Read the Bible

¹ Listen to me, you that follow after righteousness, you that seek Yahweh: look to the rock from where you were cut, and to the hole of the pit from where you were dug.² Look to Abraham your father, and to Sarah that bore you; for when he was but one I called him, and I blessed him, and made him many.³ For Yahweh has comforted Zion; he has comforted all her waste places, and has made her wilderness like Eden, and her desert like the garden of Yahweh; joy and gladness shall be found therein, thanksgiving, and the voice of melody.

⁴ Attend to me, O my people; and give ear to me, O my nation: for a law shall go forth from me, and I will establish my justice for a light of the peoples.⁵ My righteousness is near, my salvation has gone forth, and my arms shall judge the peoples; the isles shall wait for me, and on my arm they shall trust.⁶ Lift up your eyes to the heavens, and look at the earth beneath; for the heavens shall vanish away like smoke, and the earth shall wax old like a garment; and those that dwell therein shall die in like manner: but my salvation shall be forever, and my righteousness shall not be abolished.⁷ Listen to me, you that know righteousness, the people in whose heart is my law; don't be afraid of the reproach of common man, neither be dismayed at their revilings.⁸ For the moth shall eat them up like a garment, and the worm shall eat them like wool; but my righteousness shall be forever, and my salvation to all generations.

⁹ Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of Yahweh; awake, as in the days of old, the generations of ancient times. Is it not you that cut Rahab in pieces, that pierced the monster?¹⁰ Is it not you that dried up the sea, the waters of the great deep; that made the depths of the sea a way for the redeemed to pass over?¹¹ And the ransomed of Yahweh shall return, and come with singing to Zion; and everlasting joy shall be on their heads: they shall obtain gladness and joy; [and] sorrow and sighing shall flee away.¹² I, even I, am he that comforts you: who are you, that you are afraid of common man that shall die, and of the son of man that shall be made as grass;¹³ and have forgotten Yahweh your Maker, that stretched forth the heavens, and laid the foundations of the earth; and fear continually all the day because of the fury of the oppressor, when he makes ready to destroy? and where is the fury of the oppressor?¹⁴ The captive exile shall speedily be loosed; and he shall not die [and go down] into the pit, neither shall his bread fail.¹⁵ For I am Yahweh your God, who stirs up the sea, so that the waves thereof roar: Yahweh of hosts is his name.¹⁶ And I have put my words in your mouth, and have covered you in the shadow of my hand, that I may plant the heavens, and lay the foundations of the earth, and say to Zion, You are my people.

¹⁷ Awake, awake, stand up, O Jerusalem, that have drank at the hand of Yahweh the cup of his wrath; you have drank the bowl of the cup of staggering, and drained it.¹⁸ There is none to guide her among all the sons whom she has brought forth; neither is there any that takes her by the hand among all the sons that she has brought up.¹⁹ These two things have befallen you, who shall bemoan you? desolation and destruction, and the famine and the sword; [with] whom shall I comfort you?²⁰ Your sons have fainted, they lie at the head of all the streets, as an antelope in a net; they are full of the wrath of Yahweh, the rebuke of your God.²¹ Therefore now hear this, you afflicted, and drunk, but now with wine:²² Thus says your Lord Yahweh, and your God that pleads the cause of his people, Look, I have taken out of your hand the cup of staggering, even the bowl of the cup of my wrath; you shall no more drink it again:²³ and I will put it into the hand of those who afflict you and those who oppress you, that have said to your soul, Bow down, that we may go over; and you have laid your back as the ground, and as the street, to those that go over.