The Judgment of the Nations
34 You nations, come here and listen;
you peoples, pay attention!(A)
Let the earth hear, and all that fills it,
the world and all that comes from it.(B)
2 The Lord is angry with all the nations—
furious with all their armies.(C)
He will set them apart for destruction,(D)
giving them over to slaughter.
3 Their slain will be thrown out,
and the stench of their corpses will rise;(E)
the mountains will flow[a] with their blood.(F)
4 All[b] the heavenly bodies(G) will dissolve.
The skies will roll up like a scroll,(H)
and their stars will all wither
as leaves wither on the vine,
and foliage on the fig tree.(I)
The Judgment of Edom
5 When My sword has drunk its fill[c](J) in the heavens,
it will then come down on Edom(K)
and on the people I have set apart for destruction.
6 The Lord’s sword is covered with blood.
It drips with fat,
with the blood of lambs and goats,
with the fat of the kidneys of rams.(L)
For the Lord has a sacrifice in Bozrah,(M)
a great slaughter in the land of Edom.
7 The wild oxen will be struck[d] down with them,
and young bulls with the mighty bulls.
Their land will be soaked with[e] blood,
and their soil will be saturated with fat.
8 For the Lord has a day of vengeance,(N)
a time of paying back Edom
for its hostility against Zion.
9 Edom’s streams will be turned into pitch,
her soil into sulfur;(O)
her land will become burning pitch.
10 It will never go out—day or night.
Its smoke will go up forever.(P)
It will be desolate, from generation to generation;
no one will pass through it forever and ever.(Q)
11 The desert owl[f] and the screech owl[g] will possess it,
and the great owl and the raven will dwell there.(R)
The Lord will stretch out a measuring line
and a plumb line over her
for her destruction and chaos.(S)
12 No nobles will be left to proclaim a king,
and all her princes will come to nothing.
13 Her palaces will be overgrown with thorns;
her fortified cities, with thistles and briers.(T)
She will become a dwelling for jackals,
an abode[h] for ostriches.(U)
14 The desert creatures will meet hyenas,
and one wild goat will call to another.
Indeed, the screech owl will stay there
and will find a resting place for herself.
15 The sand partridge[i] will make her nest there;
she will lay and hatch her eggs
and will gather her brood under her shadow.
Indeed, the birds of prey will gather there,
each with its mate.(V)
16 Search and read the scroll of the Lord:(W)
Not one of them will be missing,
none will be lacking its mate,
because He has ordered it by my[j] mouth,
and He will gather them by His Spirit.
17 He has ordained a lot for them;
His hand allotted their portion with a measuring line.
They will possess it forever;(X)
they will dwell in it from generation to generation.
Footnotes
- Isaiah 34:3 Or melt, or dissolve
- Isaiah 34:4 DSS read And the valleys will be split, and all
- Isaiah 34:5 DSS read sword will appear
- Isaiah 34:7 Or will go
- Isaiah 34:7 Or will drink its fill of
- Isaiah 34:11 Or The pelican
- Isaiah 34:11 Or the hedgehog
- Isaiah 34:13 DSS, LXX, Syr, Tg; MT reads jackals, grass
- Isaiah 34:15 Or The arrow snake, or The owl
- Isaiah 34:16 Some Hb mss; other Hb mss, DSS, Syr, Tg read His
Cross references
- 34:1 : Ps 49:1; Is 1:2; 41:1; 43:9; 45:20
- 34:1 : Ps 24:1; Is 6:3; 42:5
- 34:2 : Is 13:5; Jr 10:10; 50:13
- 34:2 : Jos 6:21; 1Sm 15:3; Is 11:5; 24:1, 6; 43:28
- 34:3 : Is 14:21; 18:6; Ezk 39:17; Jl 2:10; Am 4:10; Rv 19:17-19
- 34:3 : Ps 46:2-3
- 34:4 : 2Kg 17:16; 21:3, 5; 23:4-5
- 34:4 : Rv 6:12-14
- 34:4 : Ps 102:25-27; Is 13:10; 51:6; Ezk 32:7-8; Jl 3:15; Mt 24:29; Mk 13:24-25; 2Pt 3:10, 12
- 34:5 : Dt 32:41-43; Jr 46:10; Ezk 21:3-5
- 34:5 : Nm 20:14-21; Is 63:1; Jr 49:7-8, 20; Ezk 25:12-14; 35:1-15; Jl 3:19; Am 1:11-12; Ob 1-14; Mal 1:4
- 34:6 : Is 25:6; 30:32; Jr 46:10; 51:40; Ezk 39:17; Zph 1:7-9
- 34:6 : Gn 36:33; Is 63:1; Jr 49:13, 22
- 34:8 : Is 13:6; 35:4; 47:3; 61:2; 63:4
- 34:9 : Gn 19:24; Dt 29:23; Ps 11:6; Is 30:33; Ezk 38:22
- 34:10 : Is 1:31; 66:24; Rv 14:11; 19:3
- 34:10 : Is 13:20-22; Ezk 29:11; Mal 1:3-4
- 34:11 : Is 13:21-22; 14:23; Zph 2:14
- 34:11 : 2Kg 21:13; Is 24:10; Lm 2:8
- 34:13 : Is 32:13
- 34:13 : Ps 44:19; Is 13:22; Jr 9:11; 10:22; Mal 1:3
- 34:15 : Dt 14:13
- 34:16 : Ps 40:7; 139:16; Is 8:16; 30:8; Dn 7:10; Mal 3:16; Rv 20:12
- 34:17 : Nm 24:18