Isaiah 22
22
A Country of Cowards
1-3A Message concerning the Valley of Vision:
What’s going on here anyway?
All this partying and noisemaking,
Shouting and cheering in the streets,
the city noisy with celebrations!
You have no brave soldiers to honor,
no combat heroes to be proud of.
Your leaders were all cowards,
captured without even lifting a sword,
A country of cowards
captured escaping the battle.
You Looked, but You Never Looked to Him
4-8a In the midst of the shouting, I said, “Let me alone.
Let me grieve by myself.
Don’t tell me it’s going to be all right.
These people are doomed. It’s not all right.”
For the Master, God-of-the-Angel-Armies,
is bringing a day noisy with mobs of people,
Jostling and stampeding in the Valley of Vision,
knocking down walls
and hollering to the mountains, “Attack! Attack!”
Old enemies Elam and Kir arrive armed to the teeth—
weapons and chariots and cavalry.
Your fine valleys are noisy with war,
chariots and cavalry charging this way and that.
God has left Judah exposed and defenseless.
8b-11 You assessed your defenses that Day, inspected your arsenal of weapons in the Forest Armory. You found the weak places in the city walls that needed repair. You secured the water supply at the Lower Pool. You took an inventory of the houses in Jerusalem and tore down some to get bricks to fortify the city wall. You built a large cistern to ensure plenty of water.
You looked and looked and looked, but you never looked to him who gave you this city, never once consulted the One who has long had plans for this city.
12-13The Master, God-of-the-Angel-Armies,
called out on that Day,
Called for a day of repentant tears,
called you to dress in somber clothes of mourning.
But what do you do? You throw a party!
Eating and drinking and dancing in the streets!
You barbecue bulls and sheep, and throw a huge feast—
slabs of meat, kegs of beer.
“Seize the day! Eat and drink!
Tomorrow we die!”
14 God-of-the-Angel-Armies whispered to me his verdict on this frivolity: “You’ll pay for this outrage until the day you die.” The Master, God-of-the-Angel-Armies, says so.
The Key of the Davidic Heritage
15-19The Master, God-of-the-Angel-Armies, spoke: “Come. Go to this steward, Shebna, who is in charge of all the king’s affairs, and tell him: What’s going on here? You’re an outsider here and yet you act like you own the place, make a big, fancy tomb for yourself where everyone can see it, making sure everyone will think you’re important. God is about to sack you, to throw you to the dogs. He’ll grab you by the hair, swing you round and round dizzyingly, and then let you go, sailing through the air like a ball, until you’re out of sight. Where you’ll land, nobody knows. And there you’ll die, and all the stuff you’ve collected heaped on your grave. You’ve disgraced your master’s house! You’re fired—and good riddance!
20-24“On that Day I’ll replace Shebna. I will call my servant Eliakim son of Hilkiah. I’ll dress him in your robe. I’ll put your belt on him. I’ll give him your authority. He’ll be a father-leader to Jerusalem and the government of Judah. I’ll give him the key of the Davidic heritage. He’ll have the run of the place—open any door and keep it open, lock any door and keep it locked. I’ll pound him like a nail into a solid wall. He’ll secure the Davidic tradition. Everything will hang on him—not only the fate of Davidic descendants but also the detailed daily operations of the house, including cups and cutlery.
25“And then the Day will come,” says God-of-the-Angel-Armies, “when that nail will come loose and fall out, break loose from that solid wall—and everything hanging on it will go with it.” That’s what will happen. God says so.
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Isaiah 22: MSG
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THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. All rights reserved. Used by permission of NavPress. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers.
Yeshayah (Isaiah) 22
22
1The message concerning the Valley of Vision. What troubles you now, that you have all gone up to the house-tops,
2you who are filled with turmoils, a noisy city, a city of revelry? Your slain are not slain with the sword, nor the dead in battle.
3All your rulers have fled together; without a bow they were taken captive. All who are found in you are bound together, who have fled from afar.
4Therefore I said, “Look away from me, let me weep bitterly. Do not try to comfort me because of the ravaging of the daughter of my people.”
5For it is a day of uproar and treading down and perplexity by the Master יהוה of hosts in the Valley of Vision – breaking down of a wall and of crying to the mountain.
6And Ěylam bore the quiver with chariots of men and horsemen, and Qir bared the shield.
7And it shall be that your choicest valleys shall be filled with chariots, and the horsemen shall take up positions at the gate.
8Then He removed the covering of Yehuḏah. And you looked in that day to the weapons of the House of the Forest.
9And you saw the breaches of the city of Dawiḏ, that it was great. And you gathered together the waters of the lower pool.
10And you counted the houses of Yerushalayim, and the houses you broke down to strengthen the wall.
11And you dug a ditch between the two walls for the water of the old pool. But you have not looked to its Maker, nor have you seen Him who fashioned it long ago.
12And in that day the Master יהוה of hosts called for weeping and for mourning, for baldness and for girding with sackcloth.
13Then see! Joy and gladness, killing oxen and slaying sheep, eating meat and drinking wine, “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die!”
14And it was revealed in my hearing by יהוה of hosts, “For this crookedness shall certainly not be pardoned until you die,” said the Master יהוה of hosts.
15Thus said the Master יהוה of hosts, “Go, come to this steward, to Sheḇnah, who is over the house, and say,
16What have you here, and whom have you here, that you have hewn a burial-site here, as he who hews himself a burial-site on high, inscribing#Engraving. a resting place for himself in a rock?
17See, יהוה is hurling you away, O man, and is firmly grasping you,
18rolling you up tightly like a ball, into a wide land. There you are to die, and there your esteemed chariots are to be the shame of your master’s house.
19And I shall drive you from your office, and you shall be ousted from your position.
20And it shall be in that day, that I shall call My servant Elyaqim son of Ḥilqiyahu.
21And I shall put your robe on him, and strengthen him with your girdle, and give your authority into his hand. And he shall be a father to the inhabitants of Yerushalayim and to the house of Yehuḏah.
22And I shall place the key of the house of Dawiḏ on his shoulder. And he shall open, and no one shuts; and shall shut, and no one opens.
23And I shall fasten him like a peg in a steadfast place, and he shall become a throne of esteem to his father’s house.
24And they shall hang on him all the weight of his father’s house, the offspring and the offshoots, all vessels of small quantity, from the cups to all the jars.
25In that day,’ declares יהוה of hosts, ‘the peg that is fastened in the steadfast place shall be removed and be cut down and fall, and the burden that was on it shall be cut off. For יהוה has spoken.’ ”
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