Isaiah 24 Behold the Lord is about to destroy this inhabited land! He will lay it waste and uncover the face thereof and scatter abroad them who dwell therein.

Thomson⁽ⁱ⁾ ¹ Behold the Lord is about to destroy this inhabited land! He will lay it waste and uncover the face thereof and scatter abroad them who dwell therein. ² And it shall be as with the people so with the priest; as with the servant, so with the master; as with the maid, so with the mistress; as with the buyer, so with the seller, as with the lender, so with the borrower; as with the debtor, so with the creditor. ³ With destruction the land will be destroyed, and with spoiling this land will be ransacked: for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken this. ⁴ The land mourned and this empire is destroyed; the lofty people of the land mourned. ⁵ As for the land, it transgressed by means of its inhabitants. Because they transgressed the law, and changed the institutions; the everlasting covenant, ⁶ therefore a curse devoureth the land. Because they who dwell therein have sinned, therefore the inhabitants of the land shall be distressed, and few are the men who shall be left. ⁷ The wine will mourn, the vineyard will mourn, and all that were merry hearted will sigh. ⁸ The mirth of the tabrets hath ceased, the sound of the kithara is no more. ⁹ They are confounded: they have drunk no wine. The palm wine was bitter to them who drank it. ¹⁰ Every city is desolated: the houses will be shut up that none may enter. ¹¹ Raise the mournful cry every where for the wine. A stop is put to all the joy of the land; all the joy of the land is gone. ¹² The cities will be left desolate, and the houses being forsaken will be destroyed. ¹³ All this shall come to pass in this land, in the midst of the nations. As when one shall shake an olive tree, so shall they be shaken: and when the vintage is over ¹⁴ a shout will be raised. But they who are left in the land shall be gladdened with the glory of the Lord. The water of the sea will be troubled: ¹⁵ for this cause the glory of the Lord will be in the isles of the sea. In the isles of the sea the name of the Lord will be glorious. ¹⁶ [c] "Lord the God of Israel! from the outskirts of the earth we have heard of thy wonders: there is hope for the righteous." [p] Let them say also, "Woe to the rebels who reject the law!" ¹⁷ Terror and a pit and a snare are for you who dwell in the land: ¹⁸ and it shall come to pass, that he who fleeth from the terror, shall fall into the pit; and he who getteth out of the pit, shall be caught by the snare. Because the flood gates of heaven are opened, therefore the foundations of the land shall be shaken. ¹⁹ With confusion the land will be confounded; with perplexity this land will be perplexed. ²⁰ It reeled to and fro like a drunkard when intoxicated: like a lodge in a vineyard the land shall be shaken. For iniquity hath prevailed over it; and it shall fall and shall not be able to rise. ²¹ When God shall bring his hand on the hosts of heaven, even upon the kings of this land; ²² and the congregation thereof shall have been assembled for imprisonment, and shut up as chaff for many generations; of them there shall be a visitation. ²³ [c] When the bricks shall have mouldered away, and the wall shall have fallen; because the Lord will commence his reign from Sion and from Jerusalem, and be glorified in the presence of the elders;