1 | Call with the throat, restrain not, As a trumpet lift up thy voice, And declare to My people their transgression, And to the house of Jacob their sins; |
2 | Seeing -- Me day by day they seek, And the knowledge of My ways they desire, As a nation that righteousness hath done, And the judgment of its God hath not forsaken, They ask of me judgments of righteousness, The drawing near of God they desire: |
3 | `Why have we fasted, and Thou hast not seen? We have afflicted our soul, and Thou knowest not.` Lo, in the day of your fast ye find pleasure, And all your labours ye exact. |
4 | Lo, for strife and debate ye fast, And to smite with the fist of wickedness, Ye fast not as [to]-day, To sound in the high place your voice. |
5 | Like this is the fast that I choose? The day of a man`s afflicting his soul? To bow as a reed his head, And sackcloth and ashes spread out? This dost thou call a fast, And a desirable day -- to Jehovah? |
6 | Is not this the fast that I chose -- To loose the bands of wickedness, To shake off the burdens of the yoke, And to send out the oppressed free, And every yoke ye draw off? |
7 | Is it not to deal to the hungry thy bread, And the mourning poor bring home, That thou seest the naked and cover him, And from thine own flesh hide not thyself? |
8 | Then broken up as the dawn is thy light, And thy health in haste springeth up, Gone before thee hath thy righteousness, The honour of Jehovah doth gather thee. |
9 | Then thou callest, and Jehovah answereth, Thou criest, and He saith, `Behold Me.` If thou turn aside from thy midst the yoke, The sending forth of the finger, And the speaking of vanity, |
10 | And dost bring out to the hungry thy soul, And the afflicted soul dost satisfy, Then risen in the darkness hath thy light, And thy thick darkness [is] as noon. |
11 | And Jehovah doth lead thee continually, And hath satisfied in drought thy soul, And thy bones He armeth, And thou hast been as a watered garden, And as an outlet of waters, whose waters lie not. |
12 | And they have built out of thee the wastes of old, The foundations of many generations thou raisest up, And one calleth thee, `Repairer of the breach, Restorer of paths to rest in.` |
13 | If thou dost turn from the sabbath thy foot, Doing thine own pleasure on My holy day, And hast cried to the sabbath, `A delight,` To the holy of Jehovah, `Honoured,` And hast honoured it, without doing thine own ways, Without finding thine own pleasure, And speaking a word. |
14 | Then dost thou delight thyself on Jehovah, And I have caused thee to ride on high places of earth, And have caused thee to eat the inheritance of Jacob thy father, For the mouth of Jehovah hath spoken! |