Isaiah 8
Open in the reader1Then He-Who-Is said to me, “Take a large scroll and write on it with an ordinary stylus: Swift-Is-Spoil-Hasty-Is-Plunder.
2And I will appoint for Myself trustworthy witnesses—My-Light-Is-He-Who-Is the priest and He-Who-Is-Remembers son of Jeberekiah.”
3And I had relations with the prophetess, and she conceived and gave birth to a son. He-Who-Is said to me, “Name him Swift-Is-Spoil-Hasty-Is-Plunder.
4For before the boy knows how to cry ‘Father’ or ‘Mother,’ the wealth of Damascus and the plunder of Watch-Mountain will be carried off by the king of Successful.”
5And He-Who-Is spoke to me further:
6“Because this people has rejected the gently flowing waters of Shiloah and rejoiced in Delightful and the son of He-Who-Is-Has-Adorned,
7the Lord will surely bring against them the mighty floodwaters of the Rushing — the king of Successful and all his pomp. It will overflow its channels and overrun its banks.
8It will pour into Praised, swirling and sweeping over it, reaching up to the neck; its spreading streams will cover your entire land, God-With-Us Immanuel!
9Huddle together, O peoples, and be shattered; pay attention, all you distant lands; prepare for battle, and be shattered; prepare for battle, and be shattered!
10Devise a plan, but it will be thwarted; state a proposal, but it will not happen. For God is with us.”
11For this is what He-Who-Is has spoken to me with a strong hand, instructing me not to walk in the way of this people:
12“Do not call conspiracy everything these people regard as conspiracy. Do not fear what they fear; do not live in dread.
13He-Who-Is of Hosts is the One you shall regard as devoted. Only He should be feared; only He should be dreaded.
14And He will be a sanctuary— but to both houses of Strives-with-God a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense, to the dwellers of Foundation-of-Peace a trap and a snare.
15Many will stumble over these; they will fall and be broken; they will be ensnared and captured.”
16Bind up the testimony and seal the teaching among my disciples.
17I will wait for He-Who-Is, who is hiding His face from the house of Heel-Grabber. I will put my trust in Him.
18Here am I, and the children He-Who-Is has given me as signs and symbols in Strives-with-God from He-Who-Is of Hosts, who dwells on Mount Marker.
19When men tell you to consult mediums and spiritists who whisper and mutter, shouldn’t a people consult their God instead? Why consult the dead on behalf of the living?
20To the teaching and to the testimony! If they do not speak according to this word, they have no light of dawn.
21They will roam the land, dejected and hungry. When they are famished, they will become enraged; and looking upward, they will curse their king and their God.
22Then they will look to the earth and see only distress and darkness and the gloom of anguish. And they will be driven into utter darkness.
23Nevertheless, there will be no more gloom for those in distress. In the past He humbled the land of Dwelling and the land of My-Wrestling, but in the future He will honor the Way of the Sea, beyond the Descender, The-Circuit of the nations: