Isaiah 42

¹ “Behold, my servant, whom I uphold; my chosen, in whom my soul delights. I have put my Spirit on him. He will bring justice to the nations.

² He will not cry, nor lift up his voice, nor cause it to be heard in the street.

³ He won’t break a bruised reed. He won’t quench a dimly burning wick. He will faithfully bring justice.

⁴ He will not fail nor be discouraged, until he has set justice in the earth, and the islands will wait for his law.”

⁵ Thus says God Yahweh, he who created the heavens, and stretched them out; he who spread out the earth and that which comes out of it; he who gives breath to its people, and spirit to those who walk in it:

⁶ “I, Yahweh, have called you in righteousness, and will hold your hand, and will keep you, and make you a covenant for the people, as a light for the nations;

⁷ to open the blind eyes, to bring the prisoners out of the dungeon, and those who sit in darkness out of the prison.

⁸ I am Yahweh. That is my name. I will not give my glory to another, nor my praise to engraved images.

⁹ Behold, the former things have happened, and I declare new things. I tell you about them before they come up.”

¹⁰ Sing to Yahweh a new song, and his praise from the end of the earth, you who go down to the sea, and all that is therein, the islands and their inhabitants.

¹¹ Let the wilderness and its cities raise their voices, the villages that Kedar inhabits. Let the inhabitants of Sela sing. Let them shout from the top of the mountains!

¹² Let them give glory to Yahweh, and declare his praise in the islands.

¹³ Yahweh will go out like a mighty man. He will stir up zeal like a man of war. He will cry, yes, shout aloud. He will prevail against his enemies.

¹⁴ “I have been silent a long time. I have been quiet and restrained myself. Now I will cry out like a travailing woman. I will gasp and pant.

¹⁵ I will lay waste mountains and hills, and dry up all their herbs. I will make the rivers islands, and will dry up the pools.

¹⁶ I will bring the blind by a way that they don’t know; in paths that they don’t know I will lead them. I will make darkness light before them, and crooked places straight. These things I will do, and I will not forsake them.

¹⁷ They will be turned back, be utterly disappointed, who trust in engraved images, who tell molten images, ‘You are our gods.’

¹⁸ “Hear, you deaf, and look, you blind, that you may see.

¹⁹ Who is blind, but my servant? Or who is as deaf as my messenger whom I send? Who is as blind as he who is at peace, and as blind as Yahweh’s servant?

²⁰ You see many things, but don’t observe. His ears are open, but he doesn’t hear.

²¹ It pleased Yahweh, for his righteousness’ sake, to magnify the law, and make it honorable.

²² But this is a people robbed and plundered. All of them are snared in holes, and they are hidden in prisons. They have become a prey, and no one delivers; a plunder, and no one says, ‘Restore them!’

²³ Who among you will hear this? Who will listen and hear for the time to come?

²⁴ Who gave Jacob as plunder, and Israel to the robbers? Didn’t Yahweh, he against whom we have sinned? For they would not walk in his ways, and they disobeyed his law.

²⁵ Therefore he poured on him the fierceness of his anger, and the strength of battle. It set him on fire all around, yet he didn’t know; and it burned him, yet he didn’t take it to heart.