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Chapter Summary
Aram plotted with Ephraim. The LORD sent Isaiah to King Ahaz: Behold, a virgin shall bear a son. The LORD will use Assyria as a razor.
1And it happened in the days of Ahaz, the son of Jotham, the son of Uzziah, the king of Judah, that Rezin, the king of Syria, and Pekah, the son of Remaliah, king of Israel, ascended to Jerusalem to battle against it. But they were not able to defeat it. 2And they reported to the house of David, saying: “Syria has withdrawn to Ephraim.” And his heart was shaken, with the heart of his people, just as the trees of the forest are moved by the face of the wind. 3And the Lord said to Isaiah: Go out to meet Ahaz, you and your son, Jashub, who was left behind, to the end of the aqueduct, at the upper pool, on the road to the fuller’s field. 4And you shall say to him: “See to it that you are silent. Do not be afraid. And have no dread in your heart over the two tails of these firebrands, nearly extinguished, which are the wrath of the fury of Rezin, king of Syria, and of the son of Remaliah.” 5For Syria has undertaken a plan against you, with the evil of Ephraim and the son of Remaliah, saying: 6“Let us ascend to Judah, and stir it up, and tear it away for ourselves, and appoint the son of Tabeel as a king in its midst.” 7Thus says the Lord God: This shall not stand, and this shall not be. 8For the head of Syria is Damascus, and the head of Damascus is Rezin; and within sixty-five years from now, Ephraim will cease to be a people. 9For the head of Ephraim is Samaria, and the head of Samaria is the son of Remaliah. If you will not believe, you will not continue.
10And the Lord spoke further to Ahaz, saying: 11Ask for a sign for yourself from the Lord your God, from the depths below, even to the heights above. 12And Ahaz said, “I will not ask, for I will not tempt the Lord.” 13And he said: “Then listen, O house of David. Is it such a small thing for you to trouble men, that you must also trouble my God? 14For this reason, the Lord himself will grant to you a sign. Behold, a virgin will conceive, and she will give birth to a son, and his name will be called Immanuel. 15He will eat butter and honey, so that he may know to reject evil and to choose good. 16But even before the boy knows to refuse evil and to choose good, the land that you detest will be abandoned by the face of her two kings.
17The Lord will lead over you, and over your people, and over the house of your father, such days as have not occurred since the days of the separation of Ephraim from Judah by the king of the Assyrians. 18And this shall be in that day: the Lord will call for the fly, which is in the most distant parts of the rivers of Egypt, and for the swarm, which is in the land of Assur. 19And they will arrive, and they all will rest in the torrents of the valleys, and in the caverns of the rocks, and in every thicket, and in every opening. 20In that day, the Lord will shave with a razor the ones hired by those who are across the river, by the king of the Assyrians, from the head to the hairs of the feet, with the entire beard. 21And this shall be in that day: a man will raise a cow among oxen, and two sheep, 22and, instead of an abundance of milk, he will eat butter. For all who are left behind in the midst of the land will eat butter and honey. 23And this shall be in that day: every place, where there were a thousand grapevines worth a thousand pieces of silver, will become thorns and briers. 24They will enter such places with arrows and bows. For briers and thorns will be throughout the entire land. 25But as for all the mountains, which will be dug with a hoe, the terror of thorns and briers will not approach those places. And there will be pasture land for oxen, and a range for cattle.”