Isaiah 23

Translated from the Hebrew of the Westminster Leningrad Codex. Tap a verse to see why it reads as it does. Tap a small letter to read its footnote.

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The oracle concerning Tyre

¹The oracle concerning Tyre. \q Wail, ships of Tarshish! Tyre lies in ruins, with no house left standing and no port to come home to. \q From the land of Kittim the news has reached them. ²Be still, you people of the coast, \q whom Sidon’s traders filled with wealth as they sailed the sea. ³The grain of Shihor crossed the mighty waters; \q what the Nile harvested brought her income, \q and she grew into a market for the nations. ⁴Hang your head in shame, Sidon, \q because the sea, the sea’s stronghold, cries out: \q “I have known no labor pains and borne no children; I have raised no young men and brought up no young women.” ⁵When the news reaches Egypt, \q they will shake with pain at what they hear of Tyre. ⁶Sail away to Tarshish! \q Wail, you who live on the coast! ⁷Is this your rejoicing city, \q whose story began in ancient days? Her own feet took her far away to make her home among strangers. ⁸Who made this plan against Tyre, which once handed out crowns? \q Her traders ranked as princes; \q her merchants were honored across the earth. ⁹The LORD of Armies planned it, \q to stain the pride that every splendor brings \q and to bring low all the earth’s honored ones. ¹⁰Spread over your land as the Nile spreads, \q Daughter Tarshish; nothing holds you in any longer. ¹¹He has reached out his hand over the sea \q and set kingdoms trembling. \q The LORD has issued orders against Canaan, \q that her fortresses be torn down. ¹²He said: You will celebrate no more, \q you ravaged virgin, Daughter Sidon. Get up, cross over to Kittim; \q even there no rest awaits you. ¹³See the land of the Chaldeans, a people who no longer exist! \q Assyria gave it over to the beasts of the wilderness. \q Its siege towers went up, its palaces were torn bare, \q and it was left a heap of rubble. ¹⁴Wail, ships of Tarshish, \q for your fortress has been laid waste!

Tyre forgotten for seventy years

¹⁵On that day Tyre will drop out of memory for seventy years, as long as one king’s lifetime. At the close of those seventy years, Tyre’s story will be like the prostitute’s song: ¹⁶“Pick up a harp and walk through the city, you prostitute whom everyone forgot! \q Play sweetly, sing song after song, \q so that someone will remember you.” ¹⁷At the end of the seventy years the LORD will turn his attention to Tyre. She will go back to earning her fee, selling herself to every kingdom of the world across the face of the earth. ¹⁸Yet what she gains and what she is paid will be holy, belonging to the LORD. No one will lock it away or pile it up. Her earnings will go to those who live in the presence of the LORD, to give them all the food they want and splendid clothing.