Isaiah 59
1IT is not that the hand of the Lord is unable to save; nor that his ear is grown dull to hear;
2but your sins make a separation between you and your God; and on account of your sins He hath turned away his face from you that He may not exercise compassion.
3For your hands are polluted with blood, and your fingers with sins; your lips have spoken iniquity, and your tongue contriveth injustice.
4None speaketh just things, nor is there any just judgment. They trusted in vanities and they speak lies. Because they hatch mischief, therefore they bring forth iniquity.
5They hatched the eggs of asps, and are weaving a spider’s web; and he who was about to eat some of their eggs, upon breaking one that was hatched found therein a viper.
6Their web will not serve for a mantle, nor can they clothe themselves with their works; for their works are works of iniquity.
7Their feet are running to evil; they are swift to shed blood. And their reasonings are reasonings for murders. Destruction and misery are in their ways,
8and the path of peace they do not know, nor is there any judgment in their ways; for the paths which they travel are crooked and peace they do not know.
9Therefore judgment is far from them, and saving mercy shall not overtake them. When they were waiting for light, darkness came upon them, expecting a blaze of light they walked in obscurity.
10They shall grope like blind men for a wall and feel about like men who have no eyes, and fall at mid-day as at midnight.
11When dying they will groan like a bear and mourn like a dove; and at their departing say: We waited for judgment and there is none: and as for safety, it is far from us.
12For our manifold iniquity is before Thee; and our sins are risen up against us: for our iniquities are in us, and we acknowledge our transgressions.
13We have sinned; we have lied, and turned back from following our God; we have spoken things unjust, and have been disobedient; we have conceived and meditated from our heart lying words,
14we have indeed turned judgment backward, therefore saving mercy standeth aloof.
15Because truth was destroyed in their ways and they could not walk in straight paths; and truth was removed and they substituted opinion in place of knowledge, therefore the Lord took a view, and it displeased Him that there was no judgment.
16When He took a view and there was no man; and made close observation, and there was no helper; then with His own arm He defended them and with mercy supported them.
17And He put on righteousness as a breast plate, and placed on His head the helmet of salvation, and threw around Him the mantle of vengeance, and His cloak,
18as about to render retribution—reproach to His adversaries:
19and they from the west shall revere the name of the Lord; and they from the rising of the sun, His glorious name. For He will come like an impetuous stream—for the wrath of the Lord will come with fury.
20For the sake of Sion the Deliverer will come, and turn away ungodliness from Jacob.
21And this shall be My covenant with them, said the Lord, this spirit of Mine which is upon thee, and these words which I have put in thy mouth shall not fail from thy mouth, nor from the mouth of thy seed, (for the Lord hath spoken) from this time forth forever.