Isaiah 27
1 In that day the Lord with his sore and great and mightie sword shall visite Liuiathan, that pearcing serpent, euen Liuiathan, that crooked serpent, and he shall slay the dragon that is in the sea.
At that time, Yahweh will punish Leviathan, the swift-moving monster/dragon, that coiling serpent that lives in the sea. Yahweh will kill it with his sharp, huge, and powerful sword.
2 In that daye sing of the vineyarde of redde wine.
At that time, [Yahweh will say], “You [Israeli people, who are like] [MET] a fruitful vineyard, must sing!
3 I the Lord doe keepe it: I will water it euery moment: least any assaile it, I will keepe it night and day.
I will [protect you] [like a farmer] [MET] waters his crops carefully [in order that they will grow well]. I will guard you day and night, in order that no one harms you.
4 Anger is not in mee: who would set the briers and the thornes against me in battel? I would go through them, I would burne them together.
I am no [longer] angry [with my people]; [if any of your enemies try to injure you like briers and thorns injure people] [MET], I will attack them [in battles]; I will get rid of them completely,
5 Or will he feele my strength, that he may make peace with me, and be at one with me?
unless they request me to protect them; I strongly invite them to make peace with me [DOU]!”
6 Hereafter, Iaakob shall take roote: Israel shall florish and growe, and the world shall be filled with fruite.
There will be a time when the (descendants of Jacob/Israeli people) will [prosper like] a plant that has good roots; they will be like [MET] trees that bud and blossom and bear a lot of fruit; [what they do will bless] all the people in the world.
7 Hath hee smitten him as hee smote those that smote him? or is hee slaine according to the slaughter of them that were slaine by him?
[But now I ask], has Yahweh punished us Israelis like he punished our enemies? Has he punished us as much as he punished them?
8 In measure in the branches thereof wilt thou contende with it, when he bloweth with his rough winde in the day of the East winde.
[No, he has not done that], [but] he punished us Israeli people and (exiled us/forced us to leave our country); we were taken away from our land as though [SIM] we were struck by a windstorm from the east.
9 By this therefore shall the iniquitie of Iaakob be purged, and this is all the fruit, the taking away of his sinne: whe he shall make all the stones of the altars, as chalke stones broken in pieces, that the groues and images may not stand vp.
Yahweh did that in order to punish us for our sins, and remove our guilt. As a result [of our being exiled], all the altars to other gods [in Israel] will be demolished, and we will be forgiven for the sins that we have committed. There will be no more poles for worshiping the goddess Asherah, or altars for burning incense to other gods; they will all be torn down.
10 Yet the defenced citie shalbe desolate, and the habitation shalbe forsaken, and left like a wildernes. There shall the calfe feede, and there shall he lie, and consume the branches thereof.
The cities that have strong walls around them will be empty; like the desert, they will have no one living in them. The houses will be abandoned, and the streets will be full of weeds. Calves will eat grass there and lie down there; they will chew up all the leaves on the trees.
11 When the boughes of it are drie, they shalbe broken: the women come, and set them on fire: for it is a people of none vnderstading: therefore hee that made them, shall not haue compassion of them, and he that formed them, shall haue no mercie on them.
[The Israeli people are like] [MET] dry branches on a tree; women break them off and use them to make fires [under their cooking pots]. Our Israeli people do not have any sense; so Yahweh, who created them, will not act mercifully toward them or be kind to them.
12 And in that day shall the Lord thresh from the chanell of the Riuer vnto the riuer of Egypt, and ye shalbe gathered, one by one, O children of Israel.
[However], there will be a time when Yahweh will gather them together [again; he will separate them from the people who have conquered them, like people] separate wheat from chaff. He will bring them [back to Israel], one by one, from [the land between] the Euphrates River [in the northeast] and the brook at the border of Egypt [in the southwest].
13 In that day also shall the great trumpet be blowen, and they shall come, which perished in the land of Asshur: and they that were chased into the lande of Egypt, and they shall worship the Lord in the holy Mount at Ierusalem.
At that time, a trumpet will be blown very loudly. And those who were exiled to Assyria and Egypt and who almost died there will return to Jerusalem, to worship Yahweh on [Zion], his holy hill.
