Isaiah

¹ The vision that Isaiah son of Amoz saw regarding Judah and Jerusalem during the times of the kings of Judah: Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah.

² Listen to God's case: "I had children and raised them well, and they turned on me.

³ the mule knows the hand that feeds him, But not Israel. My people don't know up from down.

⁴ staggering under their guilt-baggage, Gang of miscreants, band of vandals— My people have walked out on me, their God, turned their backs on The Holy of Israel, walked off and never looked back.

⁵ when you just keep to your bullheaded ways? You keep beating your heads against brick walls. Everything within you protests against you.

⁶ nothing's working right. Wounds and bruises and running sores— untended, unwashed, unbandaged.

⁷ your cities burned down. Your land is destroyed by outsiders while you watch, reduced to rubble by barbarians.

⁸ like a tumbledown shack on a dead-end street, Like a tarpaper shanty on the wrong side of the tracks, like a sinking ship abandoned by the rats.

⁹ we'd be as desolate as Sodom, doomed just like Gomorrah.

¹⁰ you Sodom-schooled leaders. Receive God's revelation, you Gomorrah-schooled people.

¹¹ God's asking. "Don't you think I've had my fill of burnt sacrifices, rams and plump grain-fed calves? Don't you think I've had my fill of blood from bulls, lambs, and goats?

¹² who ever gave you the idea of acting like this, Running here and there, doing this and that— all this sheer commotion in the place provided for worship?

¹³ I can't stand your trivial religious games: Monthly conferences, weekly Sabbaths, special meetings— meetings, meetings, meetings—I can't stand one more!

¹⁴ You've worn me out! I'm sick of your religion, religion, religion, while you go right on sinning.

¹⁵ I'll be looking the other way. No matter how long or loud or often you pray, I'll not be listening. And do you know why? Because you've been tearing people to pieces, and your hands are bloody.

¹⁶ Clean up your act. Sweep your lives clean of your evildoings so I don't have to look at them any longer. Say no to wrong.

¹⁷ Work for justice. Help the down-and-out. Stand up for the homeless. Go to bat for the defenseless.

¹⁸ This is God's Message: "If your sins are blood-red, they'll be snow-white. If they're red like crimson, they'll be like wool.

¹⁹ you'll feast like kings.

²⁰ you'll die like dogs." That's right. God says so.

²¹ has become a whore! She was once all justice, everyone living as good neighbors, And now they're all at one another's throats.

²² Your wine is watered down.

²³ who keep company with crooks. They sell themselves to the highest bidder and grab anything not nailed down. They never stand up for the homeless, never stick up for the defenseless.

²⁴ the Strong One of Israel: "This is it! I'll get my oppressors off my back. I'll get back at my enemies.

²⁵ purge the junk from your life, clean you up.

²⁶ just like it was back in the beginning. Then you'll be renamed City-That-Treats-People-Right, the True-Blue City."

²⁷ God's right actions will restore her penitents.

²⁸ a dead end for those who walk out on God.

²⁹ will leave you looking mighty foolish, All that fooling around in god and goddess gardens that you thought was the latest thing.

³⁰ with all its leaves falling off, Like an unwatered garden, withered and brown.

³¹ and his 'work,' the spark that starts the fire That exposes man and work both as nothing but cinders and smoke."