Isaiah 54

Sing, you woman who never gave birth. You who never went through labor, break out in song and shout aloud. The woman who was left alone will have more children than the woman who has a husband, says the LORD.

1Sing, O barren, thou that didst not bear; break forth into singing, and cry aloud, thou that didst not travail with child: for more are the children of the desolate than the children of the married wife, saith the LORD.

NoteThroughout this chapter the one addressed is a single woman ("you" is feminine singular in Hebrew) and Hebrew poets regularly speak of a city and its people as a woman. In that society a woman who bore no children had no standing in the household and no one to provide for her in old age; childlessness was treated as a public disgrace, which is why the command to sing is startling. "The woman who was left alone" is one deserted or widowed. Where LORD is printed in capitals it stands in for God's personal name, written in Hebrew with four consonants (YHWH), which Jewish readers do not say aloud.

2Make the space of your tent bigger. Stretch out the cloth walls of your home, and do not hold back. Make your ropes longer and drive your stakes in deep.

2Enlarge the place of thy tent, and let them stretch forth the curtains of thine habitations: spare not, lengthen thy cords, and strengthen thy stakes;

NoteTents were made of panels of woven goat hair. To house a larger household you added panels, which meant longer guy ropes and stakes driven further out and deeper to hold the wider roof steady. The picture is a family outgrowing the home it lives in.

3You will spread out to the right and to the left. Your descendants will take over other nations and will live in cities that now stand empty.

3For thou shalt break forth on the right hand and on the left; and thy seed shall inherit the Gentiles, and make the desolate cities to be inhabited.

NotePeople oriented themselves facing the sunrise, so "the right hand" is south and "the left" is north: the promise covers every direction. KJV's "Gentiles" translates a Hebrew word meaning simply "the nations", peoples other than Israel. "Seed" in KJV means offspring or descendants.

4Do not be afraid, because you will not be shamed. Do not feel disgraced, because you will not be humiliated. You will forget the shame of your younger years, and you will not remember any more the insults you took as a widow.

4Fear not; for thou shalt not be ashamed: neither be thou confounded; for thou shalt not be put to shame: for thou shalt forget the shame of thy youth, and shalt not remember the reproach of thy widowhood any more.

NoteA widow had no husband's legal protection and often no property of her own, which left her near the bottom of the social order; "reproach" is the open contempt others showed her. What "the shame of your youth" refers to is not specified in the Hebrew.

5The one who made you is your husband. His name is the LORD of Armies. The Holy One of Israel is the one who buys you back and sets you free. He is called the God of the whole earth.

5For thy Maker is thine husband; the LORD of hosts is his name; and thy Redeemer the Holy One of Israel; The God of the whole earth shall he be called.

Note"LORD of hosts" means LORD of armies, the word covers armed forces, and also the ranked armies of heaven. The word behind "Redeemer" is go'el: the near relative whose duty it was to buy back family land the family had been forced to sell, to buy a relative out of debt-slavery, and to take up a family member's cause in a dispute. It is a family and legal word before it is a religious one.

6The LORD has called you back like a wife who was left alone and hurt deep inside, like a young wife who was rejected, says your God.

6For the LORD hath called thee as a woman forsaken and grieved in spirit, and a wife of youth, when thou wast refused, saith thy God.

Note"A wife of youth" is the woman a man married when they were both young. Under the customs of the time a husband could dismiss his wife; a dismissed woman went back to her father's house, to public shame and often poverty.

7For a short moment I left you, but with great compassion I will gather you back.

7For a small moment have I forsaken thee; but with great mercies will I gather thee.

8In a burst of anger I hid my face from you for a moment, but with kindness that never ends I will show you mercy, says the LORD, the one who buys you back and sets you free.

8In a little wrath I hid my face from thee for a moment; but with everlasting kindness will I have mercy on thee, saith the LORD thy Redeemer.

NoteHiding the face is a standard idiom for withdrawing favor, refusing to look at, listen to, or have dealings with someone.

9To me this is like the time of Noah's flood. I swore then that the waters of Noah's flood would never cover the earth again. In the same way I have sworn not to be angry with you or to scold you.

9For this is as the waters of Noah unto me: for as I have sworn that the waters of Noah should no more go over the earth; so have I sworn that I would not be wroth with thee, nor rebuke thee.

NoteThis refers to the flood in Genesis 6–9 and to the promise God made afterwards (Genesis 9:11) that flood waters would never again destroy the earth. The point of comparison is the sworn, once-for-all character of that promise.

10The mountains may be taken away and the hills may be shaken loose, but my kindness will not leave you, and my covenant of peace, my binding promise, will not be broken, says the LORD, who has mercy on you.

10For the mountains shall depart, and the hills be removed; but my kindness shall not depart from thee, neither shall the covenant of my peace be removed, saith the LORD that hath mercy on thee.

NoteA covenant was a formal sworn agreement, of the kind kings made in treaties and families made in marriage, binding both sides and normally sealed with an oath. The "peace" in it is Hebrew shalom, wholeness, safety and well-being, not merely the absence of fighting.

11You who suffer, beaten by storms and left without comfort, look: I am going to set your stones in bright colored mortar and lay your foundations with sapphires.

11O thou afflicted, tossed with tempest, and not comforted, behold, I will lay thy stones with fair colours, and lay thy foundations with sapphires.

NoteThe word behind KJV's "fair colours" is the Hebrew name for antimony, the dark powder women used to line their eyes; stones set in it would be framed the way eye paint frames an eye. The stone KJV calls "sapphire" is more probably lapis lazuli, the deep blue stone ancient jewellers prized; the modern sapphire was not yet in use.

12I will make your windows out of agate, your gates out of glowing red gems, and every wall around you out of precious stones.

12And I will make thy windows of agates, and thy gates of carbuncles, and all thy borders of pleasant stones.

NoteThe Hebrew names of these stones cannot be matched with certainty to particular modern gems; "agate" and "carbuncle" (an old English word for a glowing red stone, probably garnet) are traditional guesses. "Windows" may instead mean the topmost points or battlements of the wall, and "borders" means the boundary wall enclosing the city.

13All your children will be taught by the LORD, and they will have great peace.

13And all thy children shall be taught of the LORD; and great shall be the peace of thy children.

NoteIn 1611 English "taught of the LORD" meant taught by the LORD. "Peace" is again shalom: security and flourishing, which is why some translations render it "prosperity."

14You will be set firmly in place by what is right. Cruel treatment will be far from you, so you will not be afraid. Terror will stay far away and will not come near you.

14In righteousness shalt thou be established: thou shalt be far from oppression; for thou shalt not fear: and from terror; for it shall not come near thee.

Note"Righteousness" translates Hebrew tsedaqah, which covers both doing what is right and being publicly recognized as in the right. Here it is the footing the city is set on, the way a building is set on a foundation.

15Look, people may band together against you, but not because I sent them. Whoever bands together against you will fall because of you.

15Behold, they shall surely gather together, but not by me: whosoever shall gather together against thee shall fall for thy sake.

NoteThe Hebrew of this verse is compressed and disputed. The verb translated "gather together" can mean to attack or to stir up strife, and the last phrase, literally "shall fall to you" or "over you", has been read both as "will fall before you in defeat" and as "will come over to your side."

16Look, I am the one who made the metalworker who fans the coals into flame and hammers out a weapon fit for its job. And I am the one who made the destroyer who ruins things.

16Behold, I have created the smith that bloweth the coals in the fire, and that bringeth forth an instrument for his work; and I have created the waster to destroy.

NoteThe smith raised charcoal to weapon-making heat by pumping air over it with skin bellows; fanning the coals is the picture of a working forge. "The waster" is the ravager, the soldier or army that lays a place waste.

17No weapon made to use against you will succeed, and you will prove wrong every tongue that accuses you in court. This is what the servants of the LORD receive, and the proof that they are in the right comes from me, says the LORD.

17No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper; and every tongue that shall rise against thee in judgment thou shalt condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the LORD, and their righteousness is of me, saith the LORD.

NoteThe setting is a courtroom: "tongues rising in judgment" are accusers speaking against you at a trial, and to "condemn" them, in 1611 English, is to prove their case false. "Heritage" means inheritance, the allotted portion, like a family's share of land, held as theirs by right and passed on. "Righteousness" here is the verdict that a person is in the right, hence the rendering's "the proof that they are in the right."