Isaiah 51

1. “Hearken to Me, you who follow after righteousness, you who seek the LORD: Look to the Rock from which you were cut, and to the hole of the pit from which you were dug.

2. Look to Abraham your father, and to Sarah who bore you; for I called him alone, and blessed him, and made him many.”

3. For the LORD shall comfort Zion; He will comfort all her waste places; and He will make her wilderness like Eden, and her desert like the garden of the LORD. Joy and gladness shall be found in it, thanksgiving and the voice of melody.

4. “Hearken to Me, My people; and give ear to Me, O My nation; for instruction shall proceed from Me, and I will make My justice as a light to the people.

5. My righteousness is near; My salvation has gone out, and My arms shall judge the people; the isles shall wait upon Me, and on My arm they shall trust.

6. Lift up your eyes to the heavens, and look upon the earth beneath; for the heavens shall vanish away like smoke, and the earth shall become old like a garment; and its inhabitants shall die in the same way. But My salvation shall be forever, and My righteousness shall not be abolished.

7. Hearken to Me, you who know righteousness, the people in whose heart is My law; do not fear the reproach of men, nor be afraid of their revilings;

8. For the moth shall eat them up like a garment, and the worm shall eat them like wool; but My righteousness shall be forever, and My salvation from generation to generation.”

9. Awake! Awake! Put on strength, O arm of the LORD. Awake, as in the ancient days, in the generations of old. Was it not You Who cut Rahab into pieces, piercing the serpent?

10. Was it not You Who dried up the sea, the waters of the great deep; Who made the depths of the sea a way for the redeemed to pass over?

11. Therefore the redeemed of the LORD shall return and come with singing into Zion; and everlasting joy shall be upon their head. Gladness and joy shall overtake them; sorrow and mourning shall flee away.

12. “I, even I, am He Who comforts you. Who are you, that you should be afraid of a man that shall die, or of the son of man who is made as grass?

13. And you forget the LORD your Maker, Who has stretched out the heavens and laid the foundations of the earth. And you dread continually, every day because of the fury of the oppressor, as if he were ready to destroy. And where is the fury of the oppressor?

14. The captive exile will soon be set free, he will not die in the dungeon nor will he lack his bread.

15. But I am the LORD your God, Who divided the sea, so that its waves roared (the LORD of hosts is His name).

16. And I have put My words in your mouth, and I have covered you in the shadow of My hand, that I may plant the heavens and lay the foundations of the earth, and say to Zion, ‘You are My people.’ ”

17. Awake! Awake! Rise up, O Jerusalem, who drank the cup of His fury from the hand of the LORD; you have drunk of the cup of trembling to the dregs, and wrung them out.

18. There is no guide for her among all the sons she has borne; and none takes her by the hand of all the sons that she has brought up.

19. These two things have come to you, who shall be sorry for you? Desolation, and destruction, and the famine, and the sword. By whom shall I comfort you?

20. Your sons have fainted, they lie at the head of all the streets like a wild antelope in a net, filled with the fury of the LORD, the rebuke of your God.

21.Therefore now hear this, afflicted one, and drunken, but not with wine.

22. Thus says your Lord, the LORD, and your God Who defends His people, “Behold, I have taken the cup of trembling from your hand, even the dregs of the cup of My fury; you shall never drink of it again.

23. But I will put it into the hand of those who afflict you, who have said to your soul, ‘Bow down so that we may walk over you;’ and you laid your back like the ground, even like the street to those who walk over.”