The Hebrew Prophets

Woe to you, O destroyer never destroyed, O traitor never betrayed! When you have finished destroying, you will be destroyed. When you have finished betraying, you will be betrayed.

O LORD, be gracious to us! We wait for You. Be our strength every morning and our salvation in time of trouble.

The peoples flee the thunder of Your voice; the nations scatter when You rise.

Your spoil, O nations, is gathered as by locusts; like a swarm of locusts men sweep over it.

The LORD is exalted, for He dwells on high; He has filled Zion with justice and righteousness.

He will be the sure foundation for your times, a storehouse of salvation, wisdom, and knowledge. The fear of the LORD is Zion’s treasure.

Behold, their valiant ones cry aloud in the streets; the envoys of peace weep bitterly.

The highways are deserted; travel has ceased. The treaty has been broken, the witnesses are despised, and human life is disregarded.

The land mourns and languishes; Lebanon is ashamed and decayed. Sharon is like a desert; Bashan and Carmel shake off their leaves.

“Now I will arise,” says the LORD. “Now I will lift Myself up. Now I will be exalted.

You conceive chaff; you give birth to stubble. Your breath is a fire that will consume you.

The peoples will be burned to ashes, like thorns cut down and set ablaze.

You who are far off, hear what I have done; you who are near, acknowledge My might.”

The sinners in Zion are afraid; trembling grips the ungodly: “Who of us can dwell with a consuming fire? Who of us can dwell with everlasting flames?”

He who walks righteously and speaks with sincerity, who refuses gain from extortion, whose hand never takes a bribe, who stops his ears against murderous plots and shuts his eyes tightly against evil—

he will dwell on the heights; the mountain fortress will be his refuge; his food will be provided and his water assured.

Your eyes will see the King in His beauty and behold a land that stretches afar.

Your mind will ponder the former terror: “Where is he who tallies? Where is he who weighs? Where is he who counts the towers?”

You will no longer see the insolent, a people whose speech is unintelligible, who stammer in a language you cannot understand.

Look upon Zion, the city of our appointed feasts. Your eyes will see Jerusalem, a peaceful pasture, a tent that does not wander; its tent pegs will not be pulled up, nor will any of its cords be broken.

But there the Majestic One, our LORD, will be for us a place of rivers and wide canals, where no galley with oars will row, and no majestic vessel will pass.

For the LORD is our Judge, the LORD is our lawgiver, the LORD is our King. It is He who will save us.

Your ropes are slack; they cannot secure the mast or spread the sail. Then an abundance of spoils will be divided, and even the lame will carry off plunder.

And no resident of Zion will say, “I am sick.” The people who dwell there will be forgiven of iniquity.

Come near, O nations, to listen; pay attention, O peoples. Let the earth hear, and all that fills it, the world and all that springs from it.