4“For their princes are at Zoan
         And their ambassadors arrive at Hanes.

5“Everyone will be ashamed because of a people who cannot profit them,
         Who are not for help or profit, but for shame and also for reproach.”

      6The oracle concerning the beasts of the Negev.
         Through a land of distress and anguish,
         From where come lioness and lion, viper and flying serpent,
         They carry their riches on the backs of young donkeys
         And their treasures on camels’ humps,
         To a people who cannot profit them;

7Even Egypt, whose help is vain and empty.
         Therefore, I have called her
         “Rahab who has been exterminated.”

8Now go, write it on a tablet before them
         And inscribe it on a scroll,
         That it may serve in the time to come
         As a witness forever.

9For this is a rebellious people, false sons,
         Sons who refuse to listen
         To the instruction of the LORD;

10Who say to the seers, “You must not see visions”;
         And to the prophets, “You must not prophesy to us what is right,
         Speak to us pleasant words,
         Prophesy illusions.

11“Get out of the way, turn aside from the path,
         Let us hear no more about the Holy One of Israel.”

12Therefore thus says the Holy One of Israel,
         “Since you have rejected this word
         And have put your trust in oppression and guile, and have relied on them,

13Therefore this iniquity will be to you
         Like a breach about to fall,
         A bulge in a high wall,
         Whose collapse comes suddenly in an instant,

14Whose collapse is like the smashing of a potter’s jar,
         So ruthlessly shattered
         That a sherd will not be found among its pieces
         To take fire from a hearth
         Or to scoop water from a cistern.”

15For thus the Lord GOD, the Holy One of Israel, has said,
         “In repentance and rest you will be saved,
         In quietness and trust is your strength.”
         But you were not willing,

16And you said, “No, for we will flee on horses,”
         Therefore you shall flee!
         “And we will ride on swift horses,”
         Therefore those who pursue you shall be swift.

17One thousand will flee at the threat of one man;
         You will flee at the threat of five,
         Until you are left as a flag on a mountain top
         And as a signal on a hill.

God Is Gracious and Just

18Therefore the LORD longs to be gracious to you,
         And therefore He waits on high to have compassion on you.
         For the LORD is a God of justice;
         How blessed are all those who long for Him.

      19O people in Zion, inhabitant in Jerusalem, you will weep no longer. He will surely be gracious to you at the sound of your cry; when He hears it, He will answer you. 20Although the Lord has given you bread of privation and water of oppression, He, your Teacher will no longer hide Himself, but your eyes will behold your Teacher. 21Your ears will hear a word behind you, “This is the way, walk in it,” whenever you turn to the right or to the left. 22And you will defile your graven images overlaid with silver, and your molten images plated with gold. You will scatter them as an impure thing, and say to them, “Be gone!”

      23Then He will give you rain for the seed which you will sow in the ground, and bread from the yield of the ground, and it will be rich and plenteous; on that day your livestock will graze in a roomy pasture. 24Also the oxen and the donkeys which work the ground will eat salted fodder, which has been winnowed with shovel and fork. 25On every lofty mountain and on every high hill there will be streams running with water on the day of the great slaughter, when the towers fall. 26The light of the moon will be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun will be seven times brighter, like the light of seven days, on the day the LORD binds up the fracture of His people and heals the bruise He has inflicted.

27Behold, the name of the LORD comes from a remote place;
         Burning is His anger and dense is His smoke;
         His lips are filled with indignation
         And His tongue is like a consuming fire;

28His breath is like an overflowing torrent,
         Which reaches to the neck,
         To shake the nations back and forth in a sieve,
         And to put in the jaws of the peoples the bridle which leads to ruin.

29You will have songs as in the night when you keep the festival,
         And gladness of heart as when one marches to the sound of the flute,
         To go to the mountain of the LORD, to the Rock of Israel.

30And the LORD will cause His voice of authority to be heard,
         And the descending of His arm to be seen in fierce anger,
         And in the flame of a consuming fire
         In cloudburst, downpour and hailstones.

31For at the voice of the LORD Assyria will be terrified,
         When He strikes with the rod.

32And every blow of the rod of punishment,
         Which the LORD will lay on him,
         Will be with the music of tambourines and lyres;
         And in battles, brandishing weapons, He will fight them.

33For Topheth has long been ready,
         Indeed, it has been prepared for the king.
         He has made it deep and large,
         A pyre of fire with plenty of wood;
         The breath of the LORD, like a torrent of brimstone, sets it afire.

NASB ©1995

American Standard Version
For their princes are at Zoan, and their ambassadors are come to Hanes.

Douay-Rheims Bible
For thy princes were in Tanis, and thy messengers came even to Hanes.

Darby Bible Translation
For his princes were at Zoan, and his ambassadors came to Hanes.

English Revised Version
For his princes are at Zoan, and his ambassadors are come to Hanes.

Webster's Bible Translation
For his princes were at Zoan, and his embassadors came to Hanes.

World English Bible
For their princes are at Zoan, and their ambassadors have come to Hanes.

Young's Literal Translation
For in Zoan were his princes, And his messengers reach Hanes. 'Quietness and Confidence'
'In returning and rest shall ye be saved; in quietness and confidence shall be your strength.'--ISAIAH xxx. 15. ISRAEL always felt the difficulty of sustaining itself on the height of dependence on the unseen, spiritual power of God, and was ever oscillating between alliances with the Northern and Southern powers, linking itself with Assyria against Egypt, or with Egypt against Assyria. The effect was that whichever was victorious it suffered; it was the battleground for both, it was the prize of …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

God's Waiting and Man's
'And therefore will the Lord wait, that He may be gracious unto you, and therefore will He be exalted, that He may have mercy upon you: for the Lord is a God of judgment: blessed are they that wait for Him.'--ISAIAH xxx. 18. God's waiting and man's--bold and beautiful, that He and we should be represented as sharing the same attitude. I. God's waiting, 1. The first thought is--why should He wait--why does He not act at once? Because something in us hinders. We cannot enter into spiritual blessings …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

The Voice Behind Thee
The word behind us which is spoken of in the text is mentioned as one among other covenant blessings. No "if" or "but" is joined to it. It is one of those gracious, unconditional promises upon which the salvation of the guilty depends. There are many comforts of the new life which depend upon our own action and behaviour, and these come to us with "ifs"; but those which are vital and essential are secured to the chosen of God without "but" or "peradventure." It shall be so: God declares it shall, …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 28: 1882

My God Will Hear Me
"Therefore will the Lord wait, that He may be gracious unto you. Blessed are all they that wait for Him. He will be very gracious unto thee at the voice of thy cry; when He shall hear it, He will answer thee."--ISA. xxx. 18, 19. "The Lord will hear when I call upon Him."--PS. iv. 3. "I have called upon Thee, for Thou wilt hear me, O God!"--PS. xvii. 6. "I will look unto the Lord; I will wait for the God of my salvation: my God will hear me."--MIC. vii. 7. The power of prayer rests in the faith …
Andrew Murray—The Ministry of Intercession

With a Heart Full of Anxious Request,
"In returning and rest shall ye be saved; in quietness and confidence shall be your strength." -- Isaiah 30:15. With a heart full of anxious request, Which my Father in heaven bestowed, I wandered alone, and distressed, In search of a quiet abode. Astray and distracted I cried, -- Lord, where would'st Thou have me to be? And the voice of the Lamb that had died Said, Come, my beloved, to ME. I went -- for He mightily wins Weary souls to His peaceful retreat -- And He gave me forgiveness of sins, …
Miss A. L. Waring—Hymns and Meditations

God's People Delivered
When the protection of human laws shall be withdrawn from those who honor the law of God, there will be, in different lands, a simultaneous movement for their destruction. As the time appointed in the decree draws near, the people will conspire to root out the hated sect. It will be determined to strike in one night a decisive blow, which shall utterly silence the voice of dissent and reproof. The people of God--some in prison cells, some hidden in solitary retreats in the forests and the mountains--still …
Ellen Gould White—The Great Controversy

But Though Prayer is Properly Confined to Vows and Supplications...
But though prayer is properly confined to vows and supplications, yet so strong is the affinity between petition and thanksgiving, that both may be conveniently comprehended under one name. For the forms which Paul enumerates (1 Tim. 2:1) fall under the first member of this division. By prayer and supplication we pour out our desires before God, asking as well those things which tend to promote his glory and display his name, as the benefits which contribute to our advantage. By thanksgiving we duly …
John Calvin—Of Prayer--A Perpetual Exercise of Faith

"Take My Yoke Upon You, and Learn of Me," &C.
Matt. xi. 20.--"Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me," &c. Self love is generally esteemed infamous and contemptible among men. It is of a bad report every where, and indeed as it is taken commonly, there is good reason for it, that it should be hissed out of all societies, if reproaching and speaking evil of it would do it. But to speak the truth, the name is not so fit to express the thing, for that which men call self love, may rather be called self hatred. Nothing is more pernicious to a man's …
Hugh Binning—The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning

Visions of Future Glory
In the darkest days of her long conflict with evil, the church of God has been given revelations of the eternal purpose of Jehovah. His people have been permitted to look beyond the trials of the present to the triumphs of the future, when, the warfare having been accomplished, the redeemed will enter into possession of the promised land. These visions of future glory, scenes pictured by the hand of God, should be dear to His church today, when the controversy of the ages is rapidly closing and the …
Ellen Gould White—The Story of Prophets and Kings

The Girdle of the City. Nehemiah 3
The beginning of the circumference was from 'the sheep-gate.' That, we suppose, was seated on the south part, yet but little removed from that corner, which looks south-east. Within was the pool of Bethesda, famous for healings. Going forward, on the south part, was the tower Meah: and beyond that, "the tower of Hananeel": in the Chaldee paraphrast it is, 'The tower Piccus,' Zechariah 14:10; Piccus, Jeremiah 31:38.--I should suspect that to be, the Hippic tower, were not that placed on the north …
John Lightfoot—From the Talmud and Hebraica

Sennacherib (705-681 B. C. )
The struggle of Sennacherib with Judaea and Egypt--Destruction of Babylon. Sennacherib either failed to inherit his father's good fortune, or lacked his ability.* He was not deficient in military genius, nor in the energy necessary to withstand the various enemies who rose against him at widely removed points of his frontier, but he had neither the adaptability of character nor the delicate tact required to manage successfully the heterogeneous elements combined under his sway. * The two principal …
G. Maspero—History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, V 8

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