Isaiah 33 Free Bible Version
Audio: World English Bible (WEB), read by Winfred W. Henson · About the recordings
1 Tragedy is coming to you, you destroyer who has not experienced destruction yourself, you deceiver who has not experienced deception yourself! When you have finished with your destroying, you will be destroyed yourself. When you are finished with your deceiving, you will be deceived yourselves.
1 Woe to you who destroy, but you weren’t destroyed, and who betray, but nobody betrayed you! When you have finished destroying, you will be destroyed; and when you have finished betrayal, you will be betrayed.
2 Lord, please be kind to us; we put our confidence in you. Be the strength we rely on every morning; be our salvation in times of trouble.
2 Yahweh, be gracious to us. We have waited for you. Be our strength every morning, our salvation also in the time of trouble.
3 When you roar, the peoples run away; when you prepare for action, the nations scatter!
3 At the noise of the thunder, the peoples have fled. When you lift yourself up, the nations are scattered.
4 You plunder defeated enemy armies like caterpillars eating up plants; like an attack of swarming locusts.
4 Your plunder will be gathered as the caterpillar gathers. Men will leap on it as locusts leap.
5 The Lord is praised for he lives in highest heaven; he has filled Zion with justice and right.
5 Yahweh is exalted, for he dwells on high. He has filled Zion with justice and righteousness.
6 He will be your constant support throughout your lives an abundant source of salvation, wisdom, and knowledge. Reverence for the Lord is what makes Zion rich.
6 There will be stability in your times, abundance of salvation, wisdom, and knowledge. The fear of Yahweh is your treasure.
7 But look! Even your bravest soldiers are crying loudly in the street; the messengers you sent to ask for peace are weeping bitterly.
7 Behold, their valiant ones cry outside; the ambassadors of peace weep bitterly.
8 Your highways are deserted; nobody's traveling on your roads anymore. He breaks the treaty; he despises the witnesses; he doesn't care about anybody.
8 The highways are desolate. The traveling man ceases. The covenant is broken. He has despised the cities. He doesn’t respect man.
9 Israel is in mourning and fades away; Lebanon withers in shame; the fields of Sharon have become a desert; the forests of Bashan and Carmel have shed their leaves.
9 The land mourns and languishes. Lebanon is confounded and withers away. Sharon is like a desert, and Bashan and Carmel are stripped bare.
10 “But now I'm going to intervene!” says the Lord. “I'm prepared to act! I will show myself to be above all others!
10 “Now I will arise,” says Yahweh. “Now I will lift myself up. Now I will be exalted.
11 All you give birth to is only dry grass, all you deliver is just stubble. Your breath is a fire that will burn you up.
11 You will conceive chaff. You will give birth to stubble. Your breath is a fire that will devour you.
12 You people will be burned to ashes like thorns that are cut down and thrown into the fire.
12 The peoples will be like the burning of lime, like thorns that are cut down and burned in the fire.
13 Those of you who are far away, recognize what I have accomplished; those of you who are nearby, recognize how powerful I am.”
13 Hear, you who are far off, what I have done; and, you who are near, acknowledge my might.”
14 The sinners who live in Zion tremble with fear; those who are irreligious are overcome with terror. They ask, “Who can live with this fire that consumes everything? Who can live among such everlasting burning?”
14 The sinners in Zion are afraid. Trembling has seized the godless ones. Who among us can live with the devouring fire? Who among us can live with everlasting burning?
15 Those who live right and speak the truth, those who refuse to profit from extortion and refuse to take bribes, who don't listen to plots to kill people, who close their eyes rather than look at evil.
15 He who walks righteously and speaks blamelessly, he who despises the gain of oppressions, who gestures with his hands, refusing to take a bribe, who stops his ears from hearing of bloodshed, and shuts his eyes from looking at evil—
16 They will live on high; they will be protected by the mountain fortresses; they will always be provided with food and will always have water.
16 he will dwell on high. His place of defense will be the fortress of rocks. His bread will be supplied. His waters will be sure.
17 You will see the king in his wonderful appearance, and you will view a land that stretches into the distance.
17 Your eyes will see the king in his beauty. They will see a distant land.
18 In your mind you will think about the terrifying things that were expected, and then ask yourself, “Where are the enemy officials—the scribes who were to record events, the treasurers who were to weigh the looted money, the surveyors who were to count and destroy the towers?”
18 Your heart will meditate on the terror. Where is he who counted? Where is he who weighed? Where is he who counted the towers?
19 You won't see these offensive people anymore with their barbaric language that sounds like someone stammering and is impossible to understand.
19 You will no longer see the fierce people, a people of a deep speech that you can’t comprehend, with a strange language that you can’t understand.
20 On the contrary, you'll see Zion as a festival city. You will view Jerusalem as a quiet and peaceful place. It will be like a tent that's never taken down, whose tent-pegs are never pulled up, whose guy ropes never snap.
20 Look at Zion, the city of our appointed festivals. Your eyes will see Jerusalem, a quiet habitation, a tent that won’t be removed. Its stakes will never be plucked up, nor will any of its cords be broken.
21 Right here our majestic Lord will be like a place of broad rivers and waters that no enemy ship with oars can cross—no great ship can pass.
21 But there Yahweh will be with us in majesty, a place of wide rivers and streams, in which no galley with oars will go, neither will any gallant ship pass by there.
22 For the Lord is our judge, the Lord is our lawgiver, the Lord is our king. He is the one who will save us.
22 For Yahweh is our judge. Yahweh is our lawgiver. Yahweh is our king. He will save us.
23 The rigging on your ship hangs loose so the mast isn't secure and the sail can't be spread. Then all the looted treasure you're carrying will be divided among the victors—even those who are lame will have their share.
23 Your rigging is untied. They couldn’t strengthen the foot of their mast. They couldn’t spread the sail. Then the prey of a great plunder was divided. The lame took the prey.
24 Nobody in Israel will say, “I'm sick,” and those who live there will have their guilt removed.
24 The inhabitant won’t say, “I am sick.” The people who dwell therein will be forgiven their iniquity.
Cross references (24)
Related passages for each verse, from the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge as collected and ranked by readers at OpenBible.info.
- 1 Matthew 7:2; Isaiah 24:16; Isaiah 10:12; Revelation 17:17; Obadiah 10–16
- 2 2 Corinthians 1:3–4; Isaiah 30:18–19; Isaiah 59:16; Psalm 62:8; Psalm 60:11
- 3 Isaiah 10:13–14; Isaiah 10:32–34; Isaiah 37:11–18; Isaiah 59:16–18; Psalm 46:6
- 4 2 Chronicles 20:25; Isaiah 33:23; 2 Chronicles 14:13; Joel 2:9; Joel 2:25
- 5 Isaiah 2:17; Romans 11:26; Revelation 19:2–6; Daniel 4:37; Ephesians 1:20–21
- 6 Psalm 112:1–3; Proverbs 19:23; 1 Timothy 4:8; Matthew 6:33; Proverbs 14:27
- 7 2 Kings 18:18; 2 Kings 18:37–19:3; Isaiah 36:22; Isaiah 36:3
- 8 Judges 5:6; Isaiah 35:8; Isaiah 10:29–31; Lamentations 1:4; Isaiah 10:9–11
- 9 Isaiah 35:2; Isaiah 65:10; Nahum 1:4; Zechariah 11:1–3; Isaiah 3:26
- 10 Psalm 12:5; Psalm 102:13–18; Amos 6:1; Isaiah 42:13–14; Isaiah 59:16–17
- 11 Isaiah 59:4; Psalm 7:14; James 1:15; Acts 5:4; Isaiah 10:7–14
- 12 2 Samuel 23:6–7; Isaiah 27:4; Isaiah 37:36; Amos 2:1; Isaiah 10:17
- 13 Psalm 48:10; Ephesians 2:11–18; Daniel 3:27–4:3; Isaiah 49:1; Psalm 147:12–14
- 14 Hebrews 12:29; Isaiah 66:24; Matthew 25:46; Deuteronomy 5:24–25; Matthew 18:8
- 15 Psalm 119:37; 1 John 3:7; Ephesians 5:11–13; Deuteronomy 16:19; Romans 2:7
- 16 Luke 12:29–31; Isaiah 32:18; Proverbs 1:33; Isaiah 49:10; Proverbs 18:10
- 17 Zechariah 9:17; 1 John 3:2; John 14:21; 2 Corinthians 4:18; John 17:24
- 18 1 Corinthians 1:20; Psalm 71:20; Isaiah 17:14; Psalm 31:7–8; 2 Kings 18:31
- 19 Isaiah 28:11; Deuteronomy 28:49–50; Jeremiah 5:15; 2 Kings 19:32; Exodus 14:13
- 20 Psalm 46:5; Isaiah 54:2; Isaiah 32:18; Matthew 16:18; Isaiah 37:33
- 21 Psalm 46:4–5; Isaiah 41:18; Isaiah 48:18; Isaiah 66:12; 2 Corinthians 4:4–6
- 22 James 4:12; Acts 5:31; Zephaniah 3:15–17; Psalm 89:18; Isaiah 12:2
- 23 2 Kings 7:8; 1 Corinthians 1:27; Psalm 68:12; Isaiah 33:21; Acts 27:40–41
- 24 Jeremiah 50:20; Revelation 21:4; Exodus 15:26; 1 John 1:7–9; Isaiah 58:8
Cross references: OpenBible.info (CC BY), drawn mainly from the public-domain Treasury of Scripture Knowledge. · Sources & licences
What the Fathers said
Passages from the Church Fathers that expound or quote this chapter, verbatim from the public-domain Schaff edition (19th-century English translations).
How these were chosen
“Commentary” is the opening of a homily or exposition on this chapter (John Chrysostom’s homilies, Augustine’s tractates, sermons and expositions of the Psalms). “Quotes” are sentences where the edition’s own footnotes identify a quotation of a verse here, kept only when the wording matches the verse. Only works whose authorship is not in doubt are used. Psalms follow the Hebrew/English numbering (Augustine numbers them as the Septuagint does: his Psalm 50 is Psalm 51 here).
… them because He loves them, and will spare them: He will Himself set them free." And that He should Himself become very man, visible, when He should be the Word giving salvation, Isaiah again says: "Behold, city of Zion: thine eyes shall see our salvation." And that it was not a mere man who died for us, Isaiah says: "And …