have ruled over them. O my people, they that call thee blessed, the same deceive thee, and destroy the way of thy steps.

3:13. The Lord standeth up to judge, and he standeth to judge the people.

3:14. The Lord will enter into judgment with the ancients of his people, and its princes: for you have devoured the vineyard, and the spoil of the poor is in your house.

3:15. Why do you consume my people, and grind the faces of the poor? saith the Lord the God of hosts.

3:16. And the Lord said: Because the daughters of Sion are haughty, and have walked with stretched out necks, and wanton glances of their eyes, and made a noise as they walked with their feet and moved in a set pace:

3:17. The Lord will make bald the crown of the head of the daughters of Sion, and the Lord will discover their hair.

3:18. In that day the Lord will take away the ornaments of shoes, and little moons,

3:19. And chains and necklaces, and bracelets, and bonnets,

3:20. And bodkins, and ornaments of the legs, and tablets, and sweet balls, and earrings,

3:21. And rings, and jewels hanging on the forehead,

3:22. And changes of apparel, and short cloaks, and fine linen, and crisping pins,

3:23. And lookingglasses, and lawns, and headbands, and fine veils.

3:24. And instead of a sweet smell there shall be stench, and instead of a girdle, a cord, and instead of curled hair, baldness, and instead of a stomacher, haircloth.

3:25. Thy fairest men also shall fall by the sword, and thy valiant ones in battle.

3:26. And her gates shall lament and mourn, and she shall sit desolate on the ground.

Isaias Chapter 4

After an extremity of evils that shall fall upon the Jews, a remnant shall be comforted by Christ.

4:1. And in that day seven women shall take hold of one man, saying: We will eat our own bread, and wear our own apparel: only let us be called by thy name, take away our reproach.

4:2. In that day the bud of the Lord shall be in magnificence and glory, and the fruit of the earth shall be high, and a great joy to them that shall have escaped of Israel.

The bud of the Lord… That is, Christ.

4:3. And it shall come to pass, that every one that shall be left in Sion, and that shall remain in Jerusalem, shall be called holy, every one that is written in life in Jerusalem.

4:4. If the Lord shall wash away the filth of the daughters of Sion, and shall wash away the blood of Jerusalem out of the midst thereof, by the spirit of judgment, and by the spirit of burning.

4:5. And the Lord will create upon every place of mount Sion, and where he is called upon, a cloud by day, and a smoke and the brightness of a flaming fire in the night: for over all the glory shall be a protection.

4:6. And there shall be a tabernacle for a shade in the daytime from the heat, and for a security and covert from the whirlwind, and from rain.

Isaias Chapter 5

The reprobation of the Jews is foreshewn under the parable of a vineyard. A woe is pronounced against sinners: the army of God shall send against them.

5:1. I will sing to my beloved the canticle of my cousin concerning his vineyard. My beloved had a vineyard on a hill in a fruitful place.

My cousin… So the prophet calls Christ, as being of his family and kindred, by descending from the house of David. Ibid. On a hill, etc… Literally, in the horn, the son of oil.

5:2. And he fenced it in, and picked the stones out of it, and planted it with the choicest vines, and built a tower in the midst thereof, and set up a winepress therein: and he looked that it should bring forth grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes.

5:3. And now, O ye inhabitants of Jerusalem, and ye men of Juda, judge between me and my vineyard.

5:4. What is there that I ought to do more to my vineyard, that I have not done to it? was it that I looked that it should bring forth grapes, and it hath brought forth wild grapes?

5:5. And now I will shew you what I will do to my vineyard. I will take away the hedge thereof, and it shall be wasted: I will break down the wall thereof, and it shall be trodden down.

5:6. And I will make it desolate: it shall not be pruned, and it shall not be digged: but briers and thorns shall come up: and I will command the clouds to rain no rain upon it.

5:7. For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel: and the man of Juda, his pleasant plant: and I looked that he should do judgment, and behold iniquity: and do justice, and behold a cry.

5:8. Woe to you that join house to house and lay field to field, even to the end of the place: shall you alone dwell in the midst of the earth?

5:9. These things are in my ears, saith the Lord of hosts: Unless many great and fair houses shall become desolate, without an inhabitant.

5:10. For ten acres of vineyard shall yield one little measure, and thirty bushels of seed shall yield three bushels.

5:11. Woe to you that rise up early in the morning to follow drunkenness, and to drink in the evening, to be inflamed with wine.

5:12. The harp, and the lyre, and, the timbrel and the pipe, and wine are in your feasts: and the work of the Lord you regard not, nor do you consider the works of his hands.

5:13. Therefore is my people led away captive, because they had not knowledge, and their nobles have perished with famine, and their multitude were dried up with thirst.

5:14. Therefore hath hell enlarged her soul, and opened her mouth without any bounds, and their strong ones, and their people, and their high and glorious ones shall go down into it.

5:15. And man shall be brought down, and man shall be humbled, and the eyes of the lofty shall be brought low.

5:16. And the Lord of hosts shall be exalted in judgment, and the holy God shall be sanctified in justice.

5:17. And the lambs shall feed according to their order, and strangers shall eat the deserts turned into fruitfulness.

5:18. Woe to you that draw iniquity with cords of vanity, and sin as the rope of a cart.

5:19. That say: Let him make haste, and let his work come quickly, that we may see it: and let the counsel of the Holy One of Israel come, that we may know it.

5:20. Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil: that put darkness for light, and light for darkness: that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter.

5:21. Woe to you that are wise in your own eyes, and prudent in your own conceits.

5:22. Woe to you that are mighty to drink wine, and stout men at drunkenness.

5:23. That justify the wicked for gifts, and take away the justice of the just from him.

5:24. Therefore as the tongue of the fire devoureth the stubble, and the heat of the flame consumeth it: so shall their root be as ashes, and their bud shall go up as dust: for they have cast away the law of the Lord of hosts, and have blasphemed the word of the Holy One of Israel.

5:25. Therefore is the wrath of the Lord kindled against his people, and he hath stretched out his hand upon them, and struck them: and the mountains were troubles, and their carcasses became as dung in the midst of the streets. For after this his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still.

5:26. And he will lift up a sign to the nations afar off, and will whistle to them from the ends of the earth: and behold they shall come with speed swiftly.

5:27. There is none that shall faint, nor labour among them: they shall not slumber nor sleep, neither shall the girdle of their loins be loosed, nor the latchet of their shoes be broken.

5:28. Their arrows are sharp, and all their bows are bent. The hoofs of their horses shall be like the flint, and their wheels like the violence of a tempest.

5:29. Their roaring like that of a lion, they shall roar like young lions: yea they shall roar, and take hold of the prey, and they shall keep fast hold of it, and there shall be none to deliver it.

5:30. And they shall make a noise against them that day, like the roaring of the sea; we shall look towards the land, and behold darkness of tribulation, and the light is darkened with the mist thereof.

Isaias Chapter 6

A glorious vision, in which the prophet's lips are cleansed: he foretelleth the obstinacy of the Jews.

6:1. In the year that king Ozias died, I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne high and elevated: and his train filled the temple.

6:2. Upon it stood the seraphims: the one had six wings, and the other had six wings: with two they covered his face, and with two they covered his feet, and with two they flew.

6:3. And they cried one to another, and said: Holy, holy, holy, the Lord God of hosts, all the earth is full of his glory,

6:4. And the lintels of the doors were moved at the voice of him that cried, and the house was filled with smoke.

6:5. And I said: Woe is me, because I have held my peace; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people that hath unclean lips, and I have seen with my eyes the King the Lord of hosts.

6:6. And one of the seraphims flew to me, and in his hand was a live coal, which he had taken with the tongs off the altar.

6:7. And he touched my mouth, and said: Behold this hath touched thy lips, and thy iniquities shall be taken away, and thy sin shall be cleansed.

6:8. And I heard the voice of the Lord, saying: Whom shall I send? and who shall go for us? And I said: Lo, here am I, send me.

6:9. And he said: Go, and thou shalt say to this people: Hearing, hear, and understand not: and see the vision, and know it not.

6:10. Blind the heart of this people, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes: lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted and I heal them.

6:11. And I said: How long, O Lord? And he said: Until the cities be wasted without inhabitant, and the houses without man, and the land shall be left desolate.

6:12. And the Lord shall remove men far away, and she shall be multiplied that was left in the midst of the earth.

6:13. And there shall be still a tithing therein, and she shall turn, and shall be made a show as a turpentine tree, and as an oak that spreadeth its branches: that which shall stand therein, shall be a holy seed.

Isaias Chapter 7

The prophet assures king Achaz that the two kings his enemies shall not take Jerusalem. A virgin shall conceive and bear a son.

7:1. And it came to pass in the days of Achaz the son of Joathan, the son of Ozias, king of Juda, that Rasin king of Syria and Phacee the son of Romelia king of Israel, came up to Jerusalem, to fight against it: but they could not prevail over it.

7:2. And they told the house of David, saying: Syria hath rested upon Ephraim, and his heart was moved, and the heart of his people, as the trees of the woods are moved with the wind.

7:3. And the Lord said to Isaias: Go forth to meet Achaz, thou and Jasub thy son that is left, to the conduit of the upper pool in the way of the fuller's field.

7:4. And thou shalt say to him: See thou be quiet: fear not, and let not thy heart be afraid of the two tails of these firebrands, smoking with the wrath of the fury of Rasin king of Syria, and of the son of Romelia.

7:5. Because Syria hath taken counsel against thee, unto the evil of Ephraim and the son of Romelia, saying:

7:6. Let us go up to Juda, and rouse it up, and draw it away to us, and make the son of Tabeel king in the midst thereof.

7:7. Thus saith the Lord God: It shall not stand, and this shall not be.

7:8. But the head of Syria is Damascus, and the head of Damascus is Rasin: and within threescore and five years, Ephraim shall cease to be a people:

7:9. And the head of Ephraim is Samaria, and the head of Samaria is the son of Romelia. If you will not believe, you shall not continue.

7:10. And the Lord spoke again to Achaz, saying:

7:11. Ask thee a sign of the Lord thy God, either unto the depth of hell, or unto the height above.

7:12. And Achaz said: I will not ask, and I will not tempt the Lord.

7:13. And he said: Hear ye therefore, O house of David: Is it a small thing for you to be grievous to men, that you are grievous to my God also?

7:14. Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign. Behold a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son and his name shall be called Emmanuel.

7:15. He shall eat butter and honey, that he may know to refuse the evil, and to choose the good.

7:16. For before the child know to refuse the evil and to choose the good, the land which thou abhorrest shall be forsaken of the face of her two kings.

7:17. The Lord shall bring upon thee, and upon thy people, and upon the house of thy father, days that have not come since the time of the separation of Ephraim from Juda with the king of the Assyrians.

7:18. And it shall come to pass in that day, that the Lord shall hiss for the fly, that is in the uttermost parts of the rivers of Egypt, and for the bee that is in the land of Assyria.

7:19. And they shall come, and shall all of them rest in the torrents of the valleys, and in the holes of the rocks, and upon all places set with shrubs, and in all hollow places.

7:20. In that day the Lord shall shave with a razor that is hired by them that are beyond the river, by the king of the Assyrians, the head and the hairs of the feet, and the whole beard.

7:21. And it shall come to pass in that day, that a man shall nourish a young cow, and two sheep.

7:22. And for the abundance of milk he shall eat butter: for butter and honey shall every one eat that shall be left in the midst of the land.

7:23. And it shall come to pass in that day, that every place where there were a thousand vines, at a thousand pieces of silver, shall become thorns and briers.

7:24. With arrows and with bows they shall go in thither: for briers and thorns shall be in all the land.

7:25. And as for the hills that shall be raked with a rake, the fear of thorns and briers shall not come thither, but they shall be for the ox to feed on, and the lesser cattle to tread upon.

Isaias Chapter 8

The name of a child that is to be born: many evils shall come upon the
Jews for their sins.

8:1. And the Lord said to me: Take thee a great book, and write in it with a man's pen. Take away the spoils with speed, quickly take the prey.

8:2. And I took unto me faithful witnesses, Urias the priest, and Zacharias the son of Barachias.

8:3. And I went to the prophetess, and she conceived, and bore a son. And the Lord said to me: Call his name, Hasten to take away the spoils: Make hast to take away the prey.

8:4. For before the child know to call his father and his mother, the strength of Damascus, and the spoils of Samaria shall be taken away before the king of the Assyrians.

8:5. And the Lord spoke to me again, saying:

8:6. Forasmuch as this people hath cast away the waters of Siloe, that go with silence, and hath rather taken Rasin, and the son of Romelia:

8:7. Therefore behold the Lord will bring upon them the waters of the river strong and many, the king of the Assyrians, and all his glory: and he shall come up over all his channels, and shall overflow all his banks.

8:8. And shall pass through Juda, overflowing, and going over shall reach even to the neck. And the stretching out of his wings shall fill the breadth of thy, land, O Emmanuel.

8:9. Gather yourselves together, O ye people, and be overcome, and give ear, all ye lands afar off: strengthen yourselves, and be overcome, gird yourselves, and be overcome.

8:10. Take counsel together, and it shall be defeated: speak a word, and it shall not be done: because God is with us.

8:11. For thus saith the Lord to me: As he hath taught me, with a strong arm, that I should not walk in the way of this people, saying:

8:12. Say ye not: A conspiracy: for all that this people speaketh, is a conspiracy: neither fear ye their fear, nor be afraid.

8:13. Sanctify the Lord of hosts himself: and let him be your fear, and let him be your dread.

8:14. And he shall be a sanctification to you. But for a stone of stumbling, and for a rock of offence to the two houses of Israel, for a snare and a ruin to the inhabitants of Jerusalem.

8:15. And very many of them shall stumble and fall, and shall be broken in pieces, and shall be snared, and taken.

8:16. Bind up the testimony, seal the law among my disciples.

8:17. And I will wait for the Lord, who hath hid his face from the house of Jacob, and I will look for him.

8:18. Behold I and my children, whom the Lord hath given me for a sign, and for a wonder in Israel from the Lord of hosts, who dwelleth in mount Sion.

8:19. And when they shall say to you: Seek of pythons, and of diviners, who mutter in their enchantments: should not the people seek of their God, for the living of the dead?

Seek of pythons… That is, people pretending to tell future things by a prophesying spirit.-Ibid. Should not the people seek of their God, for the living of the dead?… Here is signified, that it is to God we should pray to be directed, and not to seek of the dead, (that is, of fortune-tellers dead in sin,) for the health of the living.

8:20. To the law rather, and to the testimony. And if they speak not according to this word, they shall not have the morning light.

8:21. And they shall pass by it, they shall fall, and be hungry: and when they shall be hungry, they will be angry, and curse their king, and their God, and look upwards.

8:22. And they shall look to the earth, and behold trouble and darkness, weakness and distress, and a mist following them, and they cannot fly away from their distress.

Isaias Chapter 9

What joy shall come after afflictions by the birth and kingdom of Christ; which shall flourish for ever. Judgments upon Israel for their sins.

9:1. At the first time the land of Zabulon, and the land of Nephtali was lightly touched: and at the last the way of the sea beyond the Jordan of the Galilee of the Gentiles was heavily loaded.

9:2. The people that walked in darkness, have seen a great light: to them that dwelt in the region of the shadow of death, light is risen.

9:3. Thou hast multiplied the nation, and hast not increased the joy. They shall rejoice before thee, as they that rejoice in the harvest, as conquerors rejoice after taking a prey, when they divide the spoils.

9:4. For the yoke of their burden, and the rod of their shoulder, and the sceptre of their oppressor thou hast overcome, as in the day of Madian.

9:5. For every violent taking of spoils, with tumult, and garment mingled with blood, shall be burnt, and be fuel for the fire.

9:6. For a CHILD IS BORN to us, and a son is given to us, and the government is upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, God the Mighty, the Father of the world to come, the Prince of Peace.

9:7. His empire shall be multiplied, and there shall be no end of peace: he shall sit upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom; to establish it and strengthen it with judgment and with justice, from henceforth and for ever: the zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.

9:8. The Lord sent a word into Jacob, and it hath lighted upon Israel.

9:9. And all the people of Ephraim shall know, and the inhabitants of Samaria that say in the pride and haughtiness of their heart:

9:10. The bricks are fallen down, but we will build with square stones: they have cut down the sycamores, but we will change them for cedars.

9:11. And the Lord shall set up the enemies of Rasin over him, and shall bring on his enemies in a crowd:

9:12. The Syrians from the east, and, the Philistines from the west: and they shall devour Israel with open mouth. For all this his indignation is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still.

9:13. And the people are not returned to him who hath struck them, and have not sought after the Lord of hosts.

9:14. And the Lord shall destroy out of Israel the head and the tail, him that bendeth down, and him that holdeth back, in one day.

9:15. The aged and honourable, he is the head: and the prophet that teacheth lies, he is the tail.

9:16. And they that call this people blessed, shall cause them to err: and they that are called blessed, shall be thrown down, headlong.

9:17. Therefore the Lord shall have no joy in their young men: neither shall he have mercy on their fatherless, and widows: for every one is a hypocrite and wicked, and every mouth hath spoken folly. For all this his indignation is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still.

9:18. For wickedness is kindled as a fire, it shall devour the brier and the thorn: and shall kindle in the thicket of the forest, and it shall be wrapped up in smoke ascending on high.

9:19. By the wrath of the Lord of hosts the land is troubled, and the people shall be as fuel for the fire: no man shall spare his brother.

9:20. And he shall turn to the right hand, and shall be hungry: and shall eat on the left hand, and shall not be filled: every one shall eat the flesh of his own arm: Manasses Ephraim, and Ephraim Manasses, and they together shall be against Juda.

9:21. After all these things his indignation is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still.

Isaias Chapter 10

Woe to the makers of wicked laws. The Assyrian shall be a rod for punishing Israel: but for their pride they shall be destroyed: and a remnant of Israel saved.

10:1. Woe to them that make wicked laws: and when they write, write injustice:

10:2. To oppress the poor in judgment, and do violence to the cause of the humble of my people: that widows might be their prey, and that they might rob the fatherless.

10:3. What will you do in the day of visitation, and of the calamity which cometh from afar? to whom will ye flee for help? and where will ye leave your glory?

10:4. That you be not bowed down under the bond, and fall with the slain? In all these things his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still.

10:5. Woe to the Assyrian, he is the rod and the staff of my anger, and my indignation is in their hands.

10:6. I will send him to a deceitful nation, and I will give him a charge against the people of my wrath, to take away the spoils, and to lay hold on the prey, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets.

10:7. But he shall not take it so, and his heart shall not think so: but his heart shall be set to destroy, and to cut off nations not a few.

10:8. For he shall say:

10:9. Are not my princes as so many kings? is not Calano as Charcamis: and Emath as Arphad? is not Samaria as Damascus?

10:10. As my hand hath found the kingdoms of the idol, so also their idols of Jerusalem, and of Samaria.

10:11. Shall I not, as I have done to Samaria and her idols, so do to Jerusalem and her idols?

10:12. And it shall come to pass, that when the Lord shall have performed all his works in mount Sion, and in Jerusalem, I will visit the fruit of the proud heart of the king of Assyria, and the glory of the haughtiness of his eyes.

10:13. For he hath said: By the strength of my own hand I have done it, and by my own wisdom I have understood: and I have removed the bounds of the people, and have taken the spoils of the princes, and as a mighty man hath pulled down them that sat on high.

10:14. And my hand hath found the strength of the people as a nest; and as eggs are gathered, that are left, so have I gathered all the earth: and there was none that moved the wing, or opened the mouth, or made the least noise.

10:15. Shall the axe boast itself against him that cutteth with it? or shall the saw exalt itself against him by whom it is drawn? as if a rod should lift itself up against him that lifteth it up, and a staff exalt itself, which is but wood.

10:16. Therefore the sovereign Lord, the Lord of hosts, shall send leanness among his fat ones: and under his glory shall be kindled a burning, as it were the burning of a fire.

10:17. And the light of Israel shall be as a fire, and the Holy One thereof as a flame: and his thorns and his briers shall be set on fire, and shall be devoured in one day.

10:18. And the glory of his forest, and of his beautiful hill, shall be consumed from the soul even to the flesh, and he shall run away through fear.

10:19. And they that remain of the trees of his forest shall be so few, that they shall easily be numbered, and a child shall write them down.

10:20. And it shall come to pass in that day, that the remnant of Israel, and they that shall escape of the house of Jacob, shall lean no more upon him that striketh them: but they shall lean upon the Lord the Holy One of Israel, in truth.

10:21. The remnant shall be converted, the remnant, I say, of Jacob, to the mighty God.

10:22. For if thy people, O Israel, shall be as the sand of the sea, a remnant of them shall be converted, the consumption abridged shall overflow with justice.

A remnant of them shall be converted… This was partly verified in the children of Israel who remained after the devastations of the Assyrians, in the time of king Ezechias: and partly in the conversion of a remnant of the Jews to the faithful of Christ.-Ibid. The consumption abridged, etc… That is, the number of them cut short, and reduced to few, shall flourish in abundance of justice.

10:23. For the Lord God of hosts shall make a consumption, and an abridgment in the midst of all the land.

10:24. Therefore, thus saith the Lord the God of hosts: O my people that dwellest in Sion, be not afraid of the Assyrian: he shall strike thee with his rod, and he shall lift up his staff over thee in the way of Egypt.

10:25. For yet a little and a very little while, and my indignation shall cease, and my wrath shall be upon their wickedness.

10:26. And the Lord of hosts shall raise up a scourge against him, according to the slaughter of Madian in the rock of Oreb, and his rod over the sea, and he shall lift it up in the way of Egypt.

10:27. And it shall come to pass in that day, that his burden shall be taken away from off thy shoulder, and his yoke from off thy neck, and the yoke shall putrefy at the presence of the oil.

At the presence of the oil… That is, by the sweet unction of divine mercy.

10:28. He shall come into Aiath, he shall pass into Magron: at Machmas he shall lay up his carriages.

Into Aiath, etc… Here the prophet describes the march of the Assyrians under Sennacherib; and the terror they should carry with them; and how they should suddenly be destroyed.

10:29. They have passed in haste, Gaba is our lodging: Rama was astonished, Gabaath of Saul fled away.

10:30. Lift up thy voice, O daughter of Gallim, attend, O Laisa, poor Anathoth.

10:31. Medemena is removed: ye inhabitants of Gabim, take courage.

10:32. It is yet day enough, to remain in Nobe: he shall shake his hand against the mountain of the daughter of Sion, the hill of Jerusalem.

10:33. Behold the sovereign Lord of hosts shall break the earthen vessel with terror, and the tall of stature shall be cut down, and the lofty shall be humbled.

10:34. And the thickets of the forest shall be cut down with iron, and Libanus with its high ones shall fall.

Isaias Chapter 11

Of the spiritual kingdom of Christ, to which all nations shall repair.

11:1. And there shall come forth a rod out of the root of Jesse, and a flower shall rise up out of his root.

11:2. And the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him: the spirit of wisdom, and of understanding, the spirit of counsel, and of fortitude, the spirit of knowledge, and of godliness.

11:3. And he shall be filled with the spirit of the fear of the Lord, He shall not judge according to the sight of the eyes, nor reprove according to the hearing of the ears.

11:4. But he shall judge the poor with justice, and shall reprove with equity the meek of the earth: and he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he shall slay the wicked.

11:5. And justice shall be the girdle of his loins: and faith the girdle of his reins.

11:6. The wolf shall dwell with the lamb: and the leopard shall lie down with the kid: the calf and the lion, and the sheep shall abide together, and a little child shall lead them.

11:7. The calf and the bear shall feed: their young ones shall rest together: and the lion shall eat straw like the ox.

11:8. And the sucking child shall play on other hole of the asp: and the weaned child shall thrust his hand into the den of the basilisk.

11:9. They shall not hurt, nor shall they kill in all my holy mountain, for the earth is filled with the knowledge of the Lord, as the covering waters of the sea.

11:10. In that day the root of Jesse, who standeth for an ensign of the people, him the Gentiles shall beseech, and his sepulchre shall be glorious.

11:11. And it shall come to pass in that day, that the Lord shall set his hand the second time to possess the remnant of his people, which shall be left from the Assyrians, and from Egypt, and from Phetros, and from Ethiopia, and from Elam, and from Sennaar, and from Emath, and from the islands of the sea.

11:12. And he shall set up a standard unto the nations, and shall assemble the fugitives of Israel, and shall gather together the dispersed of Juda from the four quarters of the earth.

11:13. And the envy of Ephraim shall be taken away, and the enemies of Juda shall perish: Ephraim shall not envy Juda, and Juda shall not fight against Ephraim.

11:14. But they shall fly upon the shoulders of the Philistines by the sea, they together shall spoil the children of the east: Edom, till Moab shall be under the rule of their hand, and the children of Ammon shall be obedient.

11:15. And the Lord shall lay waste the tongue of the sea of Egypt, and shall lift up his hand over the river in the strength of his spirit: and he shall strike it in the seven streams, so that men may pass through it in their shoes.

11:16. And there shall be a highway for the remnant of my people, which shall be left from the Assyrians: as there was for Israel in the day that he came up out of the land of Egypt.

Isaias Chapter 12

A canticle of thanksgiving for the benefits of Christ.

12:1. And thou shalt say in that day: I will give thanks to thee, O Lord, for thou wast angry with me: thy wrath is turned away, and thou hast comforted me.

12:2. Behold, God is my saviour, I will deal confidently, and will not fear: because the Lord is my strength, and my praise, and he is become my salvation.

12:3. Thou shall draw waters with joy out of the saviour's fountains:

12:4. And you shall say in that day: Praise ye the Lord, and call upon his name: make his works known among the people: remember that his name is high.

12:5. Sing ye to the Lord, for he hath done great things: shew this forth in all the earth.

12:6. Rejoice, and praise, O thou habitation of Sion: for great is he that is in the midst of thee, the Holy One of Israel.

Isaias Chapter 13

The desolation of Babylon.

13:1. The burden of Babylon which Isaias the son of Amos saw.

The burden of Babylon… That is, a prophecy against Babylon.

13:2. Upon the dark mountain lift ye up a banner, exalt the voice, lift up the hand, and let the rulers go into the gates.

13:3. I have commanded my sanctified ones, and have called my strong ones in my wrath, them that rejoice in my glory.

13:4. The noise of a multitude in the mountains, as it were of many people, the noise of the sound of kings, of nations gathered together: the Lord of hosts hath given charge to the troops of war.

13:5. To them that come from a country afar off, from the end of heaven: the Lord and the instruments of his wrath, to destroy the whole land.

13:6. Howl ye, for the day of the Lord is near: it shall come as a destruction from the Lord.

13:7. Therefore shall all hands be faint, and every heart of man shall melt,

13:8. And shall be broken. Gripings and pains, shall take hold of them, they shall be in pain as a woman in labour. Every one shall be amazed at his neighbour, their countenances shall be as faces burnt.

13:9. Behold, the day of the Lord shall come, a cruel day, and full of indignation, and of wrath, and fury, to lay the land desolate, and to destroy the sinners thereof out of it.

13:10. For the stars of heaven, and their brightness shall not display their light: the sun shall be darkened in his rising, and the moon shall not shine with her light.

13:11. And I will visit the evils of the world, and against the wicked for their iniquity: and I will make the pride of infidels to cease, and will bring down the arrogancy of the mighty.

13:12. A man shall be more precious than gold, yea a man than the finest of gold.

13:13. For this I will trouble the heaven: and the earth shall be moved out of her place, for the indignation of the Lord of hosts, and for the day of his fierce wrath.

13:14. And they shall be as a doe fleeing away, and as a sheep: and there shall be none to gather them together: every man shall turn to his own people, and every one shall flee to his own land.

13:15. Every one that shall be found, shall be slain: and every one that shall come to their aid, shall fall by the sword.

13:16. Their inhabitants shall be dashed in pieces before their eyes: their houses shall be pillaged, and their wives shall be ravished.

13:17. Behold I will stir up the Medes against them, who shall not seek silver, nor desire gold:

13:18. But with their arrows they shall kill the children, and shall have no pity upon the sucklings of the womb, and their eye shall not spare their sons.

13:19. And that Babylon, glorious among kingdoms, the famous pride of the Chaldeans, shall be even as the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrha.

13:20. It shall no more be inhabited for ever, and it shall not be founded unto generation and generation: neither shall the Arabian pitch his tents there, nor shall shepherds rest there.

13:21. But wild beasts shall rest there, and their houses shall be filled with serpents, and ostriches shall dwell there, and the hairy ones shall dance there:

13:22. And owls shall answer one another there, in the houses thereof, and sirens in the temples of pleasure.

Isaias Chapter 14

The restoration of Israel after their captivity. The parable or song insulting over the king of Babylon. A prophecy against the Philistines.

14:1. Her time is near at hand, and her days shall not be prolonged. For the Lord will have mercy on Jacob, and will yet choose out of Israel, and will make them rest upon their own ground: and the stranger shall be joined with them, and shall adhere to the house of Jacob.

14:2. And the people shall take them, and bring them into their place: and the house of Israel shall possess them in the land of the Lord for servants and handmaids: and they shall make them captives that had taken them, and shall subdue their oppressors.

14:3. And it shall come to pass in that day, that when God shall give thee rest from thy labour, and from thy vexation, and from the hard bondage, wherewith thou didst serve before,

14:4. Thou shalt take up this parable against the king of Babylon, and shalt say: How is the oppressor come to nothing, the tribute hath ceased?

14:5. The Lord hath broken the staff of the wicked, the rod of the rulers,

14:6. That struck the people in wrath with an incurable wound, that brought nations under in fury, that persecuted in a cruel manner.

14:7. The whole earth is quiet and still, it is glad and hath rejoiced.

14:8. The fir trees also have rejoiced over thee, and the cedars of Libanus, saying: Since thou hast slept, there hath none come up to cut us down.

14:9. Hell below was in an uproar to meet thee at thy coming, it stirred up the giants for thee. All the princes of the earth are risen up from their thrones, all the princes of nations.

14:10. All shall answer, and say to thee: Thou also art wounded as well as we, thou art become like unto us.

14:11. Thy pride is brought down to hell, thy carcass is fallen down: under thee shall the moth be strewed, and worms shall be thy covering.

14:12. How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, who didst rise in the morning? how art thou fallen to the earth, that didst wound the nations?

O Lucifer… O day star. All this, according to the letter, is spoken of the king of Babylon. It may also be applied, in a spiritual sense, to Lucifer the prince of devils, who was created a bright angel, but fell by pride and rebellion against God.

14:13. And thou saidst in thy heart: I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God, I will sit in the mountain of the covenant, in the sides of the north.

14:14. I will ascend above the height of the clouds, I will be like the most High.

14:15. But yet thou shalt be brought down to hell, into the depth of the pit.

14:16. They that shall see thee, shall turn toward thee, and behold thee. Is this the man that troubled the earth, that shook kingdoms,

14:17. That made the world a wilderness, and destroyed the cities thereof, that opened not the prison to his prisoners?

14:18. All the kings of the nations have all of them slept in glory, every one in his own house.

14:19. But thou art cast out of thy grave, as an unprofitable branch defiled, and wrapped up among them that were slain by the sword, and art gone down to the bottom of the pit, as a rotten carcass.

14:20. Thou shalt not keep company with them, even in burial: for thou hast destroyed thy land, thou hast slain thy people: the seed of the wicked shall not be named for ever.

14:21. Prepare his children for slaughter for the iniquity of their fathers: they shall not rise up, nor inherit the land, nor fill the face of the world with cities.

14:22. And I will rise up against them, saith the Lord of hosts: and I will destroy the name of Babylon, and the remains, and the bud, and the offspring, saith the Lord.

14:23. And I will make it a possession for the ericius and pools of waters, and I will sweep it and wear it out with a besom, saith the Lord of hosts.

14:24. The Lord of hosts hath sworn, saying: Surely as I have thought, so shall it be: and as I have purposed,

14:25. So shall it fall out: That I will destroy the Assyrian in my land, and upon my mountains tread him under foot: and his yoke shall be taken away from them, and his burden shall be taken off their shoulder.

14:26. This is the counsel, that I have purposed upon all the earth, and this is the hand that is stretched out upon all nations.

14:27. For the Lord of hosts hath decreed, and who can disannul it? and his hand is stretched out: and who shall turn it away?

14:28. In the year that king Achaz died, was this burden:

14:29. Rejoice not thou, whole Philistia, that the rod of him that struck thee is broken in pieces: for out of the root of the serpent shall come forth a basilisk, and his seed shall swallow the bird.

14:30. And the firstborn of the poor shall be fed, and the poor shall rest with confidence: and I will make thy root perish with famine, and I will kill thy remnant.

14:31. Howl, O gate; cry, O city: all Philistia is thrown down: for a smoke shall come from the north, and there is none that shall escape his troop.

14:32. And what shall be answered to the messengers of the nations? That the Lord hath founded Sion, and the poor of his people shall hope in him.

Isaias Chapter 15

A prophecy of the desolation of the Moabites.

15:1. The burden of Moab. Because in the night Ar of Moab is laid waste, it is silent: because the wall of Moab is destroyed in the night, it is silent.

15:2. The house is gone up, and Dibon to the high places to mourn over Nabo, and over Medaba, Moab hath howled: on all their heads shall be baldness, and every beard shall be shaven.

15:3. In their streets they are girded with sackcloth: on the tops of their houses, and in their streets all shall howl and come down weeping.

15:4. Hesebon shall cry, and Eleale, their voice is heard even to Jasa. For this shall the well appointed men of Moab howl, his soul shall howl to itself.

15:5. My heart shall cry to Moab, the bars thereof shall flee unto Segor a heifer of three years old: for by the ascent of Luith they shall go up weeping: and in the way of Oronaim they shall lift up a cry of destruction.

15:6. For the waters of Nemrim shall be desolate, for the grass is withered away, the spring is faded, all the greenness is perished.

15:7. According to the greatness of their work, is their visitation also: they shall lead them to the torrent of the willows.

Torrent of the willows… That is, as some say, the waters of Babylon: others render it, a valley of the Arabians.

15:8. For the cry is gone round about the border of Moab: the howling thereof unto Gallim, and unto the well of Elim the cry thereof.

15:9. For the waters of Dibon are filled with blood: for I will bring more upon Dibon: the lion upon them that shall flee of Moab, and upon the remnant of the land.

Isaias Chapter 16

The prophet prayeth for Christ's coming. The affliction of the Moabites for their pride.

16:1. Send forth, O Lord, the lamb, the ruler of the earth, from Petra of the desert, to the mount of the daughter of Sion.

16:2. And it shall come to pass, that as a bird fleeing away, and as young ones flying out of the nest, so shall the daughters of Moab be in the passage of Arnon.

16:3. Take counsel, gather a council: make thy shadow as the night in the midday: hide them that flee, and betray not them that wander about.

16:4. My fugitives shall dwell with thee: O Moab, be thou a covert to them from the face of the destroyer: for the dust is at an end, the wretch is consumed: he hath failed, that trod the earth under foot.

16:5. And a throne shall be prepared in mercy, and one shall sit upon it in truth in the tabernacle of David, judging and seeking judgment and quickly rendering that which is just.

16:6. We have heard of the pride of Moab, he is exceeding proud: his pride and his arrogancy, and his indignation is more than his strength.

16:7. Therefore shall Moab howl to Moab, every one shall howl: to them that rejoice upon the brick walls, tell ye their stripes.

16:8. For the suburbs of Hesebon are desolate, and the lords of the nations have destroyed the vineyard of Sabama: the branches thereof have reached even to Jazer: they have wandered in the wilderness, the branches thereof are left, they are gone over the sea.

16:9. Therefore I will lament with the weeping of Jazer the vineyard of Sabama: I will water thee with my tears, O Hesebon, and Eleale: for the voice of the treaders hath rushed in upon thy vintage, and upon thy harvest.

16:10. And gladness and joy shall be taken away from Carmel, and there shall be no rejoicing nor shouting in the vineyards. He shall not tread out wine in the press that was wont to tread it out: the voice of the treaders I have taken away.

Carmel… This name is often taken to signify a fair and fruitful hill or field, such as mount Carmel is.

16:11. Wherefore my bowels shall sound like a harp for Moab, and my inward parts for the brick wall.

16:12. And it shall come to pass, when it is seen that Moab is wearied on his high places, that he shall go in to his sanctuaries to pray, and shall not prevail.

16:13. This is the word, that the Lord spoke to Moab from that time:

16:14. And now the Lord hath spoken, saying: In three years, as the years of a hireling, the glory of Moab shall be taken away for all the multitude of the people, and it shall be left small and feeble, not many.

Isaias Chapter 17

Judgments upon Damascus and Samaria. The overthrow of the Assyrians.

17:1. The burden of Damascus. Behold Damascus shall cease to be a city, and shall be as a ruinous heap of stones.

17:2. The cities of Aroer shall be left for flocks, and they shall rest there, and there shall be none to make them afraid.

17:3. And aid shall cease from Ephraim, and the kingdom from Damascus: and the remnant of Syria shall be as the glory of the children of Israel: saith the Lord of hosts.

17:4. And it shall come to pass in that day, that the glory of Jacob shall be made thin, and the fatness of his flesh shall grow lean.

17:5. And it shall be as when one gathereth in the harvest that which remaineth, and his arm shall gather the ears of corn: and it shall be as he that seeketh ears in the vale of Raphaim.

17:6. And the fruit thereof that shall be left upon it, shall be as one cluster of grapes, and as the shaking of the olive tree, two or three berries in the top of a bough, or four or five upon the top of the tree, saith the Lord the God of Israel.

17:7. In that day man shall bow down himself to his Maker, and his eyes shall look to the Holy One of Israel.

17:8. And he shall not look to the altars which his hands made; and he shall not have respect to the things that his fingers wrought, such as groves and temples.

17:9. In that day his strong cities shall be forsaken, as the ploughs, and the corn that were left before the face of the children of Israel, and thou shalt be desolate.

That were left… Viz., by the Chanaanites, when the children of Israel came into their land.

17:10. Because thou hast forgotten God thy saviour, and hast not remembered thy strong helper: therefore shalt thou plant good plants, and shalt sow strange seed.

17:11. In the day of thy planting shall be the wild grape, and in the morning thy seed shall flourish: the harvest is taken away in the day of inheritance, and shall grieve thee much.

17:12. Woe to the multitude of many people, like the multitude of the roaring sea: and the tumult of crowds, like the noise of many waters.

The multitude, etc… This and all that follows to the end of the chapter, relates to the Assyrian army under Sennacherib.

17:13. Nations shall make a noise like the noise of waters overflowing, but he shall rebuke him, and he shall flee far off: and he shall be carried away as the dust of the mountains before the wind, and as a whirlwind before a tempest.

17:14. In the time of the evening, behold there shall be trouble: the morning shall come, and he shall not be: this is the portion of them that have wasted us, and the lot of them that spoiled us.

Isaias Chapter 18

A woe to the Ethiopians, who fed Israel with vain hopes, their future conversion.

18:1. Woe to the land, the winged cymbal, which is beyond the rivers of Ethiopia,

18:2. That sendeth ambassadors by the sea, and in vessels of bulrushes upon the waters. Go, ye swift angels, to a nation rent and torn in pieces: to a terrible people, after which there is no other: to a nation expecting and trodden underfoot, whose land the rivers have spoiled.

Angels… Or messengers.

18:3. All ye inhabitants of the world, who dwell on the earth, when the sign shall be lifted up on the mountains, you shall see, and you shall hear the sound of the trumpet.

18:4. For thus saith the Lord to me: I will take my rest, and consider in my place, as the noon light is clear, and as a cloud of dew in the day of harvest.

18:5. For before the harvest it was all flourishing, and it shall bud without perfect ripeness, and the sprigs thereof shall be cut off with pruning hooks: and what is left shall be cut away and shaken out.

18:6. And they shall be left together to the birds of the mountains, and the beasts of the earth: and the fowls shall be upon them all the summer, and all the beasts of the earth shall winter upon them.

18:7. At that time shall a present be brought to the Lord of hosts, from a people rent and torn in pieces: from a terrible people, after which there hath been no other: from a nation expecting, expecting and trodden under foot, whose land the rivers have spoiled, to the place of the name of the Lord of hosts, to mount Sion.

Isaias Chapter 19

The punishment of Egypt: their call to the church.

19:1. The burden of Egypt. Behold the Lord will ascend upon a swift cloud, and will enter into Egypt, and the idols of Egypt shall be moved at his presence, and the heart of Egypt shall melt in the midst thereof.

19:2. And I will set the Egyptians to fight against the Egyptians: and they shall fight brother against brother, and friend against friend, city against city, kingdom against kingdom.

19:3. And the spirit of Egypt shall be broken in the bowels thereof, and I will cast down their counsel: and they shall consult their idols, and their diviners, and their wizards, and soothsayers.

19:4. And I will deliver Egypt into the hand of cruel masters, and a strong king shall rule over them, saith the Lord the God of hosts.

19:5. And the water of the sea shall be dried up, and the river shall be wasted and dry.

19:6. And the rivers shall fail: the streams of the banks shall be diminished, and be dried up. The reed and the bulrush shall wither away.

19:7. The channel of the river shall be laid bare from its fountain, and every thing sown by the water shall be dried up, it shall wither away, and shall be no more.

19:8. The fishers also shall mourn, and all that cast a hook into the river shall lament, and they that spread nets upon the waters shall languish away.

19:9. They shall be confounded that wrought in flax, combing and weaving fine linen.

19:10. And its watery places shall be dry, all they shall mourn that made pools to take fishes.

19:11. The princes of Tanis are become fools, the wise counsellors of Pharao have given foolish counsel: how will you say to Pharao: I am the son of the wise, the son of ancient kings?

19:12. Where are now thy wise men? let them tell thee, and shew what the Lord of hosts hath purposed upon Egypt.

19:13. The princes of Tanis are become fools, the princes of Memphis are gone astray, they have deceived Egypt, the stay of the people thereof.

19:14. The Lord hath mingled in the midst thereof the spirit of giddiness: and they have caused Egypt to err in all its works, as a drunken man staggereth and vomiteth.

19:15. And there shall be no work for Egypt, to make head or tail, him that bendeth down, or that holdeth back.

19:16. In that day Egypt shall be like unto women, and they shall be amazed, and afraid, because of the moving of the hand of the Lord of hosts, which he shall move over it.

19:17. And the land of Juda shall be a terror to Egypt: everyone that shall remember it shall tremble because of the counsel of the Lord of hosts, which he hath determined concerning it.

19:18. In that day there shall be five cities in the land of Egypt, speaking the language of Chanaan, and swearing by the Lord of hosts: one shall be called the city of the sun.

19:19. In that day there shall be an altar of the Lord in the midst of the land of Egypt, and a monument of the Lord at the borders thereof:

19:20. It shall be for a sign, and for a testimony to the Lord of hosts in the land of Egypt. For they shall cry to the Lord because of the oppressor, and he shall send them a Saviour and a defender to deliver them.

19:21. And the Lord shall be known by Egypt, and the Egyptians shall know the Lord in that day, and shall worship him with sacrifices and offerings: and they shall make vows to the Lord, and perform them.

19:22. And the Lord shall strike Egypt with a scourge, and shall heal it, and they shall return to the Lord, and he shall be pacified towards them, and heal them.

19:23. In that day there shall be a way from Egypt to the Assyrians, and the Assyrian shall enter into Egypt, and the Egyptian to the Assyrians, and the Egyptians shall serve the Assyrian.

19:24. In that day shall Israel be the third to the Egyptian and the Assyrian: a blessing in the midst of the land,

19:25. Which the Lord of hosts hath blessed, saying: Blessed be my people of Egypt, and the work of my hands to the Assyrian: but Israel is my inheritance.

Isaias Chapter 20

The ignominious captivity of the Egyptians, and the Ethiopians.

20:1. In the year that Tharthan entered into Azotus, when Sargon the king of the Assyrians had sent him, and he had fought against Azotus, and had taken it:

20:2. At that same time the Lord spoke by the hand of Isaias the son of Amos, saying Go, and loose the sackcloth from off thy loins, and take off thy shoes from thy feet. And he did so, and went naked, and barefoot.

20:3. And the Lord said: As my servant Isaias hath walked, naked and barefoot, it shall be a sign and a wonder of three years upon Egypt, and upon Ethiopia,

20:4. So shall the king of the Assyrians lead away the prisoners of Egypt, and the captivity of Ethiopia, young and old, naked and barefoot, with their buttocks uncovered to the shame of Egypt.

20:5. And they shall be afraid, and ashamed of Ethiopia their hope, and of Egypt their glory.

20:6. And the inhabitants of this isle shall say in that day: Lo this was our hope, to whom we fled for help, to deliver us from the face of the king of the Assyrians: and how shall we be able to escape?

Isaias Chapter 21

The destruction of Babylon by the Medes and Persians: a prophecy against the Edomites and the Arabians.

21:1. The burden of the desert of the sea. As whirlwinds come from the south, it cometh from the desert from a terrible land.

The desert of the sea… So Babylon is here called, because from a city as full of people as the sea is with water, it was become a desert.

21:2. A grievous vision is told me: he that is unfaithful dealeth unfaithfully: and he that is a spoiler, spoileth. Go up, O Elam, besiege, O Mede: I have made all the mourning thereof to cease.

O Elam… That is, O Persia.

21:3. Therefore are my loins filled with pain, anguish hath taken hold of me, as the anguish of a woman in labour: I fell down at the hearing of it, I was troubled at the seeing of it.

21:4. My heart failed, darkness amazed me: Babylon my beloved is become a wonder to me.

21:5. Prepare the table, behold in the watchtower them that eat and drink: arise, ye princes, take up the shield.

21:6. For thus hath the Lord said to me: Go, and set a watchman: and whatsoever he shall see, let him tell.

21:7. And he saw a chariot with two horsemen, a rider upon an ass, and a rider upon a camel: and he beheld them diligently with much heed.

A rider upon an ass, etc… These two riders are the kings of the
Persians and Medes.

21:8. And a lion cried out: I am upon the watchtower of the Lord, standing continually by day: and I am upon my ward, standing whole nights.

And a lion cried out… That is, I Isaias seeing the approaching ruin of
Babylon, have cried out as a lion roaring.

21:9. Behold this man cometh, the rider upon the chariot with two horsemen, and he answered, and said: Babylon is fallen, she is fallen, and all the graven gods thereof are broken unto the ground.

21:10. O my thrashing, and the children of my floor, that which I have heard of the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, I have declared unto you.

21:11. The burden of Duma calleth to me out of Seir: Watchman, what of the night? watchman, what of the night?

Duma… That is, Idumea, or Edom.

21:12. The watchman said: The morning cometh, also the night: if you seek, seek: return, come.

21:13. The burden in Arabia. In the forest at evening you shall sleep, in the paths of Dedanim.

21:14. Meeting the thirsty bring him water, you that inhabit the land of the south, meet with bread him that fleeth.

21:15. For they are fled from before the swords, from the sword that hung over them, from the bent bow, from the face of a grievous battle.

21:16. For thus saith the Lord to me: Within a year, according to the years of a hireling, all the glory of Cedar shall be taken away.

Cedar… Arabia.

21:17. And the residue of the number of strong archers of the children of Cedar shall be diminished: for the Lord the God of Israel hath spoken it.

Isaias Chapter 22

The prophet laments the devastation of Juda. He foretells the deprivation of Sobna, and the substitution of Eliacim, a figure of Christ.

22:1. The burden of the valley of vision. What aileth thee also, that thou too art wholly gone up to the housetops?

The valley of vision… Jerusalem. The temple of Jerusalem was built upon mount Moria, or the mountain of vision. But the city is here called the valley of vision; either because it was lower than the temple, or because of the low condition to which it was to be reduced.

22:2. Full of clamour, a populous city, a joyous city: thy slain are not slain by the sword, nor dead in battle.

22:3. All the princes are fled together, and are bound hard: all that were found, are bound together, they are fled far off.

22:4. Therefore have I said: Depart from me, I will weep bitterly: labour not to comfort me, for the devastation of the daughter of my people.

22:5. For it is a day of slaughter and of treading down, and of weeping to the Lord the God of hosts in the valley of vision, searching the wall, and magnificent upon the mountain.

22:6. And Elam took the quiver, the chariot of the horseman, and the shield was taken down from the wall.

22:7. And thy choice valleys shall be full of chariots, and the horsemen shall place themselves in the gate.

22:8. And the covering of Juda shall be discovered, and thou shalt see in that day the armoury of the house of the forest.

22:9. And you shall see the breaches of the city of David, that they are many: and you have gathered together the waters of the lower pool,

22:10. And have numbered the houses of Jerusalem, and broken down houses to fortify the wall.

22:11. And you made a ditch between the two walls for the water of the old pool: and you have not looked up to the maker thereof, nor regarded him even at a distance, that wrought it long ago.

22:12. And the Lord, the God of hosts, in that day shall call to weeping, and to mourning, to baldness, and to girding with sackcloth:

22:13. And behold joy and gladness, killing calves, and slaying rams, eating flesh, and drinking wine: Let us eat and drink; for to morrow we shall die.

22:14. And the voice of the Lord of hosts was revealed in my ears: Surely this iniquity shall not be forgiven you till you die, saith the Lord God of hosts.

22:15. Thus saith the Lord God of hosts: Go, get thee in to him that dwelleth in the tabernacle, to Sobna who is over the temple: and thou shalt say to him:

22:16. What dost thou here, or as if thou wert somebody here? for thou hast hewed thee out a sepulchre here, thou hast hewed out a monument carefully in a high place, a dwelling for thyself in a rock.

22:17. Behold the Lord will cause thee to be carried away, as a cock is carried away, and he will lift thee up as a garment.

22:18. He will crown thee with a crown of tribulation, he will toss thee like a ball into a large and spacious country: there shalt thou die, and there shall the chariot of thy glory be, the shame of the house of thy Lord.

22:19. And I will drive thee out from thy station, and depose thee from thy ministry.

22:20. And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will call my servant Eliacim the son of Helcias,

22:21. And I will clothe him with thy robe, and will strengthen him with thy girdle, and will give thy power into his hand: and he shall be as a father to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and to the house of Juda.

22:22. And I will lay the key of the house of David upon his shoulder: and he shall open, and none shall shut: and he shall shut, and none shall open.

22:23. And I will fasten him as a peg in a sure place, and he shall be for a throne of glory to the house of his father.

22:24. And they shall hang upon him all the glory of his father's house, divers kinds of vessels, every little vessel, from the vessels of cups even to every instrument of music.

22:25. In that day, saith the Lord of hosts, shall the peg be removed, that was fastened in the sure place: and it shall be broken and shall fall: and that which hung thereon, shall perish, because the Lord hath spoken it.

Isaias Chapter 23

The destruction of Tyre. It shall be repaired again after seventy years.

23:1. The burden of Tyre. Howl, ye ships of the sea, for the house is destroyed, from whence they were wont to come: from the land of Cethim it is revealed to them.

23:2. Be silent, you that dwell in the island: the merchants of Sidon passing over the sea, have filled thee.

23:3. The seed of the Nile in many waters, the harvest of the river is her revenue: and she is become the mart of the nations.

23:4. Be thou ashamed, O Sidon: for the sea speaketh, even the strength of the sea, saying: I have not been in labour, nor have I brought forth, nor have I nourished up young men, nor brought up virgins.

23:5. When it shall be heard in Egypt, they will be sorry when they shall hear of Tyre:

23:6. Pass over the seas, howl, ye inhabitants of the island.

23:7. Is not this your city, which gloried from of old in her antiquity? her feet shall carry her afar off to sojourn.

23:8. Who hath taken this counsel against Tyre, that was formerly crowned, whose merchants were princes, and her traders the nobles of the earth?

23:9. The Lord of hosts hath designed it, to pull down the pride of all glory, and bring to disgrace all the glorious ones of the earth.

23:10. Pass thy land as a river, O daughter of the sea, thou hast a girdle no more.

23:11. He stretched out his hand over the sea, he troubled kingdoms: the Lord hath given a charge against Chanaan, to destroy the strong ones thereof.

23:12. And he said: Thou shalt glory no more, O virgin daughter of Sidon, who art oppressed: arise and sail over to Cethim, there also thou shalt have no rest.

23:13. Behold the land of the Chaldeans, there was not such a people, the Assyrians founded it: they have led away the strong ones thereof into captivity, they have destroyed the houses thereof, they have, brought it to ruin.

23:14. Howl, O ye ships of the sea, for your strength is laid waste.

23:15. And it shall come to pass in that day that thou, O Tyre, shalt be forgotten, seventy years, according to the days of one king: but after seventy years, there shall be unto Tyre as the song of a harlot.

23:16. Take a harp, go about the city, harlot that hast been forgotten: sing well, sing many a song, that thou mayst be remembered.

23:17. And it shall come to pass after seventy years, that the Lord will visit Tyre, and will bring her back again to her traffic: and she shall commit fornication again with all the kingdoms of the world upon the face of the earth.

23:18. And her merchandise and her hire shall be sanctified to the Lord: they shall not be kept in store, nor laid up: for her merchandise shall be for them that shall dwell before the Lord, that they may eat unto fulness, and be clothed for a continuance.

Sanctified to the Lord… This alludes to the conversion of the
Gentiles.

Isaias Chapter 24

The judgments of God upon all the sinners of the world. A remnant shall joyfully praise him.

24:1. Behold the Lord shall lay waste the earth, and shall strip it, and shall afflict the face thereof, and scatter abroad the inhabitants thereof.

24:2. And it shall be as with the people, so with the priest: and as with the servant so with his master: as with the handmaid, so with her mistress: as with the buyer, so with the seller: as with the lender, so with the borrower: as with him that calleth for his money, so with him that oweth.

24:3. With desolation shall the earth be laid waste, and it shall be utterly spoiled: for the Lord hath spoken this word.

24:4. The earth mourned, and faded away, and is weakened: the world faded away, the height of the people of the earth is weakened.

24:5. And the earth is infected by the inhabitants thereof: because they have transgressed the laws, they have changed the ordinance, they have broken the everlasting covenant.

24:6. Therefore shall a curse devour the earth, and the inhabitants thereof shall sin: and therefore they that dwell therein shall be mad, and few men shall be left.

24:7. The vintage hath mourned, the vine hath languished away, all the merry have sighed.

24:8. The mirth of timbrels hath ceased, the noise of them that rejoice is ended, the melody of the harp is silent.

24:9. They shall not drink wine with a song: the drink shall be bitter to them that drink it.

24:10. The city of vanity is broken down, every house is shut up, no man cometh in.

24:11. There shall be a crying for wine in the streets: all mirth is forsaken: the joy of the earth is gone away.

24:12. Desolation is left in the city, and calamity shall oppress the gates.

24:13. For it shall be thus in the midst of the earth, in the midst of the people, as if a few olives, that remain, should be shaken out of the olive tree: or grapes, when the vintage is ended.

24:14. These shall lift up their voice, and shall give praise: when the Lord shall be glorified, they shall make a joyful noise from the sea.

24:15. Therefore glorify ye the Lord in instruction: the name of the Lord God of Israel in the islands of the sea.

24:16. From the ends of the earth we have heard praises, the glory of the just one. And I said: My secret to myself, my secret to myself, woe is me: the prevaricators have prevaricated, and with the prevarication of transgressors they have prevaricated.

24:17. Fear, and the pit, and the snare are upon thee, O thou inhabitant of the earth.

24:18. And it shall come to pass, that he that shall flee from the noise of the fear, shall fall into the pit: and he that shall rid himself out of the pit, shall be taken in the snare: for the flood-gates from on high are opened, and the foundations of the earth shall be shaken.

24:19. With breaking shall the earth be broken, with crushing shall the earth be crushed, with trembling shall the earth be moved.

24:20. With shaking shall the earth be shaken as a drunken man, and shall be removed as the tent of one night: and the iniquity thereof shall be heavy upon it, and it shall fall, and not rise again.

24:21. And it shall come to pass, that in that day the Lord shall visit upon the host of heaven on high, and upon the kings of the earth, on the earth.

The host of heaven on high… The stars, which in many places of the Scripture are so called. Some commentators explain that these words here signify the demons of the air.

24:22. And they shall be gathered together as in the gathering of one bundle into the pit, and they shall be shut up there in prison: and after many days they shall be visited.

24:23. And the moon shall blush, and the sun shall be ashamed, when the Lord of hosts shall reign in mount Sion, and in Jerusalem, and shall be glorified in the sight of his ancients.

Isaias Chapter 25

A canticle of thanksgiving for God's judgments and benefits.

25:1. O Lord, thou art my God, I will exalt O thee, and give glory to thy name: for thou hast done wonderful things, thy designs of old faithful, amen.

25:2. For thou hast reduced the city to a heap, the strong city to ruin, the house of strangers, to be no city, and to be no more built up for ever.

25:3. Therefore shall a strong people praise thee, the city of mighty nations shall fear thee.

25:4. Because thou hast been a strength to the poor, a strength to the needy in his distress: a refuge from the whirlwind, a shadow from the heat. For the blast of the mighty is like a whirlwind beating against a wall.

25:5. Thou shalt bring down the tumult of strangers, as heat in thirst: and as with heat under a burning cloud, thou shalt make the branch of the mighty to wither away.

25:6. And the Lord of hosts shall make unto all people in this mountain, a feast of fat things, a feast of wine, of fat things full of marrow, of wine purified from the lees.

25:7. And he shall destroy in this mountain the face of the bond with which all people were tied, and the web that he began over all nations.

25:8. He shall cast death down headlong for ever: and the Lord God shall wipe away tears from every face, and the reproach of his people he shall take away from off the whole earth: for the Lord hath spoken it.

25:9. And they shall say in that day: Lo, this is our God, we have waited for him, and he will save us: this is the Lord, we have patiently waited for him, we shall rejoice and be joyful in his salvation.

25:10. For the hand of the Lord shall rest in this mountain: and Moab shall be trodden down under him, as straw is broken in pieces with the wain.

Moab… That is, the reprobate, whose eternal punishment, from which they can no way escape, is described under these figures.

25:11. And he shall stretch forth his hands under him, as he that swimmeth stretcheth forth his hands to swim: and he shall bring down his glory with the dashing of his hands.

25:12. And the bulwarks of thy high walls shall fall, and be brought low, and shall be pulled down to the ground, even to the dust.

Isaias Chapter 26

A canticle of thanks for the deliverance of God's people.

26:1. In that day shall this canticle be sung in the land of Juda. Sion the city of our strength a saviour, a wall and a bulwark shall be set therein.

26:2. Open ye the gates, and let the just nation, that keepeth the truth, enter in.

26:3. The old error is passed away: thou wilt keep peace: peace, because we have hoped in thee.

26:4. You have hoped in the Lord for evermore, in the Lord God mighty for ever.

26:5. For he shall bring down them that dwell on high, the high city he shall lay low. He shall bring it down even to the ground, he shall pull it down even to the dust.

26:6. The foot shall tread it down, the feet of the poor, the steps of the needy.

26:7. The way of the just is right, the path of the just is right to walk in.

26:8. And in the way of thy judgments, O Lord, we have patiently waited for thee: thy name, and thy remembrance are the desire of the soul.

26:9. My soul hath desired thee in the night: yea, and with my spirit within me in the morning early I will watch to thee. When thou shalt do thy judgments on the earth, the inhabitants of the world shall learn justice.

26:10. Let us have pity on the wicked, but he will not learn justice: in the land of the saints he hath done wicked things, and he shall not see the glory of the Lord.

26:11. Lord, let thy hand be exalted, and let them not see: let the envious people see, and be confounded: and let fire devour thy enemies.

26:12. Lord, thou wilt give us peace: for thou hast wrought all our works for us.

26:13. O Lord our God, other lords besides thee have had dominion over us, only in thee let us remember thy name.

26:14. Let not the dead live, let not the giants rise again: therefore hast visited and destroyed them, and hast destroyed all their memory.

26:15. Thou hast been favourable to the nation, O Lord, thou hast been favourable to the nation: art thou glorified? thou hast removed all the ends of the earth far off.

26:16. Lord, they have sought after thee in distress, in the tribulation of murmuring thy instruction was with them.

26:17. As a woman with child, when she draweth near the time of her delivery, is in pain, and crieth out in her pangs: so are we become in thy presence, O Lord.

26:18. We have conceived, and been as it were in labour, and have brought forth wind: we have not wrought salvation on the earth, therefore the inhabitants of the earth have not fallen.

26:19. Thy dead men shall live, my slain shall rise again: awake, and give praise, ye that dwell in the dust: for thy dew is the dew of the light: and the land of the giants thou shalt pull down into ruin.

26:20. Go, my people, enter into thy chambers, shut thy doors upon thee, hide thyself a little for a moment, until the indignation pass away.

26:21. For behold the Lord will come out of his place, to visit the iniquity of the inhabitant of the earth against him: and the earth shall disclose her blood, and shall cover her slain no more.

Shall cover her slain no more… This is said with relation to the martyrs, and their happy resurrection.

Isaias Chapter 27

The punishment of the oppressors of God's people. The Lord's favour to his church.

27:1. In that day the Lord with his hard, and great, and strong sword shall visit leviathan the bar serpent, and leviathan the crooked serpent, and shall slay the whale that is in the sea.

Leviathan… That is, the devil, the great enemy of the people of God. He is called the bar serpent from his strength, and the crooked serpent from his wiles; and the whale of the sea, from the tyranny he exercises in the sea of this world. He was spiritually slain by the death of Christ, when his power was destroyed.

27:2. In that day there shall be singing to the vineyard of pure wine.

The vineyard, etc… The church of Christ.

27:3. I am the Lord that keep it, I will suddenly give it drink: lest any hurt come to it, I keep it night and day.

I will suddenly give it drink… Or, as the Hebrew may also be rendered,
I will continually water it.

27:4. There is no indignation in me: who shall make me a thorn and a brier in battle: shall I march against it, shall, I set it on fire together?

No indignation in me, etc… Viz., against the church: nor shall I become as a thorn or brier in its regard; or march against it, or set it on fire: but it shall always take fast hold of me, and keep an everlasting peace with me.

27:5. Or rather shall it take hold of my strength, shall it make peace with me, shall it make peace with me?

27:6. When they shall rush in unto Jacob, Israel shall blossom and bud, and they shall fill the face of the world with seed.

When they shall rush in, etc… Some understand this of the enemies of the true Israel, that shall invade it in vain. Others of the spiritual invasion made by the apostles of Christ.

27:7. Hath he struck him according to the stroke of him that struck him? or is he slain, as he killed them that were slain by him?

Hath he struck him, etc… Hath God punished the carnal persecuting
Jews, in proportion to their doings against Christ and his saints?

27:8. In measure against measure, when it shall be cast off, thou shalt judge it. He hath meditated with his severe spirit in the day of heat.

When it shall be cast off, etc… When the synagogue shall be cast off, thou shalt judge it in measure, and in proportion to its crimes.-Ibid. He hath meditated, etc… God hath designed severe punishments in the day of his wrath.

27:9. Therefore upon this shall the iniquity of the house of Jacob be forgiven: and this is all the fruit, that the sin thereof should be taken away, when he shall have made all the stones of the altar, as burnt stones broken in pieces, the groves and temples shall not stand.

Of the house of Jacob… Viz., of such of them as shall be converted.

27:10. For the strong city shall be desolate, the beautiful city shall be forsaken, and shall be left as a wilderness: there the calf shall feed, and there shall he lie down, and shall consume its branches.

The strong city… Jerusalem.

27:11. Its harvest shall be destroyed with drought, women shall come and teach it: for it is not a wise people, therefore he that made it, shall not have mercy on it: and he that formed it, shall not spare it.

27:12. And it shall come to pass, that in that day the Lord will strike from the channel of the river even to the torrent of Egypt, and you shall be gathered together one by one, O ye children of Israel.

27:13. And it shall come to pass, that in that day a noise shall be made with a great trumpet, and they that were lost, shall come from the land of the Assyrians, and they that were outcasts in the land of Egypt, and they shall adore the Lord in the holy mount in Jerusalem.

A great trumpet… The preaching of the gospel for the conversion of the
Jews.

Isaias Chapter 28

The punishment of the Israelites, for their pride, intemperance, and contempt of religion. Christ the cornerstone.

28:1. Woe to the crown of pride, to the drunkards of Ephraim, and to the fading flower the glory his joy, who were on the head of the fat valley, staggering with wine.

Ephraim… That is, the kingdom of the ten tribes.-Ibid. The head of the fat valley… Samaria, situate on a hill, having under it a most fertile valley.

28:2. Behold the Lord is mighty and strong, as a storm of hail: a destroying whirlwind, as the violence of many waters overflowing, and sent forth upon a spacious land.

28:3. The crown of pride of the drunkards of Ephraim shall be trodden under feet.

28:4. And the fading tower the glory of his joy, who is on the head of the fat valley, shall be as a hasty fruit before the ripeness of autumn: which when he that seeth it shall behold, as soon he taketh it in his hand, he will eat it up.

28:5. In that day the Lord of hosts shall be a crown of glory, and a garland of joy to the residue of his people:

28:6. And a spirit of judgment to him that sitteth in judgment, and strength to them that return out of the battle to the gate.

28:7. But these also have been ignorant through wine, and through drunkenness have erred: the priest and the prophet have been ignorant through drunkenness, they are swallowed up with wine, they have gone astray in drunkenness, they have not known him that seeth, they have been ignorant of judgment.

These also… The kingdom of Juda.

28:8. For all the tables were full of vomit and filth, so that there was no more place.

28:9. Whom shall he teach knowledge? and whom shall he make to understand the hearing? them that are weaned from the milk, that are drawn away from the breasts.

28:10. For command, command again; command, command again; expect, expect again; a little there, a little there.

Command, command again, etc… This is said in the person of the Jews, resisting the repeated commands of God, and still putting him off.

28:11. For with the speech of lips, and with another tongue he will speak to this people.

28:12. To whom he said: This is my rest, refresh the weary, and this is my refreshing: and they would not hear.

28:13. And the word of the Lord shall be to them: Command, command again; command, command again; expect, expect again; a little there, a little there: that they may go, and fall backward, and be broken, and snared, and taken.

28:14. Wherefore hear the word of the Lord, ye scornful men, who rule over my people that is in Jerusalem.

28:15. For you have said: We have entered into a league with death, and we have made a covenant with hell. When the overflowing scourge shall pass through, it shall not come upon us: for we have placed our hope in lies, and by falsehood we are protected.

28:16. Therefore thus saith the Lord God: Behold I will lay a stone in the foundations of Sion, a tried stone, a corner stone, a precious stone, founded in the foundation. He that believeth, let him not hasten.

A stone in the foundations… Viz., Christ.-Ibid. Let him not hasten, etc… Let him expect his coming with patience.

28:17. And I will set judgment in weight, and justice in measure: and hail shall overturn the hope of falsehood: and waters shall overflow its protection.

28:18. And your league with death shall be abolished, and your covenant with hell shall not stand: when the overflowing scourge shall pass, you shall be trodden down by it.

28:19. Whensoever it shall pass through, it shall take you away: because in the morning early it shall pass through, in the day and in the night, and vexation alone shall make you understand what you hear.

28:20. For the bed is straitened, so that one must fall out, and a short covering cannot cover both.

The bed is straitened, etc… It is too narrow to hold two: God will have the bed of our heart all to himself.

28:21. For the Lord shall stand up as in the mountain of divisions: he shall be angry as in the valley which is in Gabaon: that he may do his work, his strange work: that he may perform his work, his work is strange to him.

As in the mountain, etc… As the Lord fought against the Philistines in
Baal Pharasim, 2 Kings 5., and against the Chanaanites, in the valley of
Gabaon, Jos. 10.

28:22. And now do not mock, lest your bonds be tied strait. For I have heard of the Lord the God of hosts a consumption and a cutting short upon all the earth.

28:23. Give ear, and hear my voice, hearken, and hear my speech.

28:24. Shall the ploughman plough all the day to sow, shall he open and harrow his ground?

28:25. Will he not, when he hath made plain the surface thereof, sow gith, and scatter cummin, and put wheat in order, and barley, and millet, and vetches in their bounds?

28:26. For he will instruct him in judgment: his God will teach him.

28:27. For gith shall not be thrashed with saws, neither shall the cart wheel turn about upon cummin: but gith shall be beaten out with a rod, and cumin with a staff.

28:28. But breadcorn shall be broken small: but the thrasher shall not thrash it for ever, neither shall the cart wheel hurt it, nor break it with its teeth.

28:29. This also is come forth from the Lord God of hosts, to make his counsel wonderful, and magnify justice.

This also, etc… Such also is the proceeding of the Lord with his land, and the divers seeds he throws therein.

Isaias Chapter 29

God's heavy judgments upon Jerusalem, for their obstinacy: with a prophecy of the conversion of the Gentiles.

29:1. Woe to Ariel, to Ariel the city which David took: year is added to year the solemnities are at an end.

Ariel… This word signifies, the lion of God, and here is taken for the strong city of Jerusalem.

29:2. And I will make a trench about Ariel, and it shall be in sorrow and mourning, and it shall be to me as Ariel.

29:3. And I will make a circle round about thee, and I will cast up a rampart against thee, and raise up bulwarks to besiege thee.

29:4. Thou shalt be brought down, thou shall speak out of the earth, and thy speech shall be heard out of the ground: and thy voice shall be from the earth like that of the python, and out of the earth thy speech shall mutter.

29:5. And the multitude of them that fan thee, shall be like small dust: and as ashes passing away, the multitude of them that have prevailed against thee.

29:6. And it shall be at an instant suddenly. A visitation shall come from the Lord of hosts in thunder, and with earthquake, and with a great noise of whirlwind and tempest; and with the flame of devouring fire.

29:7. And the multitude of all nations that have fought against Ariel, shall be as the dream of a vision by night, and all that have fought, and besieged and prevailed against it.

29:8. And as he that is hungry dreameth, and eateth, but when he is awake, his soul is empty: and as he that is thirsty dreameth, and drinketh and after he is awake, is yet faint with thirst, and his soul is empty: so shall be the multitude of all the Gentiles, that have fought against mount Sion.

29:9. Be astonished, and wonder, waver, and stagger: be drunk, and not with wine: stagger, and not with drunkenness.

29:10. For the Lord hath mingled for you the spirit of a deep sleep, he will shut up your eyes, he will cover your prophets and princes, that see visions.

29:11. And the vision of all shall be unto you as the words of a book that is sealed which when they shall deliver to one that is learned, they shall say: Read this: and he shall answer: I cannot, for it is sealed.

29:12. And the book shall be given to one that knoweth no letters, and it shall be said to him: Read: and he shall answer: I know no letters.

29:13. And the Lord said: Forasmuch as this people draw near me with their mouth, and with their lips glorify me, but their heart is far from me, and they have feared me with the commandment and doctrines of men:

29:14. Therefore behold I will proceed to cause an admiration in this people, by a great and wonderful miracle: for wisdom shall perish from their wise men, and the understanding of their prudent men shall be hid.

29:15. Woe to you that are deep of heart, to hide your counsel from the Lord: and their works are in the dark, and they say: Who seeth us, and who knoweth us?

29:16. This thought of yours is perverse: as if the clay should think against the potter, and the work should say to the maker thereof: Thou madest me not: or the thing framed should say to him that fashioned it: Thou understandest not.

29:17. Is it not yet a very little while, and Libanus shall be turned into charmel, and charmel shall be esteemed as a forest?

Charmel… This word signifies a fruitful field.

29:18. And in that day the deaf shall hear the words of the book, and out of darkness and obscurity the eyes of the blind shall see.

29:19. And the meek shall increase their joy in the Lord, and the poor men shall rejoice in the Holy One of Israel.

29:20. For he that did prevail hath failed, the scorner is consumed, and they are all cut off that watched for iniquity:

29:21. That made men sin by word, and supplanted him that reproved them in the gate, and declined in vain from the just.

29:22. Therefore thus saith the Lord to the house of Jacob, he that redeemed Abraham: Jacob shall not now be confounded, neither shall his countenance now be ashamed:

29:23. But when he shall see his children, the work of my hands in the midst of him sanctifying my name, and they shall sanctify the Holy One of Jacob, and shall glorify the God of Israel:

29:24. And they that erred in spirit, shall know understanding, and they that murmured, shall learn the law.

Isaias Chapter 30

The people are blamed for their confidence in Egypt. God's mercies towards his church. The punishment of sinners.

30:1. Woe to you, apostate children, saith the Lord, that you would take counsel, and not of me: and would begin a web, and not by my spirit, that you might add sin upon sin:

30:2. Who walk to go down into Egypt, and have not asked at my mouth, hoping for help in the strength of Pharao, and trusting in the shadow of Egypt.

30:3. And the strength of Pharao shall be to your confusion, and the confidence of the shadow of Egypt to your shame.

30:4. For thy princes were in Tanis, and thy messengers came even to Hanes.

30:5. They were all confounded at a people that could not profit them: they were no help, nor to any profit, but to confusion and to reproach.

30:6. The burden of the beasts of the south. In a land of trouble and distress, from whence come the lioness, and the lion, the viper and the flying basilisk, they carry their riches upon the shoulders of beasts, and their treasures upon the bunches of camels to a people that shall not be able to profit them.

30:7. For Egypt shall help in vain, and to no purpose: therefore have I cried concerning this: It is pride only, sit still.

30:8. Now therefore go in and write for them upon box, and note it diligently in a book, and it shall be in the latter days for a testimony for ever.

30:9. For it is a people that provoketh to wrath, and lying children that will not hear the law of God.

30:10. Who say to the seers: See not: and to them that behold: Behold not for us those things that are right: speak unto us pleasant things, see errors for us.

30:11. Take away from me the way, turn away the path from me, let the Holy One of Israel cease from before us.

30:12. Therefore thus saith the Holy One of Israel: Because you have rejected this word, and have trusted in oppression and tumult, and have leaned upon it:

30:13. Therefore shall this iniquity be to you as a breach that falleth, and is found wanting in a high wall, for the destruction thereof shall come on a sudden, when it is not looked for.

30:14. And it shall be broken small, as the potter's vessel is broken all to pieces with mighty breaking, and there shall not a sherd be found of the pieces thereof, wherein a little fire may be carried from the hearth, or a little water be drawn out of the pit.

30:15. For thus saith the Lord God the Holy One of Israel: If you return and be quiet, you shall be saved: in silence and in hope shall your strength be. And you would not:

30:16. But have said: No, but we will flee to horses: therefore shall you flee. And we will mount upon swift ones: therefore shall they be swifter that shall pursue after you.

30:17. A thousand men shall flee for fear of one: and for fear of five shall you flee, till you be left as the mast of ship on the top of a mountain, and as an ensign upon a hill.

30:18. Therefore the Lord waiteth that he may have mercy on you: and therefore shall he be exalted sparing you: because the Lord is the God of judgment: blessed are all they that wait for him.

30:19. For the people of Sion shall dwell in Jerusalem: weeping thou shalt not weep, he will surely have pity on thee: at the voice of thy cry, as soon as he shall hear, he will answer thee.

30:20. And the Lord will give you spare bread, and short water: and will not cause thy teacher to flee away from thee any more, and thy eyes shall see thy teacher.

30:21. And thy ears shall hear the word of one admonishing thee behind thy back: This is the way, walk ye in it: and go not aside neither to the right hand, nor to the left.

30:22. And thou shalt defile the plates of thy graven things of silver, and the garment of thy molten things of gold, and shalt cast them away as the uncleanness of a menstruous woman. Thou shalt say to it: Get thee hence.

30:23. And rain shall be given to thy seed, wheresoever thou shalt sow in the land: and the bread of the corn of the land shall be most plentiful, and fat. The lamb in that day shall feed at large in thy possession:

30:24. And thy oxen, and the ass colts that till the ground, shall eat mingled provender as it was winnowed in the floor.

30:25. And there shall be upon every high mountain, and upon every elevated hill rivers of running waters in the day of the slaughter of many, when the tower shall fall.

30:26. And the light of the moon shall be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun shall be sevenfold, as the light of seven days: in the day when the Lord shall bind up the wound of his people, and shall heal the stroke of their wound.

30:27. Behold the name of the Lord cometh from afar, his wrath burneth, and is heavy to bear: his lips are filled with indignation, and his tongue as a devouring fire.

30:28. His breath as a torrent overflowing even to the midst of the neck, to destroy the nations unto nothing, and the bridle of error that was in the jaws of the people.

30:29. You shall have a song as in the night of the sanctified solemnity, and joy of heart, as where one goeth with a pipe, to come into the mountain of the Lord, to the Mighty One of Israel.

30:30. And the Lord shall make the glory of his voice to be heard, and shall shew the terror of his arm, in the threatening of wrath, and the flame of devouring fire: he shall crush to pieces with whirlwind, and hailstones.

30:31. For at the voice of the Lord the Assyrian shall fear being struck with the rod.

30:32. And the passage of the rod shall be strongly grounded, which the Lord shall make to rest upon him with timbrels and harps, and in great battles he shall overthrow them.

30:33. For Topheth is prepared from yesterday, prepared by the king, deep, and wide. The nourishment thereof is fire and much wood: the breath of the Lord as a torrent of brimstone kindling it.

Topheth… It is the same as Gehenna, and is taken for hell.

Isaias Chapter 31

The folly of trusting to Egypt, and forgetting God. He will fight for his people against the Assyrians.

31:1. Woe to them that go down to Egypt for help, trusting in horses, and putting their confidence in chariots, because they are many: and in horsemen, because they are very strong: and have not trusted in the Holy One of Israel, and have not sought after the Lord.

31:2. But he that is the wise one hath brought evil, and hath not removed his words: and he will rise up against the house of the wicked, and against the aid of them that work iniquity.

31:3. Egypt is man, and not God: and their horses, flesh, and not spirit: and the Lord shall put down his hand, and the helper shall fall, and he that is helped shall fall, and they shall all be confounded together.

31:4. For thus saith the Lord to me: Like as the lion roareth, and the lions whelp upon his prey, and when a multitude of shepherds shall come against him, he will not fear at their voice, nor be afraid of their multitude: so shall the Lord of hosts come down to fight upon mount Sion, and upon the hill thereof.

31:5. As birds flying, so will the Lord of hosts protect Jerusalem, protecting and delivering, passing over and saving.

31:6. Return as you had deeply revolted, O children of Israel.

31:7. For in that day a man shall cast away his idols of silver, and his idols of gold, which your hands have made for you to sin.

31:8. And the Assyrian shall fall by the sword not of a man, and the sword not of a man shall devour him, and he shall flee not at the face of the sword, and his young men shall be tributaries.

31:9. And his strength shall pass away with dread, and his princes fleeing shall be afraid: the Lord hath said it, whose fire is in Sion, and his furnace in Jerusalem.

Isaias Chapter 32

The blessings of the reign of Christ. The desolation of the Jews, and prosperity of the church of Christ.

32:1. Behold a king shall reign in justice, and princes shall rule in judgment.

32:2. And a man shall be as when one is hid from the wind, and hideth himself from a storm, as rivers of waters in drought, and the shadow of a rock that standeth out in a desert land.

32:3. The eyes of them that see shall not be dim, and the ears of them that hear shall hearken diligently.

32:4. And the heart of fools shall understand knowledge, and the tongue of stammerers shall speak readily and plain.

32:5. The fool shall no more be called prince: neither shall the deceitful be called great:

32:6. For the fool will speak foolish things, and his heart will work iniquity, to practise hypocrisy, and speak to the Lord deceitfully, and to make empty the soul of the hungry, and take away drink from the thirsty.

32:7. The vessels of the deceitful are most wicked: for he hath framed devices to destroy the meek, with lying words, when the poor man speaketh judgment.

32:8. But the prince will devise such things as are worthy of a prince, and he shall stand above the rulers.

32:9. Rise up, ye rich women, and hear my voice: ye confident daughters, give ear to my speech.

32:10. For after days and a year, you that are confident shall be troubled: for the vintage is at an end, the gathering shall come no more.

32:11. Be astonished, ye rich women, be troubled, ye confident ones: strip you, and be confounded, gird your loins.

32:12. Mourn for your breasts, for the delightful country, for the fruitful vineyard.

32:13. Upon the land of my people shall thorns and briers come up: how much more upon all the houses of joy, of the city that rejoiced?

32:14. For the house is forsaken, the multitude of the city is left, darkness and obscurity are come upon its dens for ever. A joy of wild asses, the pastures of flocks.

32:15. Until the spirit be poured upon us from on high: and the desert shall be as a charmel, and charmel shall be counted for a forest.

32:16. An judgment shall dwell in the wilderness, and justice shall sit in charmel.

32:17. And the work of justice shall be peace, and the service of justice quietness, and security for ever.

32:18. And my people shall sit in the beauty of peace, and in the tabernacles of confidence, and in wealthy rest.

32:19. But hail shall be in the descent of the forest, and the city shall be made very low.

32:20. Blessed are ye that sow upon all waters, sending thither the foot of the ox and the ass.

Isaias Chapter 33

God's revenge against the enemies of his church. The happiness of the heavenly Jerusalem.

33:1. Woe to thee that spoilest, shalt not thou thyself also be spoiled? and thou that despisest, shalt not thyself also be despised? when thou shalt have made an end of spoiling, thou shalt be spoiled: when being wearied thou shalt cease to despise, thou shalt be despised.

That spoilest, etc… This is particularly directed to Sennacherib.

33:2. O Lord, have mercy on us: for we have waited for thee: be thou our arm in the morning, and our salvation in the time of trouble.

33:3. At the voice of the angel the people fled, and at the lifting up thyself the nations are scattered.

33:4. And your spoils shall be gathered together as the locusts are gathered, as when the ditches are full of them.

33:5. The Lord is magnified, for he hath dwelt on high: he hath filled Sion with judgment and justice.

33:6. And there shall be faith in thy times: riches of salvation, wisdom and knowledge: the fear of the Lord is his treasure.

33:7. Behold they that see shall cry without, the angels of peace shall weep bitterly.

The angels of peace… The messengers or deputies sent to negotiate a peace.

33:8. The ways are made desolate, no one passeth by the road, the covenant is made void, he hath rejected the cities, he hath not regarded the men.

33:9. The land hath mourned, and languished: Libanus is confounded, and become foul, and Saron is become as a desert: and Basan and Carmel are shaken.

33:10. Now will I rise up, saith the Lord: now will I be exalted, now will I lift up myself.

33:11. You shall conceive heat, you shall bring forth stubble: your breath as fire shall devour you.

33:12. And the people shall be as ashes after a fire, as a bundle of thorns they shall be burnt with fire.

33:13. Hear, you that are far off, what I have done, and you that are near know my strength.

33:14. The sinners in Sion are afraid, trembling hath seized upon the hypocrites. Which of you can dwell with devouring fire? which of you shall dwell with everlasting burnings?

33:15. He that walketh in justices, and speaketh truth, that casteth away avarice by oppression, and shaketh his hands from all bribes, that stoppeth his ears lest he hear blood, and shutteth his eyes that he may see no evil.

33:16. He shall dwell on high, the fortifications of rocks shall be his highness: bread is given him, his waters are sure.

33:17. His eyes shall see the king in his beauty, they shall see the land far off.

33:18. Thy heart shall meditate fear: where is the learned? where is he that pondered the words of the law? where is the teacher of little ones?

33:19. The shameless people thou shalt not see, the people of profound speech: so that thou canst not understand the eloquence of his tongue, in whom there is no wisdom.

33:20. Look upon Sion the city of our solemnity: thy eyes shall see Jerusalem, a rich habitation, a tabernacle that cannot be removed: neither shall the nails thereof be taken away for ever, neither shall any of the cords thereof be broken.

33:21. Because only there our Lord is magnificent: a place of rivers, very broad and spacious streams: no ship with oars shall pass by it, neither shall the great galley pass through it.

Of rivers… He speaks of the rivers of endless joys that flow from the throne of God to water the heavenly Jerusalem, where no enemy's ship can come, etc.

33:22. For the Lord is our judge, the Lord is our lawgiver, the Lord is our king: he will save us.

33:23. Thy tacklings are loosed, and they shall be of no strength: thy mast shall be in such condition, that thou shalt not be able to spread the flag. Then shall the spoils of much prey be divided: the lame shall take the spoil.

Thy tacklings… He speaks of the enemies of the church, under the allegory of a ship that is disabled.

33:24. Neither shall he that is near, say: I am feeble. The people that dwell therein, shall have their iniquity taken away from them.

Isaias Chapter 34

The general judgment of the wicked.

34:1. Come near, ye Gentiles, and hear, and hearken, ye people: let the earth hear, and all that is therein, the world, and every thing that cometh forth of it.

34:2. For the indignation of the Lord is upon all nations, and his fury upon all their armies: he hath killed them, and delivered them to slaughter.

34:3. Their slain shall be cast forth, and out of their carcasses shall rise a stink: the mountains shall be melted with their blood.

34:4. And all the host of the heavens shall pine away, and the heavens shall be folded together as a book: and all their host shall fall down as the leaf falleth from the vine, and from the fig tree.

And all the host of the heavens… That is, the sun, moon, and stars.

34:5. For my sword is inebriated in heaven: behold it shall come down upon Idumea, and upon the people of my slaughter unto judgment.

Idumea… Under the name of Idumea, or Edom a people that were enemies of the Jews, are here understood the wicked in general, the enemies of God and his church.

34:6. The sword of the Lord is filled with blood, it is made thick with the blood of lambs and buck goats, with the blood of rams full of marrow: for there is a victim of the Lord in Bosra and a great slaughter in the land of Edom.

34:7. And the unicorns shall go down with them, and the bulls with the mighty: their land shall be soaked with blood, and their ground with the fat of fat ones.

The unicorns… That is, the great and mighty.

34:8. For it is the day of the vengeance of the Lord, the year of recompenses of the judgment of Sion.

The year of recompenses, etc… When the persecutors of Sion, that is, of the church, shall receive their reward.

34:9. And the streams thereof shall be turned into pitch, and the ground thereof into brimstone: and the land thereof shall become burning pitch.

34:10. Night and day it shall not be quenched, the smoke thereof shall go up for ever: from generation to generation it shall lie waste, none shall pass through it for ever and ever.

34:11. The bittern and ericius shall possess it: and the ibis and the raven shall dwell in it: and a line shall be stretched out upon it, to bring it to nothing, and a plummet, unto desolation.

34:12. The nobles thereof shall not be there: they shall call rather upon the king, and all the princes thereof shall be nothing.

34:13. And thorns and nettles shall grow up in its houses, and the thistle in the fortresses thereof: and it shall be the habitation of dragons, and the pasture of ostriches.

34:14. And demons and monsters shall meet, and the hairy ones shall cry out one to another, there hath the lamia lain down, and found rest for herself.

34:15. There hath the ericius had its hole, and brought up its young ones, and hath dug round about, and cherished them in the shadow thereof: thither are the kites gathered together one to another.

34:16. Search ye diligently in the book of the Lord, and read: not one of them was wanting, one hath not sought for the other: for that which proceedeth out of my mouth, he hath commanded, and his spirit it hath gathered them.

34:17. And he hath cast the lot for them, and his hand hath divided it to them by line: they shall possess it for ever, from generation to generation they shall dwell therein.

Isaias Chapter 35

The joyful flourishing of Christ's kingdom: in his church shall be a holy and secure way.

35:1. The land that was desolate and impassable shall be glad, and the wilderness shall rejoice, and shall flourish like the lily.

35:2. It shall bud forth and blossom, and shall rejoice with joy and praise: the glory of Libanus is given to it: the beauty of Carmel, and Saron, they shall see the glory of the Lord, and the beauty of our God.

35:3. Strengthen ye the feeble hands, and confirm the weak knees.

35:4. Say to the fainthearted: Take courage, and fear not: behold your God will bring the revenge of recompense: God himself will come and will save you.

35:5. Then shall the eyes of the blind be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped.

35:6. Then shall the lame man leap as a hart, and the tongue of the dumb shall be free: for waters are broken out in the desert, and streams in the wilderness.

35:7. And that which was dry land, shall become a pool, and the thirsty land springs of water. In the dens where dragons dwelt before, shall rise up the verdure of the reed and the bulrush.

35:8. And a path and a way shall be there, and it shall be called the holy way: the unclean shall not pass over it, and this shall be unto you a straight way, so that fools shall not err therein.

35:9. No lion shall be there, nor shall any mischievous beast go up by it, nor be found there: but they shall walk there that shall be delivered.

35:10. And the redeemed of the Lord shall return, and shall come into Sion with praise, and everlasting joy shall be upon their heads: they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and mourning shall flee away.

Isaias Chapter 36

Sennacherib invades Juda: his blasphemies.

36:1. And it came to pass in the fourteenth year of king Ezechias, that Sennacherib king of the Assyrians came up against all the fenced cities of Juda, and took them.

36:2. And the king of the Assyrians sent Rabsaces from Lachis to Jerusalem, to king Ezechias with a great army, and he stood by the conduit of the upper pool in the way of the fuller's field.

36:3. And there went out to him Eliacim the son of Helcias, who was over the house, and Sobna the scribe, and Joahe the son of Asaph the recorder.

36:4. And Rabsaces said to them: Tell Ezechias: Thus saith the great king, the king of the Assyrians: What is this confidence wherein thou trustest?

36:5. Or with what counsel or strength dost thou prepare for war? on whom dost thou trust, that thou art revolted from me?

36:6. Lo thou trustest upon this broken staff of a reed, upon Egypt: upon which if a man lean, it will go into his hand, and pierce it: so is Pharao king of Egypt to all that trust in him.

36:7. But if thou wilt answer me: We trust in the Lord our God: is it not he whose high places and altars Ezechias hath taken away, and hath said to Juda and Jerusalem: You shall worship before this altar?

36:8. And now deliver thyself up to my lord the king of the Assyrians, and I will give thee two thousand horses, and thou wilt not be able on thy part to find riders for them.

36:9. And how wilt thou stand against the face of the judge of one place, of the least of my master's servants? But if thou trust in Egypt, in chariots and in horsemen:

36:10. And am I now come up without the Lord against this land to destroy it? The Lord said to me: Go up against this land, and destroy it.

36:11. And Eliacim, and Sobna, and Joahe said to Rabsaces: Speak to thy servants in the Syrian tongue: for we understand it: speak not to us in the Jews' language in the hearing of the people, that are upon the wall.

36:12. And Rabsaces said to them: Hath my master sent me to thy master and to thee, to speak all these words; and not rather to the men that sit on the wall; that they may eat their own dung, and drink their urine with you?

36:13. Then Rabsaces stood, and cried out with a loud voice in the Jews' language, and said: Hear the words of the great king, the king of the Assyrians.

36:14. Thus saith the king: Let not Ezechias deceive you, for he shall not be able to deliver you.

36:15. And let not Ezechias make you trust in the Lord, saying: The Lord will surely deliver us, and this city shall not be given into the hands of the king of the Assyrians.

36:16. Do not hearken to Ezechias: for thus said the king of the Assyrians: Do with me that which is for your advantage, and come out to me, and eat ye every one of his vine, and every one of his fig tree, and drink ye every one the water of his cistern,

36:17. Till I come and take you away to a land, like to your own, a land of corn and of wine, a land of bread and vineyards.

36:18. Neither let Ezechias trouble you, saying: The Lord will deliver us. Have any of the gods of the nations delivered their land out of the hand of the king of the Assyrians?

36:19. Where is the god of Emath and of Arphad? where is the god of Sepharvaim? have they delivered Samaria out of my hand?

36:20. Who is there among all the gods of these lands, that hath delivered his country out of my hand, that the Lord may deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?

36:21. And they held their peace, and answered him not a word. For the king had commanded, saying: Answer him not.

36:22. And Eliacim the son of Helcias, that was over the house, and Sobna the scribe, and Joahe the son of Asaph the recorder, went in to Ezechias with their garments rent, and told him the words of Rabsaces.

Isaias Chapter 37

Ezechias, his mourning and prayer. God's promise of protection. The
Assyrian army is destroyed. Sennacherib is slain.

37:1. And it came to pass, when king Ezechias had heard it, that he rent his garments and covered himself with sackcloth, and went into the house of the Lord.

37:2. And he sent Eliacim who was over the house, and Sobna the scribe, and the ancients of the priests covered with sackcloth, to Isaias the son of Amos the prophet.

37:3. And they said to him: Thus saith Ezechias: This day is a day of tribulation, and of rebuke, and of blasphemy: for the children are come to the birth, and there is not strength to bring forth.

37:4. It may be the Lord thy God will hear the words of Rabsaces, whom the king of the Assyrians his master hath sent to blaspheme the living God, and to reproach with words which the Lord thy God hath heard: wherefore lift up by prayer for the remnant that is left.

37:5. And the servants of Ezechias came to Isaias.

37:6. And Isaias said to them: Thus shall you say to your master: Thus saith the Lord: Be not afraid of the words that thou hast heard, with which the servants of the king of the Assyrians have blasphemed me.

37:7. Behold, I will send a spirit upon him, and he shall hear a message, and shall return to his own country, and I will cause him to fall by the sword in his own country.

37:8. And Rabsaces returned, and found the king of the Assyrians besieging Lobna. For he had heard that he was departed from Lachis.

37:9. And he heard say about Tharaca the king of Ethiopia: He is come forth to fight against thee. And when he heard it, he sent messengers to Ezechias, saying:

37:10. Thus shall you speak to Ezechias the king of Juda, saying: Let not thy God deceive thee, in whom thou trustest, saying: Jerusalem shall not be given into the hands of the king of the Assyrians.

37:11. Behold thou hast heard all that the kings of the Assyrians have done to all countries which they have destroyed, and canst thou be delivered?

37:12. Have the gods of the nations delivered them whom my fathers have destroyed, Gozam, and Haram, and Reseph, and the children of Eden, that were in Thalassar?

37:13. Where is the king of Emath, and the king of Arphad, and the king of the city of Sepharvaim, of Ana, and of Ava?

37:14. And Ezechias took the letter from the hand of the messengers, and read it, and went up to the house of the Lord, and Ezechias spread it before the Lord.

37:15. And Ezechias prayed to the Lord, saying:

37:16. Lord of hosts, God of Israel who sitteth upon the cherubims, thou alone art the God of all the kingdoms of the earth, thou hast made heaven and earth.

37:17. Incline, O Lord, thy ear, and hear: open, O Lord, thy eyes, and see, and hear all the words of Sennacherib, which he hath sent to blaspheme the living God.

37:18. For of a truth, O Lord, the kings of the Assyrians have laid waste lands, and their countries.

37:19. And they have cast their gods into the fire, for they were not gods, but the works of men's hands, of wood and stone: and they broke them in pieces.

37:20. And now, O Lord our God, save us out of his hand: and let all the kingdoms of the earth know, that thou only art the Lord.

37:21. And Isaias the son of Amos sent to Ezechias, saying: Thus saith the Lord the God of Israel: For the prayer thou hast made to me concerning Sennacherib the king of the Assyrians:

37:22. This is the word which the Lord hath spoken of him: The virgin the daughter of Sion hath despised thee, and laughed thee to scorn: the daughter of Jerusalem hath wagged the head after thee.

37:23. Whom hast thou reproached, and whom hast thou blasphemed, and against whom hast thou exalted thy voice, and lifted up thy eyes on high? Against the Holy One of Israel.

37:24. By the hand of thy servants thou hast reproached the Lord: and hast said: With the multitude of my chariots I have gone up to the height of the mountains, to the top of Libanus: and I will cut down its tall cedars, and its choice fir trees, and will enter to the top of its height, to the forest of its Carmel.

Carmel… See these figurative expressions explained in the annotations on the nineteenth chapter of the fourth book of Kings.

37:25. I have digged, and drunk water, and have dried up with the sole of my foot, all the rivers shut up in banks.

37:26. Hast thou not heard what I have done to him of old? from the days of old I have formed it: and now I have brought it to effect: and it hath come to pass that hills fighting together, and fenced cities should be destroyed.

37:27. The inhabitants of them were weak of hand, they trembled, and were confounded: they became like the grass of the field, and the herb of the pasture, and like the grass of the housetops, which withered before it was ripe.

37:28. I know thy dwelling, and thy going out, and thy coming in, and thy rage against me.

37:29. When thou wast mad against me, thy pride came up to my ears: therefore I will put a ring in thy nose, and a bit between thy lips, and I will turn thee back by the way by which thou camest.

37:30. But to thee this shall be a sign: Eat this year the things that spring of themselves, and in the second year eat fruits: but in the third year sow and reap, and plant vineyards, and eat the fruit of them.

37:31. And that which shall be saved of the house of Juda, and which is left, shall take root downward, and shall bear fruit upward:

37:32. For out of Jerusalem shall go forth a remnant, and salvation from mount Sion: the zeal of the Lord of hosts shall do this.

37:33. Wherefore thus saith the Lord concerning the king of the Assyrians: He shall not come into this city, nor shoot an arrow into it, nor come before it with shield, nor cast a trench about it.

37:34. By the way that he came, he shall return, and into this city he shall not come, saith the Lord.

37:35. And I will protect this city, and will save it for my own sake, and for the sake of David my servant.

37:36. And the angel of the Lord went out and slew in the camp of the Assyrians a hundred and eighty-five thousand. And they arose in the morning, and behold they were all dead corpses.

37:37. And Sennacherib the king of the Assyrians went out and departed, and returned, and dwelt in Ninive.

37:38. And it came to pass, as he was worshipping in the temple of Nesroch his god, that Adramelech and Sarasar his sons slew him with the sword: and they fled into the land of Ararat, and Asarhaddon his son reigned in his stead.

Isaias Chapter 38

Ezechias being advertised that he shall die, obtains by prayer a prolongation of his life: in confirmation of which the sun goes back. The canticle of Ezechias.

38:1. In those days Ezechias was sick even to death, and Isaias the son of Amos the prophet cane unto him, and said to him: Thus saith the Lord: Take order with thy house, for thou shalt die, and not live.

38:2. And Ezechias turned his face toward the wall, and prayed to the Lord,

38:3. And said: I beseech thee, O Lord, remember how I have walked before thee in truth, and with a perfect heart, and have done that which is good in thy sight. And Ezechias wept with great weeping.

38:4. And the word of the Lord came to Isaias, saying:

38:5. Go and say to Ezechias: Thus saith the Lord the God of David thy father: I have heard thy prayer, and I have seen thy tears: behold I will add to thy days fifteen years:

38:6. And I will deliver thee and this city out of the hand of the king of the Assyrians, and I will protect it.

38:7. And this shall be a sign to thee from the Lord, that the Lord will do this word which he hath spoken:

38:8. Behold I will bring again the shadow of the lines, by which it is now gone down in the sun dial of Achaz with the sun, ten lines backward. And the sun returned ten lines by the degrees by which it was gone down.

38:9. The writing of Ezechias king of Juda, when he had been sick, and was recovered of his sickness.

38:10. I said: In the midst of my days I shall go to the gates of hell: I sought for the residue of my years.

Hell… Sheol, or Hades, the region of the dead.

38:11. I said: I shall not see the Lord God in the land of the living. I shall behold man no more, nor the inhabitant of rest.

38:12. My generation is at an end, and it is rolled away from me, as a shepherd's tent. My life is cut off, as by a weaver: whilst I was yet but beginning, he cut me off: from morning even to night thou wilt make an end of me.

38:13. I hoped till morning, as a lion so hath he broken all my bones: from morning even to night thou wilt make an end of me.

38:14. I will cry like a young swallow, I will meditate like a dove: my eyes are weakened looking upward: Lord, I suffer violence, answer thou for me.

38:15. What shall I say, or what shall he answer for me, whereas he himself hath done it? I will recount to thee all my years in the bitterness of my soul.

38:16. O Lord, if man's life be such, and the life of my spirit be in such things as these, thou shalt correct me, and make me to live.

38:17. Behold in peace is my bitterness most bitter: but thou hast delivered my soul that it should not perish, thou hast cast all my sins behind thy back.

38:18. For hell shall not confess to thee, neither shall death praise thee: nor shall they that go down into the pit, look for thy truth.

38:19. The living, the living, he shall give praise to thee, as I do this day: the father shall make the truth known to the children.

38:20. O Lord, save me, and we will sing our psalms all the days of our life in the house of the Lord.

38:21. Now Isaias had ordered that they should take a lump of figs, and lay it as a plaster upon the wound, and that he should be healed.

38:22. And Ezechias had said: What shall be the sign that I shall go up to the house of the Lord?

Isaias Chapter 39

Ezechias shews all his treasures to the ambassadors of Babylon: upon which Isaias foretells the Babylonish captivity.

39:1. At that time Merodach Baladan, the son of Baladan king of Babylon, sent letters and presents to Ezechias: for he had heard that he had been sick and was recovered.

39:2. And Ezechias rejoiced at their coming, and he shewed them the storehouses of his aromatical spices, and of the silver, and of the gold, and of the sweet odours, and of the precious ointment, and all the storehouses of his furniture, and all things that were found in his treasures. There was nothing in his house, nor in all his dominion that Ezechias shewed them not.

39:3. Then Isaias the prophet came to king Ezechias, and said to him: What said these men, and from whence came they to thee? And Ezechias said: From a far country they came to me, from Babylon.

39:4. And he said: What saw they in thy house? And Ezechias said: All things that are in my house have they seen, there was not any thing which I have not shewn them in my treasures.

39:5. And Isaias said to Ezechias: Hear the word of the Lord of hosts.

39:6. Behold the days shall come that all that is in thy house, and that thy fathers have laid up in store until this day, shall be carried away into Babylon: there shall not any thing be left, saith the Lord.

39:7. And of thy children, that shall issue from thee, whom thou shalt beget, they shall take away, and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.

39:8. And Ezechias said to Isaias: The word of the Lord, which he hath spoken, is good. And he said: Only let peace and truth be in my days.

Isaias Chapter 40

The prophet comforts the people with the promise of the coming of Christ to forgive their sins. God's almighty power and majesty.

40:1. Be comforted, be comforted, my people, saith your God.

40:2. Speak ye to the heart of Jerusalem, and call to her: for her evil is come to an end, her iniquity is forgiven: she hath received of the hand of the Lord double for all her sins.

40:3. The voice of one crying in the desert: Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the wilderness the paths of our God.

40:4. Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall become straight, and the rough ways plain.

40:5. And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh together shall see, that the mouth of the Lord hath spoken.

40:6. The voice of one, saying: Cry. And I said: What shall I cry? All flesh is grass, and all the glory thereof as the flower of the field.

40:7. The grass is withered, and the flower is fallen, because the spirit of the Lord hath blown upon it. Indeed the people is grass:

40:8. The grass is withered, and the flower is fallen: but the word of our Lord endureth for ever.

40:9. Get thee up upon a high mountain, thou that bringest good tidings to Sion: lift up thy voice with strength, thou that bringest good tidings to Jerusalem: lift it up, fear not. Say to the cities of Juda: Behold your God:

40:10. Behold the Lord God shall come with strength, and his arm shall rule: Behold his reward is with him and his work is before him.

40:11. He shall feed his flock like a shepherd: he shall gather together the lambs with his arm, and shall take them up in his bosom, and he himself shall carry them that are with young.

40:12. Who hath measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and weighed the heavens with his palm? who hath poised with three fingers the bulk of the earth, and weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills in a balance?

40:13. Who hath forwarded the spirit of the Lord? or who hath been his counsellor, and hath taught him?

40:14. With whom hath he consulted, and who hath instructed him, and taught him the path of justice, and taught him knowledge, and shewed him the way of understanding?

40:15. Behold the Gentiles are as a drop of a bucket, and are counted as the smallest grain of a balance: behold the islands are as a little dust.

40:16. And Libanus shall not be enough to burn, nor the beasts thereof sufficient for a burnt offering.

40:17. All nations are before him as if they had no being at all, and are counted to him as nothing, and vanity.

40:18. To whom then have you likened God? or what image will you make for him?

40:19. Hath the workman cast a graven statue? or hath the goldsmith formed it with gold, or the silversmith with plates of silver?

40:20. He hath chosen strong wood, and that will not rot: the skilful workman seeketh how he may set up an idol that may not be moved.

40:21. Do you not know? hath it not been heard? hath it not been told you from the beginning? have you not understood the foundations of the earth?

40:22. It is he that sitteth upon the globe of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are as locusts: he that stretcheth out the heavens as nothing, and spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in.

40:23. He that bringeth the searchers of secrets to nothing, that hath made the judges of the earth as vanity.

40:24. And surely their stock was neither planted, nor sown, nor rooted in the earth: suddenly he hath blown upon them, and they are withered, and a whirlwind shall take them away as stubble.

40:25. And to whom have ye likened me, or made me equal, saith the Holy One?

40:26. Lift up your eyes on high, and see who hath created these things: who bringeth out their host by number, and calleth them all by their names: by the greatness of his might, and strength, and power, not one of them was missing.

40:27. Why sayest thou, O Jacob, and speakest, O Israel: My way is hid from the Lord, and my judgment is passed over from my God?

40:28. Knowest thou not, or hast thou not heard? the Lord is the everlasting God, who hath created the ends of the earth: he shall not faint, nor labour, neither is there any searching out of his wisdom.

40:29. It is he that giveth strength to the weary, and increaseth force and might to them that are not.

40:30. You shall faint, and labour, and young men shall fall by infirmity.

40:31. But they that hope in the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall take wings as eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.

Isaias Chapter 41

The reign of the just one: the vanity of idols.

41:1. Let the islands keep silence before me, and the nations take new strength: let them come near, and then speak, let us come near to judgment together.

41:2. Who hath raised up the just one from the east, hath called him to follow him? he shall give the nations in his sight, and he shall rule over kings: he shall give them as the dust to his sword, as stubble driven by the wind, to his bow.

41:3. He shall pursue them, he shall pass in peace, no path shall appear after his feet.

41:4. Who hath wrought and done these things, calling the generations from the beginning? I the Lord, I am the first and the last.

41:5. The islands saw it, and feared, the ends of the earth were astonished, they drew near, and came.

41:6. Every one shall help his neighbour, and shall say to his brother: Be of good courage.

41:7. The coppersmith striking with the hammer encouraged him that forged at that time, saying: It is ready for soldering: and he strengthened it with nails, that it should not be moved.

41:8. But thou Israel, art my servant, Jacob whom I have chosen, the seed of Abraham my friend:

41:9. In whom I have taken thee from the ends of the earth, and from the remote parts thereof have called thee, and said to thee: Thou art my servant, I have chosen thee, and have not cast thee away.

41:10. Fear not, for I am with thee: turn not aside, for I am thy God: I have strengthened thee, and have helped thee, and the right hand of my just one hath upheld thee.

41:11. Behold all that fight against thee shall be confounded and ashamed, they shall be as nothing, and the men shall perish that strive against thee.

41:12. Thou shalt seek them, and shalt not find the men that resist thee: they shall be as nothing: and as a thing consumed the men that war against thee.

41:13. For I am the Lord thy God, who take thee by the hand, and say to thee: Fear not, I have helped thee.

41:14. Fear not, thou worm of Jacob, you that are dead of Israel: I have helped thee, saith the Lord: and thy Redeemer the Holy One of Israel.

41:15. I have made thee as a new thrashing wain, with teeth like a saw: thou shalt thrash the mountains, and break them in pieces: and shalt make the hills as chaff.

41:16. Thou shalt fan them, and the wind shall carry them away, and the whirlwind shall scatter them: and thou shalt rejoice in the Lord, in the Holy One of Israel thou shalt be joyful.

41:17. The needy and the poor seek for waters, and there are none: their tongue hath been dry with thirst. I the Lord will hear them, I the God of Israel will not forsake them.

41:18. I will open rivers in the high hills, and fountains in the midst of the plains: I will turn the desert into pools of waters, and the impassable land into streams of waters.

41:19. I will plant in the wilderness the cedar, and the thorn, and the myrtle, and the olive tree: I will set in the desert the fir tree, the elm, and the box tree together:

The thorn… In Hebrew, the shitta, or setim, a tree resembling the white thorn.

41:20. That they may see and know, and consider, and understand together that the hand of the Lord hath done this, and the Holy One of Israel hath created it.

41:21. Bring your cause near, saith the Lord: bring hither, if you have any thing to allege, saith the King of Jacob.

41:22. Let them come, and tell us all things that are to come: tell us the former things what they were: and we will set our heart upon them and shall know the latter end of them, and tell us the things that are to come.

41:23. Shew the things that are to come hereafter, and we shall know that ye are gods. Do ye also good or evil, if you can: and let us speak, and see together.

41:24. Behold, you are of nothing, and your work of that which hath no being: he that hath chosen you is an abomination.

41:25. I have raised up one from the north, and he shall come from the rising of the sun: he shall call upon my name, and he shall make princes to be as dirt, and as the potter treading clay.

41:26. Who hath declared from the beginning, that we may know: and from time of old, that we may say: Thou art just. There is none that sheweth, nor that foretelleth, nor that heareth your words.

41:27. The first shall say to Sion: Behold they are here, and to Jerusalem I will give an evangelist.

41:28. And I saw, and there was no one even among them to consult, or who, when I asked, could answer a word.

41:29. Behold they are all in the wrong, and their works are vain: their idols are wind and vanity.

Isaias Chapter 42

The office of Christ. The preaching of the gospel to the Gentiles. The blindness and reprobation of the Jews.

42:1. Behold my servant, I will uphold him: my elect, my soul delighteth in him: I have given my spirit upon him, he shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles.

My servant… Christ, who according to his humanity, is the servant of
God.

42:2. He shall not cry, nor have respect to person, neither shall his voice be heard abroad.

42:3. The bruised reed he shall not break, and smoking flax he shall not quench, he shall bring forth judgment unto truth.

42:4. He shall not be sad, nor troublesome, till he set judgment in the earth, and the islands shall wait for his law.

42:5. Thus saith the Lord God that created the heavens, and stretched them out: that established the earth, and the things that spring out of it: that giveth breath to the people upon it, and spirit to them that tread thereon.

42:6. I the Lord have called thee in justice, and taken thee by the hand, and preserved thee. And I have given thee for a covenant of the people, for a light of the Gentiles:

42:7. That thou mightest open the eyes of the blind, and bring forth the prisoner out of prison, and them that sit in darkness out of the prison house.

42:8. I the Lord, this is my name: I will not give my glory to another, nor my praise to graven things.

42:9. The things that were first, behold they are come: and new things do I declare: before they spring forth, I will make you hear them.

42:10. Sing ye to the Lord a new song, his praise is from the ends of the earth: you that go down to the sea, and all that are therein: ye islands, and ye inhabitants of them.

42:11. Let the desert and the cities thereof be exalted: Cedar shall dwell in houses: ye inhabitants of Petra, give praise, they shall cry from the top of the mountains.

Petra… A city that gives name to Arabia Petraea.

42:12. They shall give glory to the Lord, and shall declare his praise in the islands.

42:13. The Lord shall go forth as a mighty man, as a man of war shall he stir up zeal: he shall shout and cry: he shall prevail against his enemies.

42:14. I have always held my peace, I have kept silence, I have been patient, I will speak now as a woman in labour: I will destroy, and swallow up at once.

42:15. I will lay waste the mountains and hills, and will make all their grass to wither: and I will turn rivers into islands, and will dry up the standing pools.

42:16. And I will lead the blind into the way which they know not: and in the paths which they were ignorant of I will make them walk: I will make darkness light before them, and crooked things straight: these things have I done to them, and have not forsaken them.

42:17. They are turned back: let them be greatly confounded, that trust in a graven thing, that say to a molten thing: You are our god.

42:18. Hear, ye deaf, and, ye blind, behold that you may see.

42:19. Who is blind, but my servant? or deaf, but he to whom I have sent my messengers? Who is blind, but he that is sold? or who is blind, but the servant of the Lord?

42:20. Thou that seest many things, wilt thou not observe them? thou that hast ears open, wilt thou not hear?

42:21. And the Lord was willing to sanctify him, and to magnify the law, and exalt it.

42:22. But this is a people that is robbed and wasted: they are all the snare of young men, and they are hid in the houses of prisons: they are made a prey, and there is none to deliver them: a spoil, and there is none that saith: Restore.

42:23. Who is there among you that will give ear to this, that will attend and hearken for times to come?

42:24. Who hath given Jacob for a spoil, and Israel to robbers? hath not the Lord himself, against whom we have sinned? And they would not walk in his ways, and they have not hearkened to his law.

42:25. And he hath poured out upon him the indignation of his fury, and a strong battle, and hath burnt him round about, and he knew not: and set him on fire, and he understood not.

Isaias Chapter 43

God comforts his church, promising to protect her for ever: he expostulates with the Jews for their ingratitude.

43:1. And now thus saith the Lord that created thee, O Jacob, and formed thee, O Israel: Fear not, for I have redeemed thee, and called thee by thy name: thou art mine.

43:2. When thou shalt pass through the waters, I will be with thee, and the rivers shall not cover thee: when thou shalt walk in the fire, thou shalt not be burnt, and the flames shall not burn in thee:

43:3. For I am the Lord thy God, the Holy One of Israel, thy Saviour: I have given Egypt for thy atonement, Ethiopia and Saba for thee.

43:4. Since thou becamest honourable in my eyes, thou art glorious: I have loved thee, and I will give men for thee, and people for thy life.

43:5. Fear not, for I am with thee: I will bring thy seed from the east, and gather thee from the west.

43:6. I will say to the north: Give up: and to the south: Keep not back: bring my sons from afar, and my daughters from the ends of the earth.

43:7. And every one that calleth upon my name, I have created him for my glory. I have formed him, and made him.

43:8. Bring forth the people that are blind, and have eyes: that are deaf, and have ears.

43:9. All the nations are assembled together, and the tribes are gathered: who among you can declare this, and shall make us hear the former things? let them bring forth their witnesses, let them be justified, and hear, and say: It is truth.

43:10. You are my witnesses, saith the Lord, and my servant whom I have chosen: that you may know, and believe me, and understand that I myself am. Before me there was no God formed, and after me there shall be none.

43:11. I am, I am the Lord: and there is no saviour besides me.

43:12. I have declared, and have saved. I have made it heard, and there was no strange one among you. You are my witnesses, saith the Lord, and I am God.

43:13. And from the beginning I am the same, and there is none that can deliver out of my hind: I will work, and who shall turn it away?

43:14. Thus saith the Lord your redeemer, the Holy One of Israel: For your sake I sent to Babylon, and have brought down all their bars, and the Chaldeans glorying in their ships.

43:15. I am the Lord your Holy One, the Creator of Israel, your King.

43:16. Thus saith the Lord, who made a way in the sea, and a path in the mighty waters.

43:17. Who brought forth the chariot and the horse, the army and the strong: they lay down to sleep together, and they shall not rise again: they are broken as flax, and are extinct.

43:18. Remember not former things, and look not on things of old.

43:19. Behold I do new things, and now they shall spring forth, verily you shall know them: I will make a way in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert.

43:20. The beast of the field shall glorify me, the dragons and the ostriches: because I have given waters in the wilderness, rivers in the desert, to give drink to my people, to my chosen.

43:21. This people have I formed for myself, they shall shew forth my praise.

43:22. But thou hast not called upon me, O Jacob, neither hast thou laboured about me, O Israel.

43:23. Thou hast not offered me the ram of thy holocaust, nor hast thou glorified me with thy victims: I have not caused thee to serve with oblations, nor wearied thee with incense.

43:24. Thou hast bought me no sweet cane with money, neither hast thou filled me with the fat of thy victims. But thou hast made me to serve with thy sins, thou hast wearied me with thy iniquities.

43:25. I am, I am he that blot out thy iniquities for my own sake, and I will not remember thy sins.

43:26. Put me in remembrance, and let us plead together: tell if thou hast any thing to justify thyself.

43:27. Thy first father sinned, and thy teachers have transgressed against me.

43:28. And I have profaned the holy princes, I have given Jacob to slaughter, and Israel to reproach.

Isaias Chapter 44

God's favour to his church. The folly of idolatry. The people shall be delivered from captivity.

44:1. And now hear, O Jacob, my servant, and Israel whom I have chosen.

44:2. Thus saith the Lord that made and formed thee, thy helper from the womb: Fear not, O my servant Jacob, and thou most righteous whom I have chosen.

44:3. For I will pour out waters upon the thirsty ground, and streams upon the dry land: I will pour out my spirit upon thy seed, and my blessing upon thy stock.

44:4. And they shall spring up among the herbs, as willows beside the running waters.

44:5. One shall say: I am the Lord's, and another shall call himself by the name of Jacob, and another shall subscribe with his hand, To the Lord, and surname himself by the name of Israel.

44:6. Thus saith the Lord the king of Israel, and his redeemer the Lord of hosts: I am the first, and I am the last, and besides me there is no God.

44:7. Who is like to me? let him call and declare: and let him set before me the order, since I appointed the ancient people: and the things to come, and that shall be hereafter, let them shew unto them.

44:8. Fear ye not, neither be ye troubled from that time I have made thee to hear, and have declared: you are my witnesses. Is there a God besides me, a maker, whom I have not known?

44:9. The makers of idols are all of them nothing, and their best beloved things shall not profit them. They are their witnesses, that they do not see, nor understand, that they may be ashamed.

44:10. Who hath formed a god, and made a graven thing that is profitable for nothing?

44:11. Behold, all the partakers thereof shall be confounded: for the makers are men: they shall all assemble together, they shall stand and fear, and shall be confounded together.

44:12. The smith hath wrought with his file, with coals, and with hammers he hath formed it, and hath wrought with the strength of his arm: he shall hunger and faint, he shall drink no water, and shall be weary.

44:13. The carpenter hath stretched out his rule, he hath formed it with a plane: he hath made it with corners, and hath fashioned it round with the compass: and he hath made the image of a man as it were a beautiful man dwelling in a house.

44:14. He hath cut down cedars, taken the holm, and the oak that stood among the trees of the forest: he hath planted the pine tree, which the rain hath nourished.

44:15. And it hath served men for fuel: he took thereof, and warmed himself: and he kindled it, and baked bread: but of the rest he made a god, and adored it: he made a graven thing, and bowed down before it.

44:16. Part of it he burnt with fire, and with part of it he dressed his meat: he boiled pottage, and was filled, and was warmed, and said: Aha, I am warm, I have seen the fire.

44:17. But the residue thereof he made a god, and a graven thing for himself: he boweth down before it, and adoreth it, and prayeth unto it, saying: Deliver me, for thou art my God.

44:18. They have not known, nor understood: for their eyes are covered that they may not see, and that they may not understand with their heart.

44:19. They do not consider in their mind, nor know, nor have the thought to say: I have burnt part of it in the fire, and I have baked bread upon the coals thereof: I have broiled flesh and have eaten, and of the residue thereof shall I make an idol? shall I fall down before the stock of a tree?

44:20. Part thereof is ashes: his foolish heart adoreth it, and he will not save his soul, nor say: Perhaps there is a lie in my right hand.

44:21. Remember these things, O Jacob, and Israel, for thou art my servant. I have formed thee, thou art my servant, O Israel, forget me not.

44:22. I have blotted out thy iniquities as a cloud, and thy sins as a mist: return to me, for I have redeemed thee.

44:23. Give praise, O ye heavens, for the Lord hath shewn mercy: shout with joy, ye ends of the earth: ye mountains, resound with praise, thou, O forest, and every tree therein: for the Lord hath redeemed Jacob, and Israel shall be glorified.

44:24. Thus saith the Lord thy redeemer, and thy maker, from the womb: I am the Lord, that make all things, that alone stretch out the heavens, that established the earth, and there is none with me.

44:25. That make void the tokens of diviners, and make the soothsayers mad. That turn the wise backward, and that make their knowledge foolish.

44:26. That raise up the word of my servant and perform the counsel of my messengers, who say to Jerusalem: Thou shalt be inhabited: and to the cities of Juda: You shall be built, and I will raise up the wastes thereof.

44:27. Who say to the deep: Be thou desolate, and I will dry up thy rivers.

44:28. Who say to Cyrus: Thou art my shepherd, and thou shalt perform all my pleasure. Who say to Jerusalem: Thou shalt be built: and to the temple: Thy foundations shall be laid.

Isaias Chapter 45

A prophecy of Cyrus, as a figure of Christ, the great deliverer of God's people.

45:1. Thus saith the Lord to my anointed Cyrus, whose right hand I have taken hold of, to subdue nations before his face, and to turn the backs of kings, and to open the doors before him, and the gates shall not be shut.

45:2. I will go before thee, and will humble the great ones of the earth: I will break in pieces the gates of brass, and will burst the bars of iron.

45:3. And I will give thee hidden treasures, and the concealed riches of secret places: that thou mayest know that I am the Lord who call thee by thy name, the God of Israel.

45:4. For the sake of my servant Jacob, and Israel my elect, I have even called thee by thy name: I have made a likeness of thee, and thou hast not known me.

45:5. I am the Lord, and there is none else: there is no God besides me: I girded thee, and thou hast not known me:

45:6. That they may know who are from the rising of the sun, and they who are from the west, that there is none besides me. I am the Lord, and there is none else:

45:7. I form the light, and create darkness, I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord that do all these things.

Create evil, etc… The evils of afflictions and punishments, but not the evil of sin.

45:8. Drop down dew, ye heavens, from above, and let the clouds rain the just: let the earth be opened, and bud forth a saviour: and let justice spring up together: I the Lord have created him.

45:9. Woe to him that gainsayeth his maker, a sherd of the earthen pots: shall the clay say to him that fashioneth it: What art thou making, and thy work is without hands?

45:10. Woe to him that saith to his father: Why begettest thou? and to the woman: Why dost thou bring forth?

45:11. Thus saith the Lord the Holy One of Israel, his maker: Ask me of things to come, concerning my children, and concerning the work of my hands give ye charge to me.

45:12. I made the earth: and I created man upon it: my hand stretched forth the heavens, and I have commanded all their host.

45:13. I have raised him up to justice, and I will direct all his ways: he shall build my city, and let go my captives, not for ransom, nor for presents, saith the Lord the God of hosts.

45:14. Thus saith the Lord: The labour of Egypt, and the merchandise of Ethiopia, and of Sabaim, men of stature shall come over to thee, and shall be thine: they shall walk after thee, they shall go bound with manacles: and they shall worship thee, and shall make supplication to thee: only in thee is God, and there is no God besides thee.

45:15. Verily thou art a hidden God, the God of Israel the saviour.

45:16. They are all confounded and ashamed: the forgers of errors are gone together into confusion.

45:17. Israel is saved in the Lord with an eternal salvation: you shall not be confounded, and you shall not be ashamed for ever and ever.

45:18. For thus saith the Lord that created the heavens, God himself that formed the earth, and made it, the very maker thereof: he did not create it in vain: he formed it to be inhabited. I am the Lord, and there is no other.

45:19. I have not spoken in secret, in a dark place of the earth: I have not said to the seed of Jacob: Seek me in vain. I am the Lord that speak justice, that declare right things.

45:20. Assemble yourselves, and come, and draw near together, ye that are saved of the Gentiles: they have no knowledge that set up the wood of their graven work, and pray to a god that cannot save.

45:21. Tell ye, and come, and consult together: who hath declared this from the beginning, who hath foretold this from that time? Have not I the Lord, and there is no God else besides me? A just God and a saviour, there is none besides me.

45:22. Be converted to me, and you shall be saved, all ye ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is no other.

45:23. I have sworn by myself, the word of justice shall go out of my mouth, and shall not return:

45:24. For every knee shall be bowed to me, and every tongue shall swear.

45:25. Therefore shall he say: In the Lord are my justices and empire: they shall come to him, and all that resist him shall be confounded.

45:26. In the Lord shall all the seed of Israel be justified and praised.

Isaias Chapter 46

The idols of Babylon shall be destroyed. Salvation is promised through
Christ.

46:1. Bel is broken, Nebo is destroyed: their idols are put upon beasts and cattle, your burdens of heavy weight even unto weariness.

46:2. They are consumed, and are broken together: they could not save him that carried them, and they themselves shall go into captivity.

46:3. Hearken unto me, O house of Jacob, all the remnant of the house of Israel who are carried by my bowels, are borne up by my womb.

46:4. Even to your old age I am the same, and to your grey hairs I will carry you: I have made you, and I will bear: I will carry and will save.

46:5. To whom have you likened me, and made me equal, and compared me, and made me like?

46:6. You that contribute gold out of the bag, and weigh out silver in the scales: and hire a goldsmith to make a god: and they fall down and worship.

46:7. They bear him on their shoulders and carry him, and set him in his place, and he shall stand, and shall not stir out of his place. Yea, when they shall cry also unto him, he shall not hear: he shall not save them from tribulation.

46:8. Remember this, and be ashamed: return, ye transgressors, to the heart.

46:9. Remember the former age, for I am God, and there is no God beside, neither is there the like to me:

46:10. Who shew from the beginning the things that shall be at last, and from ancient times the things that as yet are not done, saying: My counsel shall stand, and all my will shall be done:

46:11. Who call a bird from the east, and from a far country the man of my own will, and I have spoken, and will bring it to pass: I have created, and I will do it. Hear me, O ye hardhearted, who are far from justice.

46:12. I have brought my justice near, it shall not be afar off: and my salvation shall not tarry. I will give salvation in Sion, and my glory in Israel.

Isaias Chapter 47

God's judgment upon Babylon.

47:1. Come down, sit in the dust, O virgin daughter of Babylon, sit on the ground: there is no throne for the daughter of the Chaldeans, for thou shalt no more be called delicate and tender.

47:2. Take a millstone and grind meal: uncover thy shame, strip thy shoulder, make bare thy legs, pass over the rivers.

47:3. Thy nakedness shall be discovered, and thy shame shall be seen: I will take vengeance, and no man shall resist me.

47:4. Our redeemer, the Lord of hosts is his name, the Holy One of Israel.

47:5. Sit thou silent, and get thee into darkness, O daughter of the Chaldeans: for thou shalt no more be called the lady of kingdoms.

47:6. I was angry with my people, I have polluted my inheritance, and have given them into thy hand: thou hast shewn no mercy to them: upon the ancient thou hast laid thy yoke exceeding heavy.

47:7. And thou hast said: I shall be a lady for ever: thou hast not laid these things to thy heart, neither hast thou remembered thy latter end.

47:8. And now hear these things, thou that art delicate, and dwellest confidently, that sayest in thy heart: I am, and there is none else besides me: I shall not sit as a widow, and I shall not know barrenness.

47:9. These two things shall come upon thee suddenly in one day, barrenness and widowhood. All things are come upon thee, because of the multitude of thy sorceries, and for the great hardness of thy enchanters.

47:10. And thou hast trusted in thy wickedness, and hast said: There is none that seeth me. Thy wisdom, and, thy knowledge, this hath deceived thee. And thou hast said in thy heart: I am, and besides me there is no other.

47:11. Evil shall come upon thee, and thou shalt not know the rising thereof: and calamity shall fall violently upon thee, which thou canst not keep off: misery shall come upon thee suddenly, which thou shalt not know.

47:12. Stand now with thy enchanters, and with the multitude of thy sorceries, in which thou hast laboured from thy youth, if so be it may profit thee any thing, or if thou mayst become stronger.

47:13. Thou hast failed in the multitude of thy counsels: let now the astrologers stand and save thee, they that gazed at the stars, and counted the months, that from them they might tell the things that shall come to thee.

47:14. Behold they are as stubble, fire hath burnt them, they shall not deliver themselves from the power of the flames: there are no coals wherewith they may be warmed, nor fire, that they may sit thereat.

47:15. Such are all the things become to thee, in which thou hast laboured: thy merchants from thy youth, every one hath erred in his own way, there is none that can save thee.

Isaias Chapter 48

He reproaches the Jews for their obstinacy: he will deliver them out of their captivity, for his own name's sake.

48:1. Hear ye these things, O house of Jacob, you that are called by the name of Israel, and are come forth out of the waters of Juda, you who swear by the name of the Lord, and make mention of the God of Israel, but not in truth, nor in justice.

48:2. For they are called of the holy city, and are established upon the God of Israel: the Lord of hosts is his name.

48:3. The former things of old, I have declared, and they went forth out of my mouth, and I have made them to be heard: I did them suddenly and they came to pass.

48:4. For I knew that thou art stubborn, and thy neck is as an iron sinew, and thy forehead as brass.

48:5. I foretold thee of old, before they came to pass I told thee, lest thou shouldst say: My idols have done these things, and my graven and molten things have commanded them.

48:6. See now all the things which thou hast heard: but have you declared them? I have shewn thee new things from that time, and things are kept which thou knowest not:

48:7. They are created now, and not of old: and before the day, when thou heardest them not, lest thou shouldst say: Behold I knew them.

48:8. Thou hast neither heard, nor known, neither was thy ear opened of old. For I know that transgressing thou wilt transgress, and I have called thee a transgressor from the womb.

48:9. For my name's sake I will remove my wrath far off: and for my praise I will bridle thee, lest thou shouldst perish.

48:10. Behold I have refined thee, but not as silver, I have chosen thee in the furnace of poverty.

48:11. For my own sake, for my own sake will I do it, that I may not be blasphemed: and I will not give my glory to another.

48:12. Hearken to me, O Jacob, and thou Israel whom I call: I am he, I am the first, and I am the last.

48:13. My hand also hath founded the earth, and my right hand hath measured the heavens: I shall call them, and they shall stand together.

48:14. Assemble yourselves together, all you, and hear: who among them hath declared these things? the Lord hath loved him, he will do his pleasure in Babylon, and his arm shall be on the Chaldeans.

48:15. I, even I have spoken and called him: I have brought him, and his way is made prosperous.

48:16. Come ye near unto me, and hear this: I have not spoken in secret from the beginning: from the time before it was done, I was there, and now the Lord God hath sent me, and his spirit.

48:17. Thus saith the Lord thy redeemer, the Holy One of Israel: I am the Lord thy God that teach thee profitable things, that govern thee in the way that thou walkest.

48:18. O that thou hadst hearkened to my commandments: thy peace had been as a river, and thy justice as the waves of the sea,

48:19. And thy seed had been as the sand, and the offspring of thy bowels like the gravel thereof: his name should not have perished, nor have been destroyed from before my face.

48:20. Come forth out of Babylon, flee ye from the Chaldeans, declare it with the voice of joy: make this to be heard, and speak it out even to the ends of the earth. Say: The Lord hath redeemed his servant Jacob.

48:21. They thirsted not in the desert, when he led them out: he brought forth water out of the rock for them, and he clove the rock, and the waters gushed out.

48:22. There is no peace to the wicked, saith the Lord.

Isaias Chapter 49

Christ shall bring the Gentiles to salvation. God's love to his church is perpetual.

49:1. Give ear, ye islands, and hearken, ye people from afar. The Lord hath called me from the womb, from the bowels of my mother he hath been mindful of my name.

49:2. And he hath made my mouth like a sharp sword: in the shadow of his hand he hath protected me, and hath made me as a chosen arrow: in his quiver he hath hidden me.

49:3. And he said to me: Thou art my servant Israel, for in thee will I glory.

49:4. And I said: I have laboured in vain, I have spent my strength without cause and in vain: therefore my judgment is with the Lord, and my work with my God.

49:5. And now saith the Lord, that formed me from the womb to be his servant, that I may bring back Jacob unto him, and Israel will not be gathered together: and I am glorified in the eyes of the Lord, and my God is made my strength.

49:6. And he said: It is a small thing that thou shouldst be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to convert the dregs of Israel. Behold, I have given thee to be the light of the Gentiles, that thou mayst be my salvation even to the farthest part of the earth.

49:7. Thus saith the Lord the redeemer of Israel, his Holy One, to the soul that is despised, to the nation that is abhorred, to the servant of rulers: Kings shall see, and princes shall rise up, and adore for the Lord's sake, because he is faithful, and for the Holy One of Israel, who hath chosen thee.

49:8. Thus saith the Lord: In an acceptable time I have heard thee, and in the day of salvation I have helped thee: and I have preserved thee, and given thee to be a covenant of the people, that thou mightest raise up the earth, and possess the inheritances that were destroyed:

49:9. That thou mightest say to them that are bound: Come forth: and to them that are in darkness: Shew yourselves. They shall feed in the ways, and their pastures shall be in every plain.

49:10. They shall not hunger, nor thirst, neither shall the heat nor the sun strike them: for he that is merciful to them, shall be their shepherd, and at the fountains of waters he shall give them drink.

49:11. And I will make all my mountains a way, and my paths shall be exalted.

49:12. Behold these shall come from afar, and behold these from the north and from the sea, and these from the south country.

49:13. Give praise, O ye heavens, and rejoice, O earth, ye mountains, give praise with jubilation: because the Lord hath comforted his people, and will have mercy on his poor ones.

49:14. And Sion said: The Lord hath forsaken me, and the Lord hath forgotten me.

49:15. Can a woman forget her infant, so as not to have pity on the son of her womb? and if she should forget, yet will not I forget thee.

49:16. Behold, I have graven thee in my hands: thy walls are always before my eyes.

49:17. Thy builders are come: they that destroy thee and make thee waste shall go out of thee.

49:18. Lift up thy eyes round about, and see all these are gathered together, they are come to thee: I live, saith the Lord, thou shalt be clothed with all these as with an ornament, and as a bride thou shalt put them about thee.

49:19. For thy deserts, and thy desolate places, and the land of thy destruction shall now be too narrow by reason of the inhabitants, and they that swallowed thee up shall be chased far away.

49:20. The children of thy barrenness shall still say in thy ears: The place is too strait for me, make me room to dwell in.

49:21. And thou shalt say in thy heart: Who hath begotten these? I was barren and brought not forth, led away, and captive: and who hath brought up these? I was destitute and alone: and these, where were they?

49:22. Thus saith the Lord God: Behold I will lift up my hand to the Gentiles, and will set up my standard to the people. And they shall bring thy sons in their arms, and carry thy daughters upon their shoulders.

49:23. And kings shall be thy nursing fathers, and queens thy nurses: they shall worship thee with their face toward the earth, and they shall lick up the dust of thy feet. And thou shalt know that I am the Lord, for they shall not be confounded that wait for him.

49:24. Shall the prey be taken from the strong? or can that which was taken by the mighty, be delivered?

49:25. For thus saith the Lord: Yea verily, even the captivity shall be taken away from the strong: and that which was taken by the mighty, shall be delivered. But I will judge those that have judged thee, and thy children I will save.

49:26. And I will feed thy enemies with their own flesh: and they shall be made drunk with their own blood, as with new wine: and all flesh shall know, that I am the Lord that save thee, and thy Redeemer the Mighty One of Jacob.

Isaias Chapter 50

The synagogue shall be divorced for her iniquities. Christ for her sake will endure ignominious afflictions.

50:1. Thus saith the Lord: What is this bill of the divorce of your mother, with which I have put her away? or who is my creditor, to whom I sold you: behold you are sold for your iniquities, and for your wicked deeds have I put your mother away.

50:2. Because I came, and there was not a man: I called, and there was none that would hear. Is my hand shortened and become little, that I cannot redeem? or is there no strength in me to deliver? Behold at my rebuke I will make the sea a desert, I will turn the rivers into dry land: the fishes shall rot for want of water, and shall die for thirst.

50:3. I will clothe the heavens with darkness, and will make sackcloth their covering.

50:4. The Lord hath given me a learned tongue, that I should know how to uphold by word him that is weary: he wakeneth in the morning, in the morning he wakeneth my ear, that I may hear him as a master.

50:5. The Lord God hath opened my ear, and I do not resist: I have not gone back.

50:6. I have given my body to the strikers, and my cheeks to them that plucked them: I have not turned away my face from them that rebuked me, and spit upon me.

50:7. The Lord God is my helper, therefore am I not confounded: therefore have I set my face as a most hard rock, and I know that I shall not be confounded.

50:8. He is near that justifieth me, who will contend with me? let us stand together, who is my adversary? let him come near to me.

50:9. Behold the Lord God is my helper: who is he that shall condemn me? Lo, they shall all be destroyed as a garment, the moth shall eat them up.

50:10. Who is there among you that feareth the Lord, that heareth the voice of his servant, that hath walked in darkness, and hath no light? let him hope in the name of the Lord, and lean upon his God.

50:11. Behold all you that kindle a fire, encompassed with flames, walk in the light of your fire, and in the flames which you have kindled: this is done to you by my hand, you shall sleep in sorrows.

Isaias Chapter 51

An exhortation to trust in Christ. He shall protect the children of his church.

51:1. Give ear to me, you that follow that which is just, and you that seek the Lord: look unto the rock whence you are hewn, and to the hole of the pit from which you are dug out.

51:2. Look unto Abraham your father, and to Sara that bore you: for I called him alone, and blessed him, and multiplied him.

51:3. The Lord therefore will comfort Sion, and will comfort all the ruins thereof: and he will make her desert as a place of pleasure, and her wilderness as the garden of the Lord. Joy and gladness shall be found therein, thanksgiving, and the voice of praise.

51:4. Hearken unto me, O my people, and give ear to me, O my tribes: for a law shall go forth from me, and my judgment shall rest to be a light of the nations.

51:5. My just one is near at hand, my saviour is gone forth, and my arms shall judge the people: the islands shall look for me, and shall patiently wait for my arm.

51:6. Lift up your eyes to heaven, and look down to the earth beneath: for the heavens shall vanish like smoke, and the earth shall be worn away like a garment, and the inhabitants thereof shall perish in like manner: but my salvation shall be for ever, and my justice shall not fail.

51:7. Hearken to me, you that know what is just, my people who have my law in your heart: fear ye not the reproach of men, and be not afraid of their blasphemies.

51:8. For the worm shall eat them up as a garment: and the moth shall consume them as wool: but my salvation shall be for ever, and my justice from generation to generation.

51:9. Arise, arise, put on strength, O thou arm of the Lord, arise as in the days of old, in the ancient generations. Hast not thou struck the proud one, and wounded the dragon?

51:10. Hast not thou dried up the sea, the water of the mighty deep, who madest the depth of the sea a way, that the delivered might pass over?

51:11. And now they that are redeemed by the Lord, shall return, and shall come into Sion singing praises, and joy everlasting shall be upon their heads, they shall obtain joy and gladness, sorrow and mourning shall flee away.

51:12. I myself will comfort you: who art thou, that thou shouldst be afraid of a mortal man, and of the son of man, who shall wither away like grass?

51:13. And thou hast forgotten the Lord thy maker, who stretched out the heavens, and founded the earth: and thou hast been afraid continually all the day at the presence of his fury who afflicted thee, and had prepared himself to destroy thee: where is now the fury of the oppressor?

51:14. He shall quickly come that is going to open unto you, and he shall not kill unto utter destruction, neither shall his bread fail.

51:15. But I am the Lord thy God, who trouble the sea, and the waves thereof swell: the Lord of hosts is my name.

51:16. I have put my words in thy mouth, and have protected thee in the shadow of my hand, that thou mightest plant the heavens, and found the earth: and mightest say to Sion: Thou art my people.

51:17. Arise, arise, stand up, O Jerusalem, which hast drunk at the hand of the Lord the cup of his wrath; thou hast drunk even to the bottom of the cup of dead sleep, and thou hast drunk even to the dregs.

51:18. There is none that can uphold her among all the children that she hath brought forth: and there is none that taketh her by the hand among all the children that she hath brought up.

51:19. There are two things that have happened to thee: who shall be sorry for thee? desolation, and destruction, and the famine, and the sword, who shall comfort thee?

51:20. Thy children are cast forth, they have slept at the head of all the ways, and the wild ox that is snared: full of the indignation of the Lord, of the rebuke of thy God.

51:21. Therefore hear this, thou poor little one, and thou that art drunk but not with wine.

51:22. Thus saith thy Sovereign the Lord, and thy God, who will fight for his people: Behold I have taken out of thy hand the cup of dead sleep, the dregs of the cup of my indignation, thou shalt not drink it again any more.

51:23. And I will put it in the hand of them that have oppressed thee, and have said to thy soul: Bow down, that we may go over: and thou hast laid thy body as the ground, and as a way to them that went over.

Isaias Chapter 52

Under the figure of the deliverance from the Babylonish captivity, the church is invited to rejoice for her redemption from sin. Christ's kingdom shall be exalted.

52:1. Arise, arise, put on thy strength, O Sion, put on the garments of thy glory, O Jerusalem, the city of the Holy One: for henceforth the uncircumcised, and unclean shall no more pass through thee.

52:2. Shake thyself from the dust, arise, sit up, O Jerusalem: loose the bonds from off thy neck, O captive daughter of Sion.

52:3. For thus saith the Lord: You were sold gratis, and you shall be redeemed, without money.

52:4. For thus saith the Lord God: My people went down into Egypt at the beginning to sojourn there: and the Assyrian hath oppressed them without any cause at all.

52:5. And now what have I here, saith the Lord: for my people is taken away gratis. They that rule over them treat them unjustly, saith the Lord, and my name is continually blasphemed all the day long.

52:6. Therefore my people shall know my name in that day: for I myself that spoke, behold I am here.

52:7. How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings, and that preacheth peace: of him that sheweth forth good, that preacheth salvation, that saith to Sion: Thy God shall reign!

52:8. The voice of thy watchmen: they have lifted up their voice, they shall praise together: for they shall see eye to eye when the Lord shall convert Sion.

52:9. Rejoice, and give praise together, O ye deserts of Jerusalem: for the Lord hath comforted his people: he hath redeemed Jerusalem.

52:10. The Lord hath prepared his holy arm in the sight of all the Gentiles: and all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God.

52:11. Depart, depart, go ye out from thence, touch no unclean thing: go out of the midst of her, be ye clean, you that carry the vessels of the Lord.

52:12. For you shall not go out in a tumult, neither shall you make haste by flight: for the Lord will go before you, and the God of Israel will gather you together.

52:13. Behold my servant shall understand, he shall be exalted, and extolled, and shall be exceeding high.

52:14. As many have been astonished at thee, so shall his visage be inglorious among men, and his form among the sons of men.

52:15. He shall sprinkle many nations, kings shall shut their mouth at him: for they to whom it was not told of him, have seen: and they that heard not, have beheld.

Isaias Chapter 53

A prophecy of the passion of Christ.

53:1. Who a hath believed our report? and to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed?

53:2. And he shall grow up as a tender plant before him, and as a root out of a thirsty ground: there is no beauty in him, nor comeliness: and we have seen him, and there was no sightliness, that we should be desirous of him:

53:3. Despised, and the most abject of men, a man of sorrows, and acquainted with infirmity: and his look was as it were hidden and despised, whereupon we esteemed him not.

53:4. Surely he hath borne our infirmities and carried our sorrows: and we have thought him as it were a leper, and as one struck by God and afflicted.

53:5. But he was wounded for our iniquities, he was bruised for our sins: the chastisement of our peace was upon him, and by his bruises we are healed.

53:6. All we like sheep have gone astray, every one hath turned aside into his own way: and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.

53:7. He was offered because it was his own will, and he opened not his mouth: he shall be led as a sheep to the slaughter, and shall be dumb as a lamb before his shearer, and he shall not open his mouth.

53:8. He was taken away from distress, and from judgment: who shall declare his generation? because he is cut off out of the land of the living: for the wickedness of my people have I struck him.

53:9. And he shall give the ungodly for his burial, and the rich for his death: because he hath done no iniquity, neither was there deceit in his mouth.

53:10. And the Lord was pleased to bruise him in infirmity: if he shall lay down his life for sin, he shall see a longlived seed, and the will of the Lord shall be prosperous in his hand.

53:11. Because his soul hath laboured, he shall see and be filled: by his knowledge shall this my just servant justify many, and he shall bear their iniquities.

53:12. Therefore will I distribute to him very many, and he shall divide the spoils of the strong, because he hath delivered his soul unto death, and was reputed with the wicked: and he hath borne the sins of many, and hath prayed for the transgressors.

Isaias Chapter 54

The Gentiles, who were barren before, shall multiply in the church of
Christ: from which God's mercy shall never depart.

54:1. Give praise, O thou barren, that bearest not: sing forth praise, and make a joyful noise, thou that didst not travail with child: for many are the children of the desolate, more than of her that hath a husband, saith the Lord.

54:2. Enlarge the place of thy tent, and stretch out the skins of thy tabernacles, spare not: lengthen thy cords, and strengthen thy stakes.

54:3. For thou shalt pass on to the right hand, and to the left: and thy seed shall inherit the Gentiles, and shall inhabit the desolate cities.

54:4. Fear not, for thou shalt not be confounded, nor blush: for thou shalt not be put to shame, because thou shalt forget the shame of thy youth, and shalt remember no more the reproach of thy widowhood.

54:5. For he that made thee shall rule over thee, the Lord of hosts is his name: and thy Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel, shall be called the God of all the earth.

54:6. For the Lord hath called thee as a woman forsaken and mourning in spirit, and as a wife cast off from her youth, said thy God.

54:7. For a small moment have I forsaken thee, but with great mercies will I gather thee.

54:8. In a moment of indignation have I hid my face a little while from thee, but with everlasting kindness have I had mercy on thee, said the Lord thy Redeemer.

54:9. This thing is to me as in the days of Noe, to whom I swore, that I would no more bring in the waters of Noe upon the earth: so have I sworn not to be angry with thee, and not to rebuke thee.

54:10. For the mountains shall be moved, and the hills shall tremble; but my mercy shall not depart from thee, and the covenant of my peace shall not be moved: said the Lord that hath mercy on thee.

54:11. O poor little one, tossed with tempest, without all comfort, behold I will lay thy stones in order, and will lay thy foundations with sapphires,

54:12. And I will make thy bulwarks of jasper: and thy gates of graven stones, and all thy borders of desirable stones.

54:13. All thy children shall be taught of the Lord: and great shall be the peace of thy children.

54:14. And thou shalt be founded in justice: depart far from oppression, for thou shalt not fear; and from terror, for it shall not come near thee.

54:15. Behold, an inhabitant shall come, who was not with me, he that was a stranger to thee before, shall be joined to thee.

54:16. Behold, I have created the smith that bloweth the coals in the fire, and bringeth forth an instrument for his work, and I have created the killer to destroy.

54:17. No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper: and every tongue that resisteth thee in judgment, thou shalt condemn. This is the inheritance of the servants of the Lord, and their justice with me, saith the Lord.

Isaias Chapter 55

God promises abundance of spiritual graces to the faithful, that shall believe in Christ out of all nations, and sincerely serve him.

55:1. All you that thirst, come to the waters: and you that have no money make haste, buy, and eat: come ye, buy wine and milk without money, and without any price.

55:2. Why do you spend money for that which is not bread, and your labour for that which doth not satisfy you? Hearken diligently to me, and eat that which is good, and your soul shall be delighted in fatness.

55:3. Incline your ear and come to me: hear and your soul shall live, and I will make an everlasting covenant with you, the faithful mercies of David.

55:4. Behold I have given him for a witness to the people, for a leader and a master to the Gentiles.

55:5. Behold thou shalt call a nation, which thou knewest not: and the nations that knew not thee shall run to thee, because of the Lord thy God, and for the Holy One of Israel, for he hath glorified thee.

55:6. Seek ye the Lord, while he may be found: call upon him, while he is near.

55:7. Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unjust man his thoughts, and let him return to the Lord, and he will have mercy on him, and to our God: for he is bountiful to forgive.

55:8. For my thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways my ways, saith the Lord.

55:9. For as the heavens are exalted above the earth, so are my ways exalted above your ways, and my thoughts above your thoughts.

55:10. And as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and return no more thither, but soak the earth, and water it, and make it to spring, and give seed to the sower, and bread to the eater:

55:11. So shall my word be, which shall go forth from my mouth: it shall not return to me void, but it shall do whatsoever I please, and shall prosper in the things for which I sent it.

55:12. For you shall go out with joy, and be led forth with peace: the mountains and the hills shall sing praise before you, and all the trees of the country shall clap their hands.

55:13. Instead of the shrub, shall come up the fir tree, and instead of the nettle, shall come up the myrtle tree: and the Lord shall be named for an everlasting sign, that shall not be taken away.

Isaias Chapter 56

God invites all to keep his commandments: the Gentiles that keep them shall be the people of God: the Jewish pastors are reproved.

56:1. Thus saith the Lord: Keep ye judgment, and do justice: for my salvation is near to come, and my justice to be revealed.

56:2. Blessed is the man that doth this, and the son of man that shall lay hold on this: that keepeth the sabbath from profaning it, that keepeth his hands from doing any evil.

56:3. And let not the son of the stranger, that adhereth to the Lord, speak, saying: The Lord will divide and separate me from his people. And let not the eunuch say: Behold I am a dry tree.

56:4. For thus saith the Lord to the eunuchs, They that shall keep my sabbaths, and shall choose the things that please me, and shall hold fast my covenant:

56:5. I will give to them in my house, and within my walls, a place, and a name better than sons and daughters: I will give them an everlasting name which shall never perish.

56:6. And the children of the stranger that adhere to the Lord, to worship him, and to love his name, to be his servants: every one that keepeth the sabbath from profaning it, and that holdeth fast my covenant:

56:7. I will bring them into my holy mount, and will make them joyful in my house of prayer: their holocausts, and their victims shall please me upon my altar: for my house shall be called the house of prayer, for all nations.

56:8. The Lord God, who gathereth the scattered of Israel, saith: I will still gather unto him his congregation.

56:9. All ye beasts of the field come to devour, all ye beasts of the forest.

56:10. His watchmen are all blind, they are all ignorant: dumb dogs not able to bark, seeing vain things, sleeping and loving dreams.

56:11. And most impudent dogs, they never had enough: the shepherds themselves knew no understanding: all have turned aside into their own way, every one after his own gain, from the first even to the last.

56:12. Come, let us take wine, and be filled with drunkenness: and it shall be as to day, so also to morrow, and much more.

Isaias Chapter 57

The infidelity of the Jews: their idolatry. Promises to humble penitents.

57:1. The just perisheth, and no man layeth it to heart, and men of mercy are taken away, because there is none that understandeth; for the just man is taken away from before the face of evil.

57:2. Let peace come, let him rest in his bed that hath walked in his uprightness.

57:3. But draw near hither, you sons of the sorceress, the seed of the adulterer, and of the harlot.

57:4. Upon whom have you jested? upon whom have you opened your mouth wide, and put out your tongue? are not you wicked children, a false seed,

57:5. Who seek your comfort in idols under every green tree, sacrificing children in the torrents, under the high rocks?

57:6. In the parts of the torrent is thy portion, this is thy lot: and thou hast poured out libations to them, thou hast offered sacrifice. Shall I not be angry at these things?

57:7. Upon a high and lofty mountain thou hast laid thy bed, and hast gone up thither to offer victims.

57:8. And behind the door, and behind the post thou hast set up thy remembrance: for thou hast discovered thyself near me, and hast received an adulterer: thou hast enlarged thy bed, and made a covenant with them: thou hast loved their bed with open hand.

57:9. And thou hast adorned thyself for the king with ointment, and hast multiplied thy perfumes. Thou hast sent thy messengers far off, and wast debased even to hell.

57:10. Thou hast been wearied in the multitude of thy ways: yet thou saidst not: I will rest: thou has found life of thy hand, therefore thou hast not asked.

57:11. For whom hast thou been solicitous and afraid, that thou hast lied, and hast not been mindful of me, nor thought on me in thy heart? for I am silent, and as one that seeth not, and thou hast forgotten me.

57:12. I will declare thy justice, and thy works shall not profit thee.

57:13. When thou shalt cry, let thy companies deliver thee, but the wind shall carry them all off, a breeze shall take them away, but he that putteth his trust in me, shall inherit the land, and shall possess my holy mount.

57:14. And I will say: Make a way: give free passage, turn out of the path, take away the stumblingblocks out of the way of my people.

57:15. For thus saith the High and the Eminent that inhabiteth eternity: and his name is Holy, who dwelleth in the high and holy place, and with a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite.

57:16. For I will not contend for ever, neither will I be angry unto the end: because the spirit shall go forth from my face, and breathings I will make.

57:17. For the iniquity of his covetousness I was angry, and I struck him: I hid my face from thee, and was angry: and he went away wandering in his own heart.

57:18. I saw his ways, and I healed him, and brought him back, and restored comforts to him, and to them that mourn for him.

57:19. I created the fruit of the lips, peace, peace to him that is far off, and to him that is near, said the Lord, and I healed him.

57:20. But the wicked are like the raging sea, which cannot rest, and the waves thereof cast up dirt and mire.

57:21. There is no peace to the wicked, saith the Lord God.

Isaias Chapter 58

God rejects the hypocritical fasts of the Jews: recommends works of mercy, and sincere godliness.

58:1. Cry, cease not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet, and shew my people their wicked doings, and the house of Jacob their sins.

58:2. For they seek me from day to day, and desire to know my ways, as a nation that hath done justice, and hath not forsaken the judgment of their God: they ask of me the judgments of justice: they are willing to approach to God.

58:3. Why have we fasted, and thou hast not regarded: have we humbled our souls, and thou hast not taken notice? Behold in the day of your fast your own will is found, and you exact of all your debtors.

58:4. Behold you fast for debates and strife, and strike with the fist wickedly. Do not fast as you have done until this day, to make your cry to be heard on high.

58:5. Is this such a fast as I have chosen: for a man to afflict his soul for a day? is this it, to wind his head about like a circle, and to spread sackcloth and ashes? wilt thou call this a fast, and a day acceptable to the Lord?

58:6. Is not this rather the fast that I have chosen? loose the bands of wickedness, undo the bundles that oppress, let them that are broken go free, and break asunder every burden.

58:7. Deal thy bread to the hungry, and bring the needy and the harbourless into thy house: when thou shalt see one naked, cover him, and despise not thy own flesh.

58:8. Then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thy health shall speedily arise, and thy justice shall go before thy face, and the glory of the Lord shall gather thee up.

58:9. Then shalt thou call, and the Lord shall hear: thou shalt cry, and he shall say, Here I am. If thou wilt take away the chain out of the midst of thee, and cease to stretch out the finger, and to speak that which profiteth not.

58:10. When thou shalt pour out thy soul to the hungry, and shalt satisfy the afflicted soul, then shall thy light rise up in darkness, and thy darkness shall be as the noonday.

58:11. And the Lord will give thee rest continually, and will fill thy soul with brightness, and deliver thy bones, and thou shalt be like a watered garden, and like a fountain of water whose waters shall not fail.

58:12. And the places that have been desolate for ages shall be built in thee: thou shalt raise up the foundation of generation and generation: and thou shalt be called the repairer of the fences, turning the paths into rest.

58:13. If thou turn away thy foot from the sabbath, from doing thy own will in my holy day, and call the sabbath delightful, and the holy of the Lord glorious, and glorify him, while thou dost not thy own ways, and thy own will is not found, to speak a word:

58:14. Then shalt thou be delighted in the Lord, and I will lift thee up above the high places of the earth, and will feed thee with the inheritance of Jacob thy father. For the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.

Isaias Chapter 59

The dreadful evil of sin is displayed, as the great obstacle to all good from God: yet he will send a Redeemer, and make an everlasting covenant with his church.

59:1. Behold the hand of the Lord is not shortened that it cannot save, neither is his ear heavy that it cannot hear.

59:2. But your iniquities have divided between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you that he should not hear.

59:3. For your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity: your lips have spoken lies, and your tongue uttereth iniquity.

59:4. There is none that calleth upon justice, neither is there any one that judgeth truly: but they trust in a mere nothing, and speak vanities: they have conceived labour, and brought forth iniquity.

59:5. They have broken the eggs of asps, and have woven the webs of spiders: he that shall eat of their eggs, shall die: and that which is brought out, shall be hatched into a basilisk.

59:6. Their webs shall not be for clothing, neither shall they cover themselves with their works: their works are unprofitable works, and the work of iniquity is in their hands.

59:7. Their feet run to evil, and make haste to shed innocent blood: their thoughts are unprofitable thoughts: wasting and destruction are in their ways.

59:8. They have not known the way of peace, and there is no judgment in their steps: their paths are become crooked to them, every one that treadeth in them knoweth no peace.

59:9. Therefore is judgment far from us, and justice shall not overtake us. We looked for light, and behold darkness: brightness, and we have walked in the dark.

59:10. We have groped for the wall, and like the blind we have groped as if we had no eyes: we have stumbled at noonday as in darkness, we are in dark places, as dead men.

59:11. We shall roar all of us like bears, and shall lament as mournful doves. We have looked for judgment, and there is none: for salvation, and it is far from us.

59:12. For our iniquities are multiplied before thee, and our sins have testified against us: for our wicked doings are with us, and have known our iniquities:

59:13. In sinning and lying against the Lord: and we have turned away so that we went not after our God, but spoke calumny and transgression: we have conceived, and uttered from the heart, words of falsehood.

59:14. And judgment is turned away backward, and justice hath stood far off: because truth hath fallen down in the street, and equity could not come in.

59:15. And truth hath been forgotten: and he that departed from evil, lay open to be a prey: and the Lord saw, and it appeared evil in his eyes, because there is no judgment.

59:16. And he saw that there is not a man: and he stood astonished, because there is none to oppose himself: and his own arm brought salvation to him, and his own justice supported him.

59:17. He put on justice as a breastplate, and a helmet of salvation upon his head: he put on the garments of vengeance, and was clad with zeal as with a cloak.

59:18. As unto revenge, as it were to repay wrath to his adversaries, and a reward to his enemies: he will repay the like to the islands.

59:19. And they from the west, shall fear the name of the Lord: and they from the rising of the sun, his glory when he shall come as a violent stream, which the spirit of the Lord driveth on:

59:20. And there shall come a redeemer to Sion, and to them that return from iniquity in Jacob, saith the Lord.

59:21. This is my covenant with them, saith the Lord: My spirit that is in thee, and my words that I have put in thy mouth, shall not depart out of thy mouth, nor out of the mouth of thy seed, nor out of the mouth of thy seed's seed, saith the Lord, from henceforth and for ever.

This is my covenant, etc… Note here a clear promise of perpetual orthodoxy to the church of Christ.

Isaias Chapter 60

The light of true faith shall shine forth in the church of Christ, and shall be spread through all nations, and continue for all ages.

60:1. Arise, be enlightened, O Jerusalem: for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee.

60:2. For behold darkness shall cover the earth, and a mist the people: but the Lord shall arise upon thee, and his glory shall be seen upon thee.

60:3. And the Gentiles shall walk in thy light, and kings in the brightness of thy rising.

60:4. Lift up thy eyes round about, and see: all these are gathered together, they are come to thee: thy sons shall come from afar, and thy daughters shall rise up at thy side.

60:5. Then shalt thou see, and abound, and thy heart shall wonder and be enlarged, when the multitude of the sea shall be converted to thee, the strength of the Gentiles shall come to thee.

60:6. The multitude of camels shall cover thee, the dromedaries of Madian and Epha: all they from Saba shall come, bringing gold and frankincense: and shewing forth praise to the Lord.

60:7. All the flocks of Cedar shall be gathered together unto thee, the rams of Nabaioth shall minister to thee: they shall be offered upon my acceptable altar, and I will glorify the house of my majesty.

60:8. Who are these, that fly as clouds, and as doves to their windows?

60:9. For, the islands wait for me, and the ships of the sea in the beginning: that I may bring thy sons from afar: their silver, and their gold with them, to the name of the Lord thy God, and to the Holy One of Israel, because he hath glorified thee.

60:10. And the children of strangers shall build up thy walls, and their kings shall minister to thee: for in my wrath have I struck thee, and in my reconciliation have I had mercy upon thee.

60:11. And thy gates shall be open continually: they shall not be shut day nor night, that the strength of the Gentiles may be brought to thee, and their kings may be brought.

60:12. For the nation and the kingdom that will not serve thee, shall perish: and the Gentiles shall be wasted with desolation.

60:13. The glory of Libanus shall come to thee, the fir tree, and the box tree, and the pine tree together, to beautify the place of my sanctuary: and I will glorify the place of my feet.

60:14. And the children of them that afflict thee, shall come bowing down to thee, and all that slandered thee shall worship the steps of thy feet, and shall call thee the city of the Lord, the Sion of the Holy One of Israel.

60:15. Because thou wast forsaken, and hated, and there was none that passed through thee, I will make thee to be an everlasting glory, a joy unto generation and generation:

60:16. And thou shalt suck the milk of the Gentiles, and thou shalt be nursed with the breasts of kings: and thou shalt know that I am the Lord thy Saviour, and thy Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob.

60:17. For brass I will bring gold, and for iron I will bring silver: and for wood brass, and for stones iron: and I will make thy visitation peace, and thy overseers justice.

60:18. Iniquity shall no more be heard in thy land, wasting nor destruction in thy borders, and salvation shall possess thy walls, and praise thy gates.

60:19. Thou shalt no more have the sun for thy light by day, neither shall the brightness of the moon enlighten thee: but the Lord shall be unto thee for an everlasting light, and thy God for thy glory.

Thou shalt no more, etc… In this latter part of the chapter, the prophet passes from the illustrious promises made to the church militant on earth, to the glory of the church triumphant in heaven.

60:20. Thy sun shall go down no more, and thy moon shall not decrease: for the Lord shall be unto thee for an everlasting light, and the days of thy mourning shall be ended.

60:21. And thy people shall be all just, they shall inherit the land for ever, the branch of my planting, the work of my hand to glorify me.

60:22. The least shall become a thousand, and a little one a most strong nation: I the Lord will suddenly do this thing in its time.

Isaias Chapter 61

The office of Christ: the mission of the Apostles; the happiness of their converts.

61:1. The spirit of the Lord is upon me, because the Lord hath anointed me: he hath sent me to preach to the meek, to heal the contrite of heart, and to preach a release to the captives, and deliverance to them that are shut up.

61:2. To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord, and the day of vengeance of our God: to comfort all that mourn:

61:3. To appoint to the mourners of Sion, and to give them a crown for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, a garment of praise for the spirit of grief: and they shall be called in it the mighty ones of justice, the planting of the Lord to glorify him.

61:4. And they shall build the places that have been waste from of old, and shall raise up ancient ruins, and shall repair the desolate cities, that were destroyed for generation and generation.

61:5. And strangers shall stand and shall feed your flocks: and the sons of strangers shall be your husbandman, and the dressers of your vines.

61:6. But you shall be called the priests of the Lord: to you it shall be said: Ye ministers of our God: you shall eat the riches of the Gentiles, and you shall pride yourselves in their glory.

61:7. For your double confusion and shame, they shall praise their part: therefore shall they receive double in their land, everlasting joy shall be unto them.

61:8. For I am the Lord that love judgment, and hate robbery in a holocaust: and I will make their work in truth, and I will make a perpetual covenant with them.

61:9. And they shall know their seed among the Gentiles, and their offspring in the midst of peoples: all that shall see them, shall know them, that these are the seed which the Lord hath blessed.

61:10. I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, and my soul shall be joyful in my God: for he hath clothed me with the garments of salvation: and with the robe of justice he hath covered me, as a bridegroom decked with a crown, and as a bride adorned with her jewels.

61:11. For as the earth bringeth forth her bud, and as the garden causeth her seed to shoot forth: so shall the Lord God make justice to spring forth, and praise before all the nations.

Isaias Chapter 62

The prophet will not cease from preaching Christ: to whom all nations shall be converted: and whose church shall continue for ever.

62:1. For Sion's sake I will not hold my peace, and for the sake of Jerusalem, I will not rest till her just one come forth as brightness, and her saviour be lighted as a lamp.

62:2. And the Gentiles shall see thy just one, and all kings thy glorious one: and thou shalt be called by a new name, which the mouth of the Lord shall name.

62:3. And thou shalt be a crown of glory in the hand of the Lord, and a royal diadem in the hand of thy God.

62:4. Thou shalt no more be called Forsaken: and thy land shall no more be called Desolate: but thou shalt be called My pleasure in her, and thy land inhabited. Because the Lord hath been well pleased with thee: and thy land shall be inhabited.

62:5. For the young man shall dwell with the virgin, and thy children shall dwell in thee. And the bridegroom shall rejoice over the bride, and thy God shall rejoice over thee.

62:6. Upon thy walls, O Jerusalem, I have appointed watchmen all the day, and all the night, they shall never hold their peace. You that are mindful of the Lord, hold not your peace,

62:7. And give him no silence till he establish, and till he make Jerusalem a praise in the earth.

62:8. The Lord hath sworn by his right hand, and by the arm of his strength: Surely I will no more give thy corn to be meat for thy enemies: and the sons of the strangers shall not drink thy wine, for which thou hast laboured.

62:9. For they that gather it, shall eat it, and shall praise the Lord: and they that bring it together, shall drink it in my holy courts.

62:10. Go through, go through the gates, prepare the way for the people, make the road plain, pick out the stones, and lift up the standard to the people.

62:11. Behold the Lord hath made it to be heard in the ends of the earth, tell the daughter of Sion: Behold thy Saviour cometh: behold his reward is with him, and his work before him.

62:12. And they shall call them, The holy people, the redeemed of the Lord. But thou shalt be called: A city sought after, and not forsaken.

Isaias Chapter 63

Christ's victory over his enemies: his mercies to his people: their complaint.

63:1. Who is this that cometh from Edom, with dyed garments from Bosra, this beautiful one in his robe, walking in the greatness of his strength. I, that speak justice, and am a defender to save.

Edom… Edom and Bosra (a strong city of Edom) are here taken in a mystical sense for the enemies of Christ and his church.

63:2. Why then is thy apparel red, and thy garments like theirs that tread in the winepress?

63:3. I have trodden the winepress alone, and of the Gentiles there is not a man with me: I have trampled on them in my indignation, and have trodden them down in my wrath, and their blood is sprinkled upon my garments, and I have stained all my apparel.

63:4. For the day of vengeance is in my heart, the year of my redemption is come.

63:5. I looked about, and there was none to help: I sought, and there was none to give aid: and my own arm hath saved for me, and my indignation itself hath helped me.

63:6. And I have trodden down the people in my wrath, and have made them drunk in my indignation, and have brought down their strength to the earth.

63:7. I will remember the tender mercies of the Lord, the praise of the Lord for all the things that the Lord hath bestowed upon us, and for the multitude of his good things to the house of Israel, which he hath given them according to his kindness, and according to the multitude of his mercies.

63:8. And he said: Surely they are my people, children that will not deny: so he became their saviour.

63:9. In all their affliction he was not troubled, and the angel of his presence saved them: in his love, and in his mercy he redeemed them, and he carried them and lifted them up all the days of old.

63:10. But they provoked to wrath, and afflicted the spirit of his Holy One: and he was turned to be their enemy, and he fought against them.

63:11. And he remembered the days of old of Moses, and of his people: Where is he that brought them up out of the sea, with the shepherds of his flock? where is he that put in the midst of them the spirit of his Holy One?

63:12. He that brought out Moses by the right hand, by the arm of his majesty: that divided the waters before them, to make himself an everlasting name.

63:13. He that led them out through the deep, as a horse in the wilderness that stumbleth not.

63:14. As a beast that goeth down in the field, the spirit of the Lord was their leader: so didst thou lead thy people to make thyself a glorious name.

63:15. Look down from heaven, and behold from thy holy habitation and the place of thy glory: where is thy zeal, and thy strength, the multitude of thy bowels, and of thy mercies? they have held back themselves from me.

They have held back, etc… This is spoken by the prophet in the person of the Jews at the time when, for their sins, they were given up to their enemies.

63:16. For thou art our father, and Abraham hath not known us, and Israel hath been ignorant of us: thou, O Lord, art our father, our redeemer, from everlasting is thy name.

Abraham hath not know us, etc… That is, Abraham will not now acknowledge us for his children, by reason of our degeneracy; but thou, O Lord, art our true father and our redeemer, and no other can be called our parent in comparison with thee.

63:17. Why hast thou made us to err, O Lord, from thy ways: why hast thou hardened our heart, that we should not fear thee? return for the sake of thy servants, the tribes of thy inheritance.

Made us to err, etc. Hardened our heart, etc… The meaning is, that God in punishment of their great and manifold crimes, and their long abuse of his mercy and grace, had withdrawn his graces from them, and so given them up to error and hardness of heart.

63:18. They have possessed thy holy people as nothing: our enemies have trodden down thy sanctuary.

63:19. We are become as in the beginning, when thou didst not rule over us, and when we were not called by thy name.

Isaias Chapter 64

The prophet prays for the release of his people; and for the remission of their sins.

64:1. O that thou wouldst rend the heavens, and wouldst come down: the mountains would melt away at thy presence.

64:2. They would melt as at the burning of fire, the waters would burn with fire, that thy name might be made known to thy enemies: that the nations might tremble at thy presence.

64:3. When thou shalt do wonderful things, we shall not bear them: thou didst come down, and at thy presence the mountains melted away.

64:4. From the beginning of the world they have not heard, nor perceived with the ears: the eye hath not seen, O God, besides thee, what things thou hast prepared for them that wait for thee.

64:5. Thou hast met him that rejoiceth, and doth justice: in thy ways they shall remember thee: behold thou art angry, and we have sinned: in them we have been always, and we shall be saved.

64:6. And we are all become as one unclean, and all our justices as the rag of a menstruous woman: and we have all fallen as a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away.

Our justices, etc… That is, the works by which we pretended to make ourselves just. This is spoken particularly of the sacrifices, sacraments, and ceremonies of the Jews, after the death of Christ, and the promulgation of the new law.

64:7. There is none that calleth upon thy name: that riseth up, and taketh hold of thee: thou hast hid thy face from us, and hast crushed us in the hand of our iniquity.

64:8. And now, O Lord, thou art our father, and we are clay: and thou art our maker, and we all are the works of thy hands.

64:9. Be not very angry, O Lord, and remember no longer our iniquity: behold, see we are all thy people.

64:10. The city of thy sanctuary is become a desert, Sion is made a desert, Jerusalem is desolate.

64:11. The house of our holiness, and of our glory, where our fathers praised thee, is burnt with fire, and all our lovely things are turned into ruins.

64:12. Wilt thou refrain thyself, O Lord, upon these things, wilt thou hold thy peace, and afflict us vehemently?

Isaias Chapter 65

The Gentiles shall seek and find Christ, but the Jews will persecute him, and be rejected, only a remnant shall be reserved. The church shall multiply, and abound with graces.

65:1. They have sought me that before asked not for me, they have found me that sought me not. I said: Behold me, behold me, to a nation that did not call upon my name.

65:2. I have spread forth my hands all the day to an unbelieving people, who walk in a way that is not good after their own thoughts.

65:3. A people that continually provoke me to anger before my face, that immolate in gardens, and sacrifice upon bricks.

65:4. That dwell in sepulchres, and sleep in the temple of idols: that eat swine's flesh, and profane broth is in their vessels.

65:5. That say: Depart from me, come not near me, because thou art unclean: these shall be smoke in my anger, a fire burning all the day.

65:6. Behold it is written before me: I will not be silent, but I will render and repay into their bosom.

65:7. Your iniquities, and the iniquities of your fathers together, saith the Lord, who have sacrificed upon the mountains, and have reproached me upon the hills; and I will measure back their first work in their bosom.

65:8. Thus saith the Lord: As if a grain be found in a cluster, and it be said: Destroy it not, because it is a blessing: so will I do for the sake of my servants, that I may not destroy the whole.

65:9. And I will bring forth a seed out of Jacob, and out of Juda a possessor of my mountains: and my elect shall inherit it, and my servants shall dwell there.

65:10. And the plains shall be turned to folds of flocks, and the valley of Achor into a place for the herds to lie down in, for my people that have sought me.

65:11. And you, that have forsaken the Lord, that have forgotten my holy mount, that set a table for fortune, and offer libations upon it,

65:12. I will number you in the sword, and you shall all fall by slaughter: because I called and you did not answer: I spoke, and you did not hear: and you did evil in my eyes, and you have chosen the things that displease me.

65:13. Therefore thus saith the Lord God: Behold my servants shall eat, and you shall be hungry: behold my servants shall drink, and you shall be thirsty.

65:14. Behold my servants shall rejoice, and you shall be confounded: behold my servants shall praise for joyfulness of heart, and you shall cry for sorrow of heart, and shall howl for grief of spirit.

65:15. And you shall leave your name for an execration to my elect: and the Lord God shall slay thee, and call his servants by another name.

65:16. In which he that is blessed upon the earth, shall be blessed in God, amen: and he that sweareth in the earth, shall swear by God, amen: because the former distresses are forgotten, and because they are hid from my eyes.

65:17. For behold I create new heavens, and a new earth: and the former things shall not be in remembrance, and they shall not come upon the heart.

65:18. But you shall be glad and rejoice for ever in these things, which I create: for behold I create Jerusalem a rejoicing, and the people thereof joy.

65:19. And I will rejoice in Jerusalem, and joy in my people, and the voice of weeping shall no more be heard in her, nor the voice of crying.

65:20. There shall no more be an infant of days there, nor an old man that shall not fill up his days: for the child shall die a hundred years old, and the sinner being a hundred years old shall be accursed.

65:21. And they shall build houses, and inhabit them; and they shall plant vineyards, and eat the fruits of them.

65:22. They shall not build, and another inhabit; they shall not plant, and another eat: for as the days of a tree, so shall be the days of my people, and the works of their hands shall be of long continuance.

65:23. My elect shall not labour in vain, nor bring forth in trouble; for they are the seed of the blessed of the Lord, and their posterity with them.

65:24. And it shall come to pass, that before they call, I will hear; as they are yet speaking, I will hear.

65:25. The wolf and the lamb shall feed together; the lion and the ox shall eat straw; and dust shall be the serpent's food: they shall not hurt nor kill in all my holy mountain, saith the Lord.

Isaias Chapter 66

More of the reprobation of the Jews, and of the call of the Gentiles.

66:1. Thus saith the Lord: Heaven is my throne, and the earth my footstool: what is this house that you will build to me? and what is this place of my rest?

What is this house, etc… This is a prophecy that the temple should be cast off.

66:2. My hand made all these things, and all these things were made, saith the Lord. But to whom shall I have respect, but to him that is poor and little, and of a contrite spirit, and that trembleth at my words?

66:3. He that sacrificeth an ox, is as if he slew a man: he that killeth a sheep in sacrifice, as if he should brain a dog: he that offereth an oblation, as if he should offer swine's blood; he that remembereth incense, as if he should bless an idol. All these things have they chosen in their ways, and their soul is delighted in their abominations.

He that sacrificeth an ox, etc… This is a prophecy that the sacrifices which were offered in the old law should be abolished in the new; and that the offering of them should be a crime.-Ibid. Remembereth incense… Viz., to offer it in the way of a sacrifice.

66:4. Wherefore I also will choose their mockeries, and will bring upon them the things they feared: because I called, and there was none that would answer; I have spoken, and they heard not; and they have done evil in my eyes, and have chosen the things that displease me.

I will choose their mockeries… I will turn their mockeries upon themselves; and will cause them to be mocked by their enemies.

66:5. Hear the word of the Lord, you that tremble at his word: Your brethren that hate you, and cast you out for my name's sake, have said: Let the Lord be glorified, and we shall see in your joy: but they shall be confounded.

66:6. A voice of the people from the city, a voice from the temple, the voice of the Lord that rendereth recompense to his enemies.

66:7. Before she was in labour, she brought forth; before her time came to be delivered, she brought forth a man child.

Before she was in labour, etc… This relates to the conversion of the
Gentiles, who were born, as it were, all on a sudden to the church of
God.

66:8. Who hath ever heard such a thing? and who hath seen the like to this? shall the earth bring forth in one day? or shall a nation be brought forth at once, because Sion hath been in labour, and hath brought forth her children?

66:9. Shall not I that make others to bring forth children, myself bring forth, saith the Lord? shall I, that give generation to others, be barren, saith the Lord thy God?

66:10. Rejoice with Jerusalem, and be glad with her, all you that love her: rejoice for joy with her, all you that mourn for her.

66:11. That you may suck, and be filled with the breasts of her consolations: that you may milk out, and flow with delights, from the abundance of her glory.

66:12. For thus saith the Lord: Behold I will bring upon her as it were a river of peace, and as an overflowing torrent the glory of the Gentiles, which you shall suck; you shall be carried at the breasts, and upon the knees they shall caress you.

66:13. As one whom the mother caresseth, so will I comfort you, and you shall be comforted in Jerusalem.

66:14. You shall see and your heart shall rejoice, and your bones shall flourish like an herb, and the hand of the Lord shall be known to his servants, and he shall be angry with his enemies.

66:15. For behold the Lord will come with fire, and his chariots are like a whirlwind, to render his wrath in indignation, and his rebuke with flames of fire.

66:16. For the Lord shall judge by fire, and by his sword unto all flesh, and the slain of the Lord shall be many.

66:17. They that were sanctified, thought themselves clean in the gardens behind the gate within, they that did eat swine's flesh, and the abomination, and the mouse: they shall be consumed together, saith the Lord.

66:18. But I know their works, and their thoughts: I come that I may gather them together with all nations and tongues: and they shall come and shall see my glory.

66:19. And I will set a sign among them, and I will send of them that shall be saved, to the Gentiles into the sea, into Africa, and Lydia them that draw the bow: into Italy, and Greece, to the islands afar off, to them that have not heard of me, and have not seen my glory. And they shall declare my glory to the Gentiles:

66:20. And they shall bring all your brethren out of all nations for a gift to the Lord, upon horses, and in chariots, and in litters, and on mules, and in coaches, to my holy mountain Jerusalem, saith the Lord, as if the children of Israel should bring an offering in a clean vessel into the house of the Lord.

66:21. And I will take of them to be priests, and Levites, saith the Lord.

66:22. For as the new heavens, and the new earth, which I will make to stand before me, saith the Lord: so shall your seed stand, and your name.

66:23. And there shall be month after month, and sabbath after sabbath: and all flesh shall come to adore before my face, saith the Lord.

66:24. And they shall go out, and see the carcasses of the men that have transgressed against me: their worm shall not die, and their fire shall not be quenched: and they shall be a loathsome sight to all flesh.

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Table of Contents

- THE HOLY BIBLE

- THE PROPHECY OF ISAIAS

- THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE