Isaiah 19
19
Anarchy and Chaos and Killing!
1A Message concerning Egypt:
Watch this! God riding on a fast-moving cloud,
moving in on Egypt!
The god-idols of Egypt shudder and shake,
Egyptians paralyzed by panic.
2-4God says, “I’ll make Egyptian fight Egyptian,
brother fight brother, neighbor fight neighbor,
City fight city, kingdom fight kingdom—
anarchy and chaos and killing!
I’ll knock the wind out of the Egyptians.
They won’t know coming from going.
They’ll go to their god-idols for answers;
they’ll conjure ghosts and hold séances, desperate for answers.
But I’ll turn the Egyptians
over to a tyrant most cruel.
I’ll put them under the rule of a mean, merciless king.”
Decree of the Master, God-of-the-Angel-Armies.
5-10The River Nile will dry up,
the riverbed baked dry in the sun.
The canals will become stagnant and stink,
every stream touching the Nile dry up.
River vegetation will rot away
the banks of the Nile-baked clay,
The riverbed hard and smooth,
river grasses dried up and gone with the wind.
Fishermen will complain
that the fishing’s been ruined.
Textile workers will be out of work, all weavers
and workers in linen and cotton and wool
Dispirited, depressed in their forced idleness—
everyone who works for a living, jobless.
11-15The princes of Zoan are fools,
the advisors of Pharaoh stupid.
How could any of you dare tell Pharaoh,
“Trust me: I’m wise. I know what’s going on.
Why, I’m descended from the old wisdom of Egypt”?
There’s not a wise man or woman left in the country.
If there were, one of them would tell you
what God-of-the-Angel-Armies has in mind for Egypt.
As it is, the princes of Zoan are all fools
and the princes of Memphis, idiots.
The honored pillars of your society
have led Egypt into detours and dead ends.
God has scrambled their brains,
Egypt’s become a falling-down-in-his-own-vomit drunk.
Egypt’s hopeless, past helping,
a senile, doddering old fool.
* * *
16-17On that Day, Egyptians will be like hysterical schoolgirls, screaming at the first hint of action from God-of-the-Angel-Armies. Little Judah will strike terror in Egyptians! Say “Judah” to an Egyptian and see panic. The word triggers fear of the God-of-the-Angel-Armies’ plan against Egypt.
18On that Day, more than one city in Egypt will learn to speak the language of faith and promise to follow God-of-the-Angel-Armies. One of these cities will be honored with the title “City of the Sun.”
19-22On that Day, there will be a place of worship to God in the center of Egypt and a monument to God at its border. It will show how the God-of-the-Angel-Armies has helped the Egyptians. When they cry out in prayer to God because of oppressors, he’ll send them help, a savior who will keep them safe and take care of them. God will openly show himself to the Egyptians and they’ll get to know him on that Day. They’ll worship him seriously with sacrifices and burnt offerings. They’ll make vows and keep them. God will wound Egypt, first hit and then heal. Egypt will come back to God, and God will listen to their prayers and heal them, heal them from head to toe.
23On that Day, there will be a highway all the way from Egypt to Assyria: Assyrians will have free range in Egypt and Egyptians in Assyria. No longer rivals, they’ll worship together, Egyptians and Assyrians!
24-25On that Day, Israel will take its place alongside Egypt and Assyria, sharing the blessing from the center. God-of-the-Angel-Armies, who blessed Israel, will generously bless them all: “Blessed be Egypt, my people! . . . Blessed be Assyria, work of my hands! . . . Blessed be Israel, my heritage!”
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Isaiah 19: MSG
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THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. All rights reserved. Used by permission of NavPress. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers.
Yeshayah (Isaiah) 19
19
1The message concerning Mitsrayim. See, יהוה is riding on a swift cloud, and He shall come into Mitsrayim. And the idols of Mitsrayim shall tremble at His presence, and the heart of Mitsrayim melt in its midst.
2“And I shall stir up Mitsrites against Mitsrites, and they shall fight, each one against his brother, and each one against his neighbour, city against city, reign against reign.
3“And the spirit of Mitsrayim shall vanish within them, and I destroy their counsel. And they shall seek the idols and the mutterers, the mediums and the sorcerers.
4“And I shall deliver the Mitsrites into the hand of a cruel master, and a fierce sovereign to rule over them,” declares the Master, יהוה of hosts.
5And waters shall fail from the sea, and the river wasted and dried up.
6And the rivers shall stink, and the streams shall be weak and dried up. Reeds and rushes shall wither.
7Bare places by the River, by the mouth of the River, and every sown field by the River shall wither. It shall be driven away, and be no more.
8And the fishermen shall lament, and all those who cast hooks into the River shall mourn, and they who spread nets on the waters shall pine away.
9And those who work in fine flax, and those who weave fine fabric shall become ashamed.
10And its foundations shall be crushed, all the wage workers grieved in being.
11The princes of Tso‛an are only fools; the counsel of Pharaoh’s wise ones has become senseless. How do you say to Pharaoh, “I am the son of the wise, the son of ancient sovereigns?”
12Where are they? Where are your wise men? Let them show you, and let them know what יהוה of hosts has counselled against Mitsrayim.
13The princes of Tso‛an have become fools, the princes of Noph are deceived. They, the corner-stone of her tribes, have led Mitsrayim astray.
14יהוה has mixed a perverse spirit in her midst. And they have led Mitsrayim astray in all her work, as a drunkard strays in his vomit.
15And there is no work for Mitsrayim, by either head or tail, palm branch or bulrush.
16In that day Mitsrayim shall become like women, and tremble and fear because of the waving of the hand of יהוה of hosts, which He waves over it.
17And the land of Yehuḏah shall be a fear to Mitsrayim, everyone who mentions it fears for himself, because of the counsel of יהוה of hosts which He has counselled against it.
18In that day five cities in the land of Mitsrayim shall speak the language of Kena‛an and swear by יהוה of hosts; one is called the City of Destruction.
19In that day a slaughter-place to יהוה shall be in the midst of the land of Mitsrayim, and a standing column to יהוה at its border.
20And it shall be for a sign and for a witness to יהוה of hosts in the land of Mitsrayim. When they cry to יהוה because of the oppressors, He sends them a Saviour and a great one,#Hebrew raḇ from the root raḇaḇ or riḇ. and shall deliver them.
21And יהוה shall be known to Mitsrayim, and the Mitsrites shall know יהוה in that day, and make slaughtering and meal offering, and shall make a vow to יהוה and pay it.
22And יהוה shall smite Mitsrayim, smite it and heal it. And they shall turn to יהוה, and He shall hear them and heal them.
23In that day there shall be a highway from Mitsrayim to Ashshur, and Ashshur shall come into Mitsrayim and Mitsrayim into Ashshur, and Mitsrayim shall serve with Ashshur.
24In that day Yisra’ĕl shall be one of three with Mitsrayim and Ashshur, even a blessing in the midst of the earth,
25whom יהוה of hosts shall bless, saying, “Blessed is Mitsrayim My people, and Ashshur the work of My hands, and Yisra’ĕl My inheritance.”
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