1 Hearken to me, ye that follow after righteousness, ye that seek the LORD; look unto the rock from which ye are hewn and to the hole of the pit from which ye are dug. 2 Look unto Abraham your father and unto Sarah that bore you; for I called him alone and blessed him and multiplied him. 3 For the LORD shall surely comfort Zion; he will comfort all her waste places; and he will make her wilderness like Eden and her desert like the garden of the LORD; joy and gladness shall be found therein, thanksgiving, and the voice of singing.
4 Hearken unto me, my people, and give ear unto me, O my nation: for the law shall proceed from me, and I will uncover my judgment for a light of the peoples. 5 My righteousness is near; my saving health is gone forth, and my arms shall judge the people; the isles shall wait upon me; and on my arm shall they place their hope. 6 Lift up your eyes to the heavens, and look upon the earth beneath; for the heavens shall vanish away like smoke, and the earth shall wax old like a garment, and those that dwell therein shall perish in like manner; but my saving health shall be for ever, and my righteousness shall never perish.
7 Hearken unto me, ye that know righteousness, the people in whose heart is my law; do not fear the reproach of men, neither be afraid of their revilings. 8 For the moth shall eat them up like a garment, and the worm shall eat them like wool: but my righteousness shall be for ever, and my saving health from age to age.
9 Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of the LORD; awake, as in the ancient days, in ages past. Art thou not he who cut off the proud one, and he who smote the dragon? 10 Art thou not he who dried up the sea, the waters of the great deep; he who turned the depths of the sea into a way, that the redeemed might pass over? 11 Therefore the ransomed of the LORD shall return and come with singing unto Zion; and everlasting joy shall be upon their head; they shall obtain gladness and joy; and sorrow and mourning shall flee away.
12 I, even I, am he that comforts you. Who art thou that thou should be afraid of man that is mortal and of the son of man which shall be counted as stubble? 13 And thou hast already forgotten the LORD thy maker that has stretched forth the heavens and laid the foundations of the earth and hast feared continually every day the fury of the oppressor when he was ready to destroy. But, where is the fury of the oppressor? 14 The prisoner is anxious that he may be loosed and that he should not die in the pit nor that his bread should fail. 15 And I am the LORD thy God that divides the sea and the waves roar; I am thy God; the LORD of the hosts is his name. 16 That has placed my words in thy mouth, and I have covered thee with the shadow of my hand, that thou may plant the heavens and lay the foundations of the earth and say unto Zion, Thou art my people.
17 Awake, awake, stand up, O Jerusalem, which hast drunk at the hand of the LORD the cup of his fury; thou hast drunken the dregs of the cup of trembling and wrung them out. 18 There is no one to guide her among all the sons whom she has brought forth; neither is there any that takes her by the hand of all the sons that she has brought up. 19 These two things are come unto thee; who shall be sorry for thee? desolation, and destruction, and the famine, and the sword. Who shall comfort thee? 20 Thy sons have fainted, they lie at the head of all the streets as a wild bull in a net: they are full of the fury of the LORD, the rebuke of thy God.
21 Therefore now hear this, thou afflicted and drunken, but not with wine: 22 Thus has thy Lord said, I AM thy God who pleads the cause of his people; Behold, I have taken out of thine hand the cup of trembling, even the dregs of the cup of my fury; thou shalt no more drink it again: 23 But I will put it into the hand of those that afflict thee, which have said to thy soul, Bow down, that we may go over: and thou hast laid thy body as the ground and as the street to those that went over.