ISAIAH 21-23

¹ From the wilderness, from a fearsome land.

² I will put an end to all the sighing she caused.

³ I am too disturbed to see.

⁴ The twilight I longed for makes me tremble.

⁵ Get up, you princes, anoint the shield!

⁶ “Go, post a lookout and have him report what he sees.”

⁷ He watched carefully, with great attentiveness.

⁸ And I am stationed at my guardpost every night.

⁹ All the graven images of her gods he has shattered to the ground!”

¹⁰ I have reported to you what I have heard from Jehovah of armies, the God of Israel.

¹¹ Watchman, what of the night?”

¹² Come again!”

¹³ O caravans of Deʹdan.

¹⁴ And bring bread for the one fleeing.

¹⁵ From the bent bow, and from the cruelty of the war.

¹⁶ For this is what Jehovah said to me: “Within one year, like the years of a hired worker, all the glory of Keʹdar will come to an end.

¹⁷ The remaining bowmen of the warriors of Keʹdar will be few, for Jehovah the God of Israel has spoken.”

¹ What is the matter with you that you have all gone up to the roofs?

² Nor did they die in battle.

³ Even though they had fled far away.

⁴ Over the destruction of the daughter of my people.

⁵ And a cry to the mountain.

⁶ And Kir uncovers the shield.

⁷ And the horses will take their positions at the gate,

⁸ “In that day you will look toward the armory of the House of the Forest,

⁹ and you will see the many breaches of the City of David. And you will collect the waters of the lower pool.

¹⁰ You will count the houses of Jerusalem, and you will pull down the houses to reinforce the wall.

¹¹ And you will make a basin between the two walls for the water of the old pool, but you will not look to its Grand Maker, and you will not see the One who formed it long ago.

¹² For shaved heads and the wearing of sackcloth.

¹³ ‘Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we will die.’”

¹⁴ Then Jehovah of armies revealed himself in my ears: “‘This error will not be atoned in your behalf until you people die,’ says the Sovereign Lord, Jehovah of armies.”

¹⁵ This is what the Sovereign Lord, Jehovah of armies, says: “Go in to this steward, to Shebʹna, who is in charge of the house, and say,

¹⁶ ‘What is your interest here, and who is there of interest to you here, that you hewed out a burial place here for yourself?’ He is hewing out his burial place in a high place; he is cutting out a resting-place for himself in a crag.

¹⁷ ‘Look! Jehovah will hurl you down violently, O man, and seize you forcibly.

¹⁸ He will certainly wrap you up tightly and hurl you like a ball into a wide land. There you will die, and there your glorious chariots will be, a disgrace to your master’s house.

¹⁹ And I will depose you from your position and throw you out of your office.

²⁰ “‘In that day I will call my servant E·liʹa·kim the son of Hil·kiʹah,

²¹ and I will clothe him with your robe and firmly bind your sash around him, and I will give your authority into his hand. And he will be a father to the inhabitants of Jerusalem and to the house of Judah.

²² And I will put the key of the house of David on his shoulder. He will open and no one will shut; and he will shut and no one will open.

²³ I will drive him in as a peg in a lasting place, and he will become as a throne of glory to the house of his father.

²⁴ And they will hang on him all the glory of the house of his father, the descendants and the offspring, all the small vessels, the bowl-shaped vessels, as well as all the large jars.

²⁵ “‘In that day,’ declares Jehovah of armies, ‘the peg that is driven in a lasting place will be removed, and it will be cut down and fall, and the load that it supported will fall to ruin, for Jehovah himself has spoken.’”

¹ From the land of Kitʹtim it has been revealed to them.

² The merchants from Siʹdon who cross the sea have filled you.

³ Bringing the profit of the nations.

⁴ Nor have I brought up young men or raised young women.”

⁵ People will be in anguish over the report about Tyre.

⁶ Wail, you inhabitants of the coastland!

⁷ Her feet used to take her to distant lands to reside.

⁸ Whose tradesmen were honored in all the earth?

⁹ To humiliate all those who were honored throughout the earth.

¹⁰ There is no longer any shipyard.

¹¹ Jehovah has ordered the annihilation of Phoe·niʹcia’s strongholds.

¹² Even there you will find no rest.”

¹³ Reducing her to a crumbling ruin.

¹⁴ For your stronghold has been destroyed.

¹⁵ In that day Tyre will be forgotten for 70 years, the same as the lifetime of one king. At the end of 70 years, it will happen to Tyre as in the song of a prostitute:

¹⁶ So that they will remember you.”

¹⁷ At the end of 70 years, Jehovah will turn his attention to Tyre, and she will return to her hire and prostitute herself with all the world’s kingdoms on the face of the earth.

¹⁸ But her profit and her hire will become something holy to Jehovah. It will not be stored or laid away, because her hire will be for those dwelling before Jehovah, so that they may eat to satisfaction and wear elegant clothing.