Isaiah

¹ and his leaders will carry out justice.

² provide safe cover in stormy weather. Each will be cool running water in parched land, a huge granite outcrop giving shade in the desert.

³ anyone who listens will hear.

⁴ the tongue-tied will speak with eloquence.

⁵ nor crooks be rewarded with fame.

⁶ thinking up new ways to do mischief. They leave a wake of wrecked lives and lies about God, Turning their backs on the homeless hungry, ignoring those dying of thirst in the streets.

⁷ inventive in sin and scandal, Exploiting the poor with scams and lies, unmoved by the victimized poor.

⁸ and stand for what is noble.

⁹ Listen to me! Indulgent, indolent women, listen closely to what I have to say.

¹⁰ you'll be shaken out of your lazy lives. The grape harvest will fail, and there'll be no fruit on the trees.

¹¹ Get serious, you pampered dolls! Strip down and discard your silk fineries. Put on funeral clothes.

¹² the failed vintage.

¹³ that grow nothing but thistles and thornbushes. Cry tears, real tears, for the happy homes no longer happy, the merry city no longer merry.

¹⁴ the bustling city quiet as a morgue, The emptied parks and playgrounds taken over by wild animals, delighted with their new home.

¹⁵ down on us from above And the badlands desert grows crops and the fertile fields become forests.

¹⁶ Right will build a home in the fertile field.

¹⁷ and the progeny of Right: quiet lives and endless trust.

¹⁸ in safe houses, in quiet gardens.

¹⁹ the city showing off your power leveled.

²⁰ planting well-watered fields and gardens, with your farm animals grazing freely.