Israel’s Futile Idolatry

57 The righteous perishes,And no man takes it to heart;Merciful men are taken away,While no one considersThat the righteous is taken away from evil.² He shall enter into peace;They shall rest in their beds,Each one walking in his uprightness.

³ “But come here,You sons of the sorceress,You offspring of the adulterer and the harlot!⁴ Whom do you ridicule?Against whom do you make a wide mouthAnd stick out the tongue?Are you not children of transgression,Offspring of falsehood,⁵ Inflaming yourselves with gods under every green tree,Slaying the children in the valleys,Under the clefts of the rocks?⁶ Among the smooth stones of the streamIs your portion;They, they, are your lot!Even to them you have poured a drink offering,You have offered a grain offering.Should I receive comfort in these?⁷ “On a lofty and high mountainYou have set your bed;Even there you went upTo offer sacrifice.⁸ Also behind the doors and their postsYou have set up your remembrance;For you have uncovered yourself to those other than Me,And have gone up to them;You have enlarged your bedAnd made a covenant with them;You have loved their bed,Where you saw their nudity.^[a]9 You went to the king with ointment,And increased your perfumes;You sent your messengers far off,And even descended to Sheol.¹⁰ You are wearied in the length of your way;Yet you did not say, ‘There is no hope.’You have found the life of your hand;Therefore you were not grieved.

¹¹ “And of whom have you been afraid, or feared,That you have liedAnd not remembered Me,Nor taken it to your heart?Is it not because I have held My peace from of oldThat you do not fear Me?¹² I will declare your righteousnessAnd your works,For they will not profit you.¹³ When you cry out,Let your collection of idols deliver you.But the wind will carry them all away,A breath will take them.But he who puts his trust in Me shall possess the land,And shall inherit My holy mountain.”

Healing for the Backslider

¹⁴ And one shall say,“Heap it up! Heap it up!Prepare the way,Take the stumbling block out of the way of My people.”

¹⁵ For thus says the High and Lofty OneWho inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy:“I dwell in the high and holy place,With him who has a contrite and humble spirit,To revive the spirit of the humble,And to revive the heart of the contrite ones.¹⁶ For I will not contend forever,Nor will I always be angry;For the spirit would fail before Me,And the souls which I have made.¹⁷ For the iniquity of his covetousnessI was angry and struck him;I hid and was angry,And he went on backsliding in the way of his heart.¹⁸ I have seen his ways, and will heal him;I will also lead him,And restore comforts to himAnd to his mourners.

¹⁹ “I create the fruit of the lips:Peace, peace to him who is far off and to him who is near,”Says the Lord,“And I will heal him.”²⁰ But the wicked are like the troubled sea,When it cannot rest,Whose waters cast up mire and dirt.

²¹ “There is no peace,”Says my God, “for the wicked.”

Fasting that Pleases God

58 “Cry aloud, spare not;Lift up your voice like a trumpet;Tell My people their transgression,And the house of Jacob their sins.² Yet they seek Me daily,And delight to know My ways,As a nation that did righteousness,And did not forsake the ordinance of their God.They ask of Me the ordinances of justice;They take delight in approaching God.³ ‘Why have we fasted,’ they say, ‘and You have not seen?Why have we afflicted our souls, and You take no notice?’

“In fact, in the day of your fast you find pleasure,And exploit all your laborers.⁴ Indeed you fast for strife and debate,And to strike with the fist of wickedness.You will not fast as you do this day,To make your voice heard on high.⁵ Is it a fast that I have chosen,A day for a man to afflict his soul?Is it to bow down his head like a bulrush,And to spread out sackcloth and ashes?Would you call this a fast,And an acceptable day to the Lord?

⁶ “Is this not the fast that I have chosen:To loose the bonds of wickedness,To undo the heavy burdens,To let the oppressed go free,And that you break every yoke?⁷ Is it not to share your bread with the hungry,And that you bring to your house the poor who are cast out;When you see the naked, that you cover him,And not hide yourself from your own flesh?⁸ Then your light shall break forth like the morning,Your healing shall spring forth speedily,And your righteousness shall go before you;The glory of the Lord shall be your rear guard.⁹ Then you shall call, and the Lord will answer;You shall cry, and He will say, ‘Here I am.’

“If you take away the yoke from your midst,The pointing of the finger, and speaking wickedness,¹⁰ If you extend your soul to the hungryAnd satisfy the afflicted soul,Then your light shall dawn in the darkness,And your darkness shall be as the noonday.¹¹ The Lord will guide you continually,And satisfy your soul in drought,And strengthen your bones;You shall be like a watered garden,And like a spring of water, whose waters do not fail.¹² Those from among youShall build the old waste places;You shall raise up the foundations of many generations;And you shall be called the Repairer of the Breach,The Restorer of Streets to Dwell In.

¹³ “If you turn away your foot from the Sabbath,From doing your pleasure on My holy day,And call the Sabbath a delight,The holy day of the Lord honorable,And shall honor Him, not doing your own ways,Nor finding your own pleasure,Nor speaking your own words,¹⁴ Then you shall delight yourself in the Lord;And I will cause you to ride on the high hills of the earth,And feed you with the heritage of Jacob your father.The mouth of the Lord has spoken.”

Separated from God

59 Behold, the Lord’s hand is not shortened,That it cannot save;Nor His ear heavy,That it cannot hear.² But your iniquities have separated you from your God;And your sins have hidden His face from you,So that He will not hear.³ For your hands are defiled with blood,And your fingers with iniquity;Your lips have spoken lies,Your tongue has muttered perversity.

⁴ No one calls for justice,Nor does any plead for truth.They trust in empty words and speak lies;They conceive evil and bring forth iniquity.⁵ They hatch vipers’ eggs and weave the spider’s web;He who eats of their eggs dies,And from that which is crushed a viper breaks out.

⁶ Their webs will not become garments,Nor will they cover themselves with their works;Their works are works of iniquity,And the act of violence is in their hands.⁷ Their feet run to evil,And they make haste to shed innocent blood;Their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity;Wasting and destruction are in their paths.⁸ The way of peace they have not known,And there is no justice in their ways;They have made themselves crooked paths;Whoever takes that way shall not know peace.

Sin Confessed

⁹ Therefore justice is far from us,Nor does righteousness overtake us;We look for light, but there is darkness!For brightness, but we walk in blackness!¹⁰ We grope for the wall like the blind,And we grope as if we had no eyes;We stumble at noonday as at twilight;We are as dead men in desolate places.¹¹ We all growl like bears,And moan sadly like doves;We look for justice, but there is none;For salvation, but it is far from us.¹² For our transgressions are multiplied before You,And our sins testify against us;For our transgressions are with us,And as for our iniquities, we know them:¹³ In transgressing and lying against the Lord,And departing from our God,Speaking oppression and revolt,Conceiving and uttering from the heart words of falsehood.¹⁴ Justice is turned back,And righteousness stands afar off;For truth is fallen in the street,And equity cannot enter.¹⁵ So truth fails,And he who departs from evil makes himself a prey.

The Redeemer of Zion

Then the Lord saw it, and it displeased HimThat there was no justice.

¹⁶ He saw that there was no man,And wondered that there was no intercessor;Therefore His own arm brought salvation for Him;And His own righteousness, it sustained Him.¹⁷ For He put on righteousness as a breastplate,And a helmet of salvation on His head;He put on the garments of vengeance for clothing,And was clad with zeal as a cloak.¹⁸ According to their deeds, accordingly He will repay,Fury to His adversaries,Recompense to His enemies;The coastlands He will fully repay.¹⁹ So shall they fearThe name of the Lord from the west,And His glory from the rising of the sun;When the enemy comes in like a flood,The Spirit of the Lord will lift up a standard against him.

²⁰ “The Redeemer will come to Zion,And to those who turn from transgression in Jacob,”Says the Lord.

²¹ “As for Me,” says the Lord, “this is My covenant with them: My Spirit who is upon you, and My words which I have put in your mouth, shall not depart from your mouth, nor from the mouth of your descendants, nor from the mouth of your descendants’ descendants,” says the Lord, “from this time and forevermore.”