World English Bible · Under Assyria
Isaiah 30
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"Woe to the rebellious children", , "who take , but not from me; and who make an alliance, but not with , that they may add to ; who set out to go down into without asking for my , to strengthen themselves in the strength of , and to take refuge in the shadow of ! Therefore the strength of will be your , and the refuge in the shadow of your confusion. For their princes are at , and their ambassadors have come to Hanes. They shall all be because of a people that can't profit them, that are not a help nor profit, but a , and also a ." The burden of the animals of the South. Through the land of trouble and anguish, of the lioness and the lion, the viper and flying , they carry their riches on the shoulders of young donkeys, and their on the humps of camels, to an unprofitable people. For helps in , and to no purpose; therefore I have called her who sits still. Now go, write it before them on a tablet, and inscribe it in a book, that it may be for the time to come and ever. For it is a rebellious people, lying children, children who will not hear law; who tell the , "Don't see!" and , "Don't to us right things. Tell us pleasant things. deceits. Get out of . Turn away from . Cause the One of Israel to cease from before us." Therefore the One of Israel says, "Because you despise this word, and in and perverseness, and rely on it, therefore this shall be to you like a breach ready to fall, swelling out in a high wall, whose breaking comes suddenly in an instant. He will break it as a is broken, breaking it in pieces without sparing, so that there won't be found among the broken pieces a piece good enough to take from the hearth, or to dip up water out of the cistern." For thus said , the One of Israel, "You will be in returning and rest. Your strength will be in quietness and in confidence." You refused, but you said, "No, for we will flee on horses;" therefore you will flee; and, "We will ride on the swift;" therefore those who pursue you will be swift. One thousand will flee at the threat of one. At the threat of five, you will flee until you are left like a beacon on the top of a mountain, and like a banner on a hill. Therefore will wait, that he may be to you; and therefore he will be exalted, that he may have mercy on you, for is a of . are all those who wait for him. For the people will in at . You will weep no more. He will surely be to you at the voice of your cry. When he hears you, he will answer you. Though may give you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, yet your teachers won't be hidden any more, but your eyes will see your teachers; and when you turn to , and when you turn to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, "This is . Walk in it." You shall defile the overlaying of your engraved of silver, and the plating of your of gold. You shall cast them away as an thing. You shall tell it, "Go away!" He will give the for , with which you will sow the ground; and bread of the increase of the ground will be rich and plentiful. In that day, your livestock will feed in large pastures. The oxen likewise and the young donkeys that till the ground will eat savory feed, which has been winnowed with the shovel and with the fork. There will be brooks and streams of water on every lofty mountain and on every high hill in the day of the great slaughter, when the towers fall. Moreover of the moon will be like of the sun, and of the sun will be seven times brighter, like of seven days, in the day that binds up the fracture of his people, and heals the wound they were struck with. Behold, name comes from far away, burning with his , and in thick rising smoke. His are full of . His is as a devouring . His breath is as an overflowing stream that reaches even to the neck, to sift the nations with the sieve of . A bridle that leads to will be in the jaws of the peoples. You will have a song, as in the night when a feast is kept, and gladness of , as when one goes with a flute to come to mountain, to Israel's . will cause his voice to be heard, and will show the descent of his arm, with the of his and the flame of a devouring , with a blast, storm, and hailstones. For through voice the will be dismayed. He will strike him with his . Every stroke of the of punishment, which will lay on him, will be with the sound of tambourines and harps. He will fight with them in battles, brandishing weapons. For his burning place has long been ready. Yes, it is prepared for the king. He has made its pyre deep and large with and much wood. breath, like a stream of sulfur, kindles it.
A public domain modern English translation, free to read and share. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · Under Assyria, 745 BC to 612 BC ›
Assyria at full stretch, deporting whole populations as policy. The northern kingdom is destroyed in 722 BC and Judah survives as a tribute-paying vassal.
- Assyria
- The first empire to run mass deportation as ordinary administration: move the leadership somewhere else, settle strangers in their place, and the province stops being a nation. It worked. Samaria fell in 722 BC and the northern tribes did not come back. Assyria also advertised its cruelty deliberately, carving flayings and impalements on palace walls where envoys would see them, because terror is cheaper than garrisons.
- Judah
- Survives by paying. Hezekiah rebels, Sennacherib takes forty-six Judean towns and besieges Jerusalem in 701 BC, and the city holds. The Assyrian account boasts of shutting Hezekiah up like a bird in a cage and pointedly does not claim to have taken the city, which is one of the more interesting silences in ancient records.
- Egypt
- The splintered reed of a staff that Assyria's field commander mocks Judah for leaning on. It promises help and cannot deliver, and Isaiah spends decades saying so. Assyria eventually invades and sacks Thebes.
- Further afield
- Greece is in its archaic period, founding colonies from Spain to the Black Sea. Rome is under kings. Assyria's own libraries are collecting the literature of Mesopotamia, which is how Gilgamesh survived to be read again in the nineteenth century.
All of Isaiah