Isaiah 66

Proper Worship

¹Thus says Yahweh:

“Heaven is my throne,

Where is this house that you would build for me?

²And my hand has made all these things,

declares Yahweh, “but I look to this one:

to the humble and the contrite of spirit

³The one who slaughters a bull strikes a man;

The one who offers an offering, the blood of swine;

Indeed, they themselves have chosen their ways,

⁴Indeed, I myself I will choose their ill treatment,

because I called, and no one answered;

but they did the evil in my eyes,

⁵Hear the word of Yahweh, you who are frightened at his word:

Your brothers who hate you,

“Let Yahweh be honored so that we may see your joy!”

⁶A voice, an uproar from the city!

Zion’s Delivery

⁷Before she was in labor she gave birth;

⁸Who has heard anything like this?

Can a land be born in one day?

Yet when she was in labor, Zion indeed gave birth to her children.

⁹Shall I myself I break open and not deliver?” says Yahweh,[#Literally “cause to bring forth”]

“or I who delivers lock up the womb?” says your God.

¹⁰“Rejoice with Jerusalem

¹¹so that you may suck and be satisfied from her consoling breast,[#Literally “breast of consolation”]

¹²For thus says Yahweh:

“Look! I am about to spread prosperity out to her like a river,

and you shall suck and be carried on the hip;

¹³As a man whose mother comforts him, so I myself will comfort you,

Yahweh’s Final Judgment

¹⁴And you shall see and your heart shall rejoice,

and the hand of Yahweh shall make itself known to his servants,

¹⁵For look! Yahweh will come in fire,

to give back his anger in wrath,

¹⁶For Yahweh enters into judgment on all flesh with fire and his sword,

¹⁷Those who sanctify themselves

eating the flesh of swine

shall come to an end!” declares Yahweh.

¹⁸“And I—their works and thoughts!—am about to come to gather all nations and tongues,

¹⁹And I will set a sign among them,

Tarshish, Pul, and Lud, who draw the bow;

that have not heard of my fame,

And they shall declare my glory among the nations,

²⁰and bring all your countrymen from all the nations as an offering to Yahweh on horses and chariots and in litters and on mules and camels, to my holy mountain, Jerusalem,” says Yahweh, “just as the sons of Israel bring an offering in a clean vessel to the house of Yahweh.[#Or “brothers”; #Hebrew “chariot”; #Or “on”; #Literally “the mountain of holiness me”]

²¹And indeed, I will take some of them as priests and the Levites,” says Yahweh.

²²“For just as the new heavens and earth that I am about to make shall stand before me,” declares Yahweh, “so shall your descendants and your name stand.[#Literally “declaration of”; #Hebrew “descendant”]

²³And this shall happen: From new moon to new moon and from Sabbath to Sabbath all flesh shall come to bow in worship before me,” says Yahweh.[#Literally “enough of new moon in his new moon”; #Literally “enough of Sabbath in his Sabbath”]

²⁴“And they shall go out and look at the corpses of the people who have rebelled against me,[#Or “men”; #Literally “rebelling”]

for their worm shall not die,