Study Desk

They said to him, "This is what Hizkiyahu says: ‘Today is a day of trouble, rebuke and disgrace. Children are ready to be born, but there is no strength to bring them to birth.

The living, the living — they can thank you, as I do today; fathers will make their children know about your faithfulness.

Thus says Adonai , the Holy One of Isra'el, his Maker: "You ask for signs concerning my children? You give orders concerning the work of my hands?

Now hear this, you lover of luxuries, lolling at ease and saying to yourself, ‘I am important, and no one else! I will never be a widow or know the loss of children.'

But both will come over you in an instant, in a single day loss of children and widowhood; they will utterly overwhelm you, despite your many occult practices and powerful spells to prevent it."

Your children are coming quickly, your destroyers and plunderers are leaving and going.

The day will come when the children born when you were mourning will say to you, "This place is too cramped for me! Give me room, so I can live!"

Then you will ask yourself, "Who fathered these for me? I've been mourning my children, alone, as an exile, wandering to and fro; so who has raised these? I was left alone, so where have these come from?"

Here is Adonai 's answer: "Even a warrior's captives will be snatched away, and the booty of the fearful will be freed. I will fight those who fight you, and I will save your children.

There is no one to guide her among all the sons she has borne. Not one of all the children she raised is taking her by the hand.

Your children lie helpless at every street corner, like an antelope trapped in a net; they are full of Adonai 's fury, the rebuke of your God.

"Sing, barren woman who has never had a child! Burst into song, shout for joy, you who have never been in labor! For the deserted wife will have more children than the woman who is living with her husband," says Adonai .

All your children will be taught by Adonai ; your children will have great peace.

"But you, you witches' children, come here, you spawn of adulterers and whores!

Whom are you making fun of? At whom are you laughing and sticking out your tongue? Aren't you rebellious children, just a brood of liars?

You go into heat among the oak trees, under every spreading tree. You kill the children in the valleys under the cracks in the rocks.

"And as for me," says Adonai , "this is my covenant with them: my Spirit, who rests on you, and my words which I put in your mouth will not depart from your mouth or from the mouth of your children, or from the mouth of your children's children, now or ever," says Adonai .

The coastlands are putting their hope in me, with the ‘Tarshish' ships in the lead, to bring your children from far away, and with them their silver and gold, for the sake of Adonai your God, the Holy One of Isra'el, who glorifies you.

The children of your oppressors will come and bow low before you, all who despised you will fall at your feet, calling you the city of Adonai , Tziyon of the Holy One of Isra'el.

For he said, "They are indeed my people, children who are not disloyal." So he became their Savior.