19:8 The fishermen will mourn and lament,
all those who cast a fishhook into the river,
and those who spread out a net on the water’s surface will grieve. 1
22:11 You made a reservoir between the two walls
for the water of the old pool –
but you did not trust in 2 the one who made it; 3
you did not depend on 4 the one who formed it long ago!
32:2 Each of them 5 will be like a shelter from the wind
and a refuge from a rainstorm;
like streams of water in a dry region
and like the shade of a large cliff in a parched land.
33:16 This is the person who will live in a secure place; 6
he will find safety in the rocky, mountain strongholds; 7
he will have food
and a constant supply of water.
41:17 The oppressed and the poor look for water, but there is none;
their tongues are parched from thirst.
I, the Lord, will respond to their prayers; 8
I, the God of Israel, will not abandon them.
41:18 I will make streams flow down the slopes
and produce springs in the middle of the valleys.
I will turn the desert into a pool of water
and the arid land into springs.
42:15 I will make the trees on the mountains and hills wither up; 9
I will dry up all their vegetation.
I will turn streams into islands, 10
and dry up pools of water. 11
43:20 The wild animals of the desert honor me,
the jackals and ostriches,
because I put water in the desert
and streams in the wilderness,
to quench the thirst of my chosen people,
44:3 For I will pour water on the parched ground 12
and cause streams to flow 13 on the dry land.
I will pour my spirit on your offspring
and my blessing on your children.
44:12 A blacksmith works with his tool 14
and forges metal over the coals.
He forms it 15 with hammers;
he makes it with his strong arm.
He gets hungry and loses his energy; 16
he drinks no water and gets tired.
49:10 They will not be hungry or thirsty;
the sun’s oppressive heat will not beat down on them, 17
for one who has compassion on them will guide them;
he will lead them to springs of water.
55:10 18 The rain and snow fall from the sky
and do not return,
but instead water the earth
and make it produce and yield crops,
and provide seed for the planter and food for those who must eat.
58:11 The Lord will continually lead you;
he will feed you even in parched regions. 19
He will give you renewed strength, 20
and you will be like a well-watered garden,
like a spring that continually produces water.
1 tn Or perhaps, “will disappear”; cf. TEV “will be useless.”
2 tn Heb “look at”; NAB, NRSV “did not look to.”
3 tn The antecedent of the third feminine singular suffix here and in the next line is unclear. The closest feminine noun is “pool” in the first half of the verse. Perhaps this “old pool” symbolizes the entire city, which had prospered because of God’s provision and protection through the years.
4 tn Heb “did not see.”
5 tn Heb “a man,” but אִישׁ (’ish) probably refers here to “each” of the officials mentioned in the previous verse.
6 tn Heb “he [in the] exalted places will live.”
7 tn Heb “mountain strongholds, cliffs [will be] his elevated place.”
8 tn Heb “will answer them” (so ASV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT).
9 tn Heb “I will dry up the mountains and hills.” The “mountains and hills” stand by synecdoche for the trees that grow on them. Some prefer to derive the verb from a homonymic root and translate, “I will lay waste.”
10 tc The Hebrew text reads, “I will turn streams into coastlands [or “islands”].” Scholars who believe that this reading makes little sense have proposed an emendation of אִיִּים (’iyyim, “islands”) to צִיּוֹת (tsiyyot, “dry places”; cf. NCV, NLT, TEV). However, since all the versions support the MT reading, there is insufficient grounds for an emendation here. Although the imagery of changing rivers into islands is somewhat strange, J. N. Oswalt describes this imagery against the backdrop of rivers of the Near East. The receding of these rivers at times occasioned the appearance of previously submerged islands (Isaiah [NICOT], 2:126).
11 sn The imagery of this verse, which depicts the Lord bringing a curse of infertility to the earth, metaphorically describes how the Lord will destroy his enemies.
12 tn Heb “the thirsty.” Parallelism suggests that dry ground is in view (see “dry land” in the next line.)
13 tn Heb “and streams”; KJV “floods.” The verb “cause…to flow” is supplied in the second line for clarity and for stylistic reasons.
14 tn The noun מַעֲצָד (ma’atsad), which refers to some type of tool used for cutting, occurs only here and in Jer 10:3. See HALOT 615 s.v. מַעֲצָד.
15 tn Some English versions take the pronoun “it” to refer to an idol being fashioned by the blacksmith (cf. NIV, NCV, CEV). NLT understands the referent to be “a sharp tool,” which is then used by the carpenter in the following verse to carve an idol from wood.
16 tn Heb “and there is no strength”; NASB “his strength fails.”
17 tn Heb “and the heat and the sun will not strike them.” In Isa 35:7, its only other occurrence in the OT, שָׁרָב (sharav) stands parallel to “parched ground” and in contrast to “pool.” In later Hebrew and Aramaic it refers to “dry heat, heat of the sun” (Jastrow 1627 s.v.). Here it likely has this nuance and forms a hendiadys with “sun.”
18 tn This verse begins in the Hebrew text with כִּי כַּאֲשֶׁר (ki ka’asher, “for, just as”), which is completed by כֵּן (ken, “so, in the same way”) at the beginning of v. 11. For stylistic reasons, this lengthy sentence is divided up into separate sentences in the translation.
19 tn Heb “he will satisfy in parched regions your appetite.”
20 tn Heb “and your bones he will strengthen.”