Isaiah 21:9-12
The Message
6-9 The Master told me, “Go, post a lookout.
Have him report whatever he spots.
When he sees horses and wagons in battle formation,
lines of donkeys and columns of camels,
Tell him to keep his ear to the ground,
note every whisper, every rumor.”
Just then, the lookout shouted,
“I’m at my post, Master,
Sticking to my post day after day
and all through the night!
I watched them come,
the horses and wagons in battle formation.
I heard them call out the war news in headlines:
‘Babylon fallen! Fallen!
And all its precious god-idols
smashed to pieces on the ground.’”
10 Dear Israel, you’ve been through a lot,
you’ve been put through the mill.
The good news I get from God-of-the-Angel-Armies,
the God of Israel, I now pass on to you.
* * *
11-12 A Message concerning Edom:
A voice calls to me
from the Seir mountains in Edom,
“Night watchman! How long till daybreak?
How long will this night last?”
The night watchman calls back,
“Morning’s coming,
But for now it’s still night.
If you ask me again, I’ll give the same answer.”
* * *
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Isaiah 21:9-11
New International Version
9 Look, here comes a man in a chariot(A)
with a team of horses.
And he gives back the answer:
‘Babylon(B) has fallen,(C) has fallen!
All the images of its gods(D)
lie shattered(E) on the ground!’”
10 My people who are crushed on the threshing floor,(F)
I tell you what I have heard
from the Lord Almighty,
from the God of Israel.
A Prophecy Against Edom
11 A prophecy against Dumah[a]:(G)
Someone calls to me from Seir,(H)
“Watchman, what is left of the night?
Watchman, what is left of the night?”
Footnotes
- Isaiah 21:11 Dumah, a wordplay on Edom, means silence or stillness.
Copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson
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