Isaiah 34
Contemporary English Version
The Nations Will Be Judged
34 Everyone of every nation,
the entire earth,
and all its creatures,
come here and listen!
2 The Lord is terribly angry
with the nations;
he has condemned them
to be slaughtered.
3 Their dead bodies will be left
to rot and stink;
their blood will flow
down the mountains.
4 (A) Each star[a] will disappear—
the sky will roll up
like a scroll.[b]
Everything in the sky
will dry up and wilt
like leaves on a vine
or fruit on a tree.
Trouble for Edom
5 (B) After the sword of the Lord
has done what it wants
to the skies above,[c]
it will come down on Edom,
the nation that the Lord
has doomed for destruction.
6 The sword of the Lord
is covered with blood
from lambs and goats,
together with fat
from kidneys of rams.
This is because the Lord
will slaughter many people
and make a sacrifice of them
in the city of Bozrah
and everywhere else
in Edom.
7 Edom's leaders are wild oxen.
They are powerful bulls,
but they will die
with the others.
Their country will be soaked
with their own blood,
and its soil made fertile
with their own fat.
8 The Lord has chosen
the year and the day,
when he will take revenge
and come to Zion's defense.
9 Edom's streams will turn into tar
and its soil into sulfur—
then the whole country
will go up in flames.
10 (C) It will burn night and day
and never stop smoking.
Edom will be a desert,
generation after generation;
no one will ever travel
through that land.
11 Owls, hawks, and wild animals[d]
will make it their home.
God will leave it in ruins,
merely a pile of rocks.
The End of Edom
12 Edom will be called
“Kingdom of Nothing.”
Its rulers will also be nothing.
13 Its palaces and fortresses
will be covered with thorns;
only wolves and ostriches
will make their home there.
14 Wildcats and hyenas
will hunt together,
demons will scream to demons,
and creatures of the night
will live among the ruins.
15 Owls will nest there
to raise their young
among its shadows,[e]
while families of vultures
circle around.
16 In
you can search and find
where it is written,
“The Lord brought together
all of his creatures
by the power of his Spirit.
Not one is missing.”
17 The Lord has decided
where they each should live;
they will be there forever,
generation after generation.
Footnotes
- 34.4 star: Stars were worshiped as gods.
- 34.4 scroll: A roll of paper or specially prepared leather used for writing on.
- 34.5 has done … above: The Standard Hebrew Text; the Dead Sea Scrolls “appears in the skies above.”
- 34.11 Owls … animals: One possible meaning for the difficult Hebrew text.
- 34.15 Owls … shadows: One possible meaning for the difficult Hebrew text.
- 34.16 The Book of the Lord: The book that Isaiah refers to is unknown.
Isaiah 34
King James Version
34 Come near, ye nations, to hear; and hearken, ye people: let the earth hear, and all that is therein; the world, and all things that come forth of it.
2 For the indignation of the Lord is upon all nations, and his fury upon all their armies: he hath utterly destroyed them, he hath delivered them to the slaughter.
3 Their slain also shall be cast out, and their stink shall come up out of their carcases, and the mountains shall be melted with their blood.
4 And all the host of heaven shall be dissolved, and the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll: and all their host shall fall down, as the leaf falleth off from the vine, and as a falling fig from the fig tree.
5 For my sword shall be bathed in heaven: behold, it shall come down upon Idumea, and upon the people of my curse, to judgment.
6 The sword of the Lord is filled with blood, it is made fat with fatness, and with the blood of lambs and goats, with the fat of the kidneys of rams: for the Lord hath a sacrifice in Bozrah, and a great slaughter in the land of Idumea.
7 And the unicorns shall come down with them, and the bullocks with the bulls; and their land shall be soaked with blood, and their dust made fat with fatness.
8 For it is the day of the Lord's vengeance, and the year of recompences for the controversy of Zion.
9 And the streams thereof shall be turned into pitch, and the dust thereof into brimstone, and the land thereof shall become burning pitch.
10 It shall not be quenched night nor day; the smoke thereof shall go up for ever: from generation to generation it shall lie waste; none shall pass through it for ever and ever.
11 But the cormorant and the bittern shall possess it; the owl also and the raven shall dwell in it: and he shall stretch out upon it the line of confusion, and the stones of emptiness.
12 They shall call the nobles thereof to the kingdom, but none shall be there, and all her princes shall be nothing.
13 And thorns shall come up in her palaces, nettles and brambles in the fortresses thereof: and it shall be an habitation of dragons, and a court for owls.
14 The wild beasts of the desert shall also meet with the wild beasts of the island, and the satyr shall cry to his fellow; the screech owl also shall rest there, and find for herself a place of rest.
15 There shall the great owl make her nest, and lay, and hatch, and gather under her shadow: there shall the vultures also be gathered, every one with her mate.
16 Seek ye out of the book of the Lord, and read: no one of these shall fail, none shall want her mate: for my mouth it hath commanded, and his spirit it hath gathered them.
17 And he hath cast the lot for them, and his hand hath divided it unto them by line: they shall possess it for ever, from generation to generation shall they dwell therein.
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