World English Bible · Babylon and the exile
Isaiah 58
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"Cry aloud! Don't spare! Lift up your voice like a ! Declare to my people their , and to the house of their . Yet they seek me daily, and delight to know my ways. As a nation that did , and didn't forsake the of their , they ask of me judgments. They delight to draw near to . 'Why have we ,' they say, 'and you don't see? Why have we afflicted our , and you don't notice?' "Behold, in the day of your you find pleasure, and oppress all your laborers. Behold, you for strife and contention, and to strike with the fist of wickedness. You don't today so as to make your voice to be heard on high. Is this the that I have chosen? A day for a man to humble his ? Is it to his head like a reed, and to spread under himself? Will you call this a , and an acceptable day to ? "Isn't this the that I have chosen: to the bonds of wickedness, to undo the straps of the , to let the oppressed go free, and that you break every ? Isn't it to distribute your bread to the hungry, and that you bring who are cast out to your house? When you see the , that you cover him; and that you not hide yourself from your own ? Then your will break out as the morning, and your healing will appear quickly; then your shall go before you, and will be your rear guard. Then you will call, and will answer. You will cry for help, and he will say, 'Here I am.' "If you take away from among you the , finger pointing, and speaking wickedly; and if you pour out your to the hungry, and satisfy , then your will rise , and your obscurity will be as the noonday; and will guide you continually, satisfy your in dry places, and make your bones strong. You will be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water whose waters don't fail. Those who will be of you will build the old waste places. You will raise up the foundations of many generations. You will be called Repairer of the Breach, Restorer of with Dwellings. "If you turn away your foot from the , from doing your pleasure on my day, and call the a delight, and the of honorable, and it, not doing your own ways, nor finding your own pleasure, nor speaking your own words, then you will delight yourself in , and I will make you to ride on the of the earth, and I will feed you with the heritage of your ;" for has spoken it.
A public domain modern English translation, free to read and share. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · Babylon and the exile, 612 BC to 539 BC ›
Babylon replaces Assyria, Jerusalem and its temple are destroyed in 586 BC, and the leadership of Judah lives in Mesopotamia without a king, a temple, or a country.
- Babylon
- Nebuchadnezzar II rebuilds the city on a scale meant to be seen from a distance: the Ishtar Gate in glazed blue brick, the processional way, the ziggurat, and gardens later counted among the wonders of the world. Babylonian tablets record rations issued to the captive king Jehoiachin of Judah by name, which is one of the tidier points of contact between the Bible and the archives.
- Egypt
- Briefly resurgent. Pharaoh Neco marches north, kills King Josiah at Megiddo, and installs and deposes kings in Jerusalem, until Babylon beats him decisively at Carchemish in 605 BC. Jeremiah spends his career saying that betting on Egypt is suicide, and is proved right.
- Judah
- Deported in stages, then destroyed. The temple is burned, the walls broken, and the leadership marched to Mesopotamia. What happens next is one of the strangest survivals in history: a people keeps its identity without land, king, or sanctuary, and comes out of it with its scriptures more central than before.
- Further afield
- An extraordinary century for ideas everywhere at once. Thales and the first Greek philosophers, Solon's reforms at Athens, the Buddha in India, Confucius and Lao Tzu in China, and Zoroaster in Persia all fall within a few generations of the exile.
All of Isaiah