Discovery BoxIsaiah 1:14 
Context1:14 I hate your new moon festivals and assemblies;
they are a burden
that I am tired of carrying.
Isaiah 2:9
Context2:9 Men bow down to them in homage,
they lie flat on the ground in worship. 1
Don’t spare them! 2
Isaiah 3:8
Context3:8 Jerusalem certainly stumbles,
Judah falls,
for their words and their actions offend the Lord; 3
they rebel against his royal authority. 4
Isaiah 10:29
Context10:29 They went through the pass,
spent the night at Geba.
Ramah trembled,
Gibeah of Saul ran away.
Isaiah 17:2
Context17:2 The cities of Aroer are abandoned. 5
They will be used for herds,
which will lie down there in peace. 6
Isaiah 17:7
Context17:7 At that time 7 men will trust in their creator; 8
they will depend on 9 the Holy One of Israel. 10
Isaiah 22:8
Context22:8 They 11 removed the defenses 12 of Judah.
At that time 13 you looked
for the weapons in the House of the Forest. 14
Isaiah 24:5
Context24:5 The earth is defiled by 15 its inhabitants, 16
for they have violated laws,
disregarded the regulation, 17
and broken the permanent treaty. 18
Isaiah 30:9
Context30:9 For these are rebellious people –
they are lying children,
children unwilling to obey the Lord’s law. 19
Isaiah 33:3
Context33:3 The nations run away when they hear a loud noise; 20
the nations scatter when you spring into action! 21
Isaiah 36:21
Context36:21 They were silent and did not respond, for the king had ordered, “Don’t respond to him.”
Isaiah 44:18
Context44:18 They do not comprehend or understand,
for their eyes are blind and cannot see;
their minds do not discern. 22
Isaiah 48:3
Context48:3 “I announced events beforehand, 23
I issued the decrees and made the predictions; 24
suddenly I acted and they came to pass.
Isaiah 48:13
Context48:13 Yes, my hand founded the earth;
my right hand spread out the sky.
I summon them;
they stand together.
Isaiah 57:12
Context57:12 I will denounce your so-called righteousness and your deeds, 25
but they will not help you.
Isaiah 63:8
Context63:8 He said, “Certainly they will be my people,
children who are not disloyal.” 26
He became their deliverer.
Isaiah 63:10
Context63:10 But they rebelled and offended 27 his holy Spirit, 28
so he turned into an enemy
and fought against them.
Isaiah 63:13
Context63:13 who led them through the deep water?
Like a horse running on flat land 29 they did not stumble.
Isaiah 63:19
Context63:19 We existed from ancient times, 30
but you did not rule over them,
they were not your subjects. 31
Isaiah 65:3
Context65:3 These people continually and blatantly offend me 32
as they sacrifice in their sacred orchards 33
and burn incense on brick altars. 34
1 tn Heb “men bow down, men are low.” Since the verbs שָׁחָח (shakhakh) and שָׁפַל (shafal) are used later in this discourse to describe how God will humiliate proud men (see vv. 11, 17), some understand v. 9a as a prediction of judgment, “men will be brought down, men will be humiliated.” However, these prefixed verbal forms with vav (ו) consecutive appear to carry on the description that precedes and are better taken with the accusation. They draw attention to the fact that human beings actually bow down and worship before the lifeless products of their own hands.
2 tn Heb “don’t lift them up.” The idiom “lift up” (נָשָׂא with לְ, nasa’ with preposition lamed) can mean “spare, forgive” (see Gen 18:24, 26). Here the idiom plays on the preceding verbs. The idolaters are bowed low as they worship their false gods; the prophet asks God not to “lift them up.”
3 tn Heb “for their tongue and their deeds [are] to the Lord.”
4 tn Heb “to rebel [against] the eyes of his majesty.” The word כָּבוֹד (kavod) frequently refers to the Lord’s royal splendor that is an outward manifestation of his authority as king.
5 tn Three cities are known by this name in the OT: (1) an Aroer located near the Arnon, (2) an Aroer in Ammon, and (3) an Aroer of Judah. (See BDB 792-93 s.v. עֲרֹעֵר, and HALOT 883 s.v. II עֲרוֹעֵר.) There is no mention of an Aroer in Syrian territory. For this reason some want to emend the text here to עֲזֻבוֹת עָרַיהָ עֲדֵי עַד (’azuvot ’arayha ’adey ’ad, “her cities are permanently abandoned”). However, Aroer near the Arnon was taken by Israel and later conquered by the Syrians. (See Josh 12:2; 13:9, 16; Judg 11:26; 2 Kgs 10:33). This oracle pertains to Israel as well as Syria (note v. 3), so it is possible that this is a reference to Israelite and/or Syrian losses in Transjordan.
6 tn Heb “and they lie down and there is no one scaring [them].”
7 tn Heb “in that day” (so ASV, NASB, NIV); KJV “At that day.”
8 tn Heb “man will gaze toward his maker.”
9 tn Heb “his eyes will look toward.”
10 sn See the note on the phrase “the Holy One of Israel” in 1:4.
11 tn Heb “he,” i.e., the enemy invader. NASB, by its capitalization of the pronoun, takes this to refer to the Lord.
12 tn Heb “covering.”
13 tn Heb “in that day” (so KJV), likewise at the beginning of v. 12.
14 sn Perhaps this refers to a royal armory, or to Solomon’s “House of the Forest of Lebanon,” where weapons may have been kept (see 1 Kgs 10:16-17).
15 tn Heb “beneath”; cf. KJV, ASV, NRSV “under”; NAB “because of.”
16 sn Isa 26:21 suggests that the earth’s inhabitants defiled the earth by shedding the blood of their fellow human beings. See also Num 35:33-34, which assumes that bloodshed defiles a land.
17 tn Heb “moved past [the?] regulation.”
18 tn Or “everlasting covenant” (KJV, NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT); NAB “the ancient covenant”; CEV “their agreement that was to last forever.”
sn For a lengthy discussion of the identity of this covenant/treaty, see R. Chisholm, “The ‘Everlasting Covenant’ and the ‘City of Chaos’: Intentional Ambiguity and Irony in Isaiah 24,” CTR 6 (1993): 237-53. In this context, where judgment comes upon both the pagan nations and God’s covenant community, the phrase “permanent treaty” is intentionally ambiguous. For the nations this treaty is the Noahic mandate of Gen 9:1-7 with its specific stipulations and central regulation (Gen 9:7). By shedding blood, the warlike nations violated this treaty, which promotes population growth and prohibits murder. For Israel, which was also guilty of bloodshed (see Isa 1:15, 21; 4:4), this “permanent treaty” would refer more specifically to the Mosaic Law and its regulations prohibiting murder (Exod 20:13; Num 35:6-34), which are an extension of the Noahic mandate.
19 tn Or perhaps, “instruction” (so NASB, NIV, NRSV); NCV, TEV “teachings.”
20 tn Heb “at the sound of tumult the nations run away.”
21 tn Heb “because of your exaltation the nations scatter.”
22 tn Heb “for their eyes are smeared over so they cannot see, so their heart cannot be wise.”
23 tn Heb “the former things beforehand I declared.”
24 tn Heb “and from my mouth they came forth and I caused them to be heard.”
25 tn Heb “I, I will declare your righteousness and your deeds.”
26 tn Heb “children [who] do not act deceitfully.” Here the verb refers to covenantal loyalty.
27 tn Or “grieved, hurt the feelings of.”
28 sn The phrase “holy Spirit” occurs in the OT only here (in v. 11 as well) and in Ps 51:11 (51:13 HT), where it is associated with the divine presence.
29 tn Heb “in the desert [or “steppe”].”
30 tn Heb “we were from antiquity” (see v. 16). The collocation עוֹלָם + מִן + הָיָה (hayah + min + ’olam) occurs only here.
31 tn Heb “you did not rule them, your name was not called over them.” The expression “the name is called over” indicates ownership; see the note at 4:1. As these two lines stand they are very difficult to interpret. They appear to be stating that the adversaries just mentioned in v. 18 have not been subject to the Lord’s rule in the past, perhaps explaining why they could commit the atrocity described in v. 18b.
32 tn Heb “the people who provoke me to anger to my face continually.”
33 tn Or “gardens” (KJV, NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT).
34 tn Or perhaps, “on tiles.”
