Isaiah 49:1-22

Ideal Israel Delivers the Exiles

49:1 Listen to me, you coastlands! ¹ 

Pay attention, you people who live far away!

The Lord summoned me from birth; ² 

he commissioned me when my mother brought me into the world. ³ 

49:2 He made my mouth like a sharp sword,

he hid me in the hollow of his hand;

he made me like a sharpened ⁴  arrow,

he hid me in his quiver. ⁵ 

49:3 He said to me, “You are my servant,

Israel, through whom I will reveal my splendor.” ⁶ 

49:4 But I thought, ⁷  “I have worked in vain;

I have expended my energy for absolutely nothing.” ⁸ 

But the Lord will vindicate me;

my God will reward me. ⁹ 

49:5 So now the Lord says,

the one who formed me from birth ¹⁰  to be his servant –

he did this ¹¹  to restore Jacob to himself,

so that Israel might be gathered to him;

and I will be honored ¹²  in the Lord’s sight,

for my God is my source of strength ¹³  –

49:6 he says, “Is it too insignificant a task for you to be my servant,

to reestablish the tribes of Jacob,

and restore the remnant ¹⁴  of Israel? ¹⁵ 

I will make you a light to the nations, ¹⁶ 

so you can bring ¹⁷  my deliverance to the remote regions of the earth.”

49:7 This is what the Lord,

the protector ¹⁸  of Israel, their Holy One, ¹⁹  says

to the one who is despised ²⁰  and rejected ²¹  by nations, ²² 

a servant of rulers:

“Kings will see and rise in respect, ²³ 

princes will bow down,

because of the faithful Lord,

the Holy One of Israel who has chosen you.”

49:8 This is what the Lord says:

“At the time I decide to show my favor, I will respond to you;

in the day of deliverance I will help you;

I will protect you ²⁴  and make you a covenant mediator for people, ²⁵ 

to rebuild ²⁶  the land ²⁷ 

and to reassign the desolate property.

49:9 You will say ²⁸  to the prisoners, ‘Come out,’

and to those who are in dark dungeons, ²⁹  ‘Emerge.’ ³⁰ 

They will graze beside the roads;

on all the slopes they will find pasture.

49:10 They will not be hungry or thirsty;

the sun’s oppressive heat will not beat down on them, ³¹ 

for one who has compassion on them will guide them;

he will lead them to springs of water.

49:11 I will make all my mountains into a road;

I will construct my roadways.”

49:12 Look, they come from far away!

Look, some come from the north and west,

and others from the land of Sinim! ³² 

49:13 Shout for joy, O sky! ³³ 

Rejoice, O earth!

Let the mountains give a joyful shout!

For the Lord consoles his people

and shows compassion to the ³⁴  oppressed.

The Lord Remembers Zion

49:14 “Zion said, ‘The Lord has abandoned me,

the sovereign master ³⁵  has forgotten me.’

49:15 Can a woman forget her baby who nurses at her breast? ³⁶ 

Can she withhold compassion from the child she has borne? ³⁷ 

Even if mothers ³⁸  were to forget,

I could never forget you! ³⁹ 

49:16 Look, I have inscribed your name ⁴⁰  on my palms;

your walls are constantly before me.

49:17 Your children hurry back,

while those who destroyed and devastated you depart.

49:18 Look all around you! ⁴¹ 

All of them gather to you.

As surely as I live,” says the Lord,

“you will certainly wear all of them like jewelry;

you will put them on as if you were a bride.

49:19 Yes, your land lies in ruins;

it is desolate and devastated. ⁴² 

But now you will be too small to hold your residents,

and those who devoured you will be far away.

49:20 Yet the children born during your time of bereavement

will say within your hearing,

‘This place is too cramped for us, ⁴³ 

make room for us so we can live here.’ ⁴⁴ 

49:21 Then you will think to yourself, ⁴⁵ 

‘Who bore these children for me?

I was bereaved and barren,

dismissed and divorced. ⁴⁶ 

Who raised these children?

Look, I was left all alone;

where did these children come from?’”

49:22 This is what the sovereign Lord says:

“Look I will raise my hand to the nations;

I will raise my signal flag to the peoples.

They will bring your sons in their arms

and carry your daughters on their shoulders.

[49:1]  ¹ tn Or “islands” (NASB, NIV); NLT “in far-off lands.”

[49:1]  ² tn Heb “called me from the womb.”

[49:1]  ³ tn Heb “from the inner parts of my mother he mentioned my name.”

[49:2]  ⁴ tn Or perhaps, “polished” (so KJV, ASV, NAB, NIV, NRSV); NASB “a select arrow.”

[49:2]  ⁵ sn The figurative language emphasizes the servant’s importance as the Lord’s effective instrument. The servant’s mouth, which stands metonymically for his words, is compared to a sharp sword because he will be an effective spokesman on God’s behalf (see 50:4). The Lord holds his hand on the servant, ready to draw and use him at the appropriate time. The servant is like a sharpened arrow reserved in a quiver for just the right moment.

[49:3]  ⁶ sn This verse identifies the servant as Israel. This seems to refer to the exiled nation (cf. 41:8-9; 44:1-2, 21; 45:4; 48:20), but in vv. 5-6 this servant says he has been commissioned to reconcile Israel to God, so he must be distinct from the exiled nation. This servant is an ideal “Israel” who, like Moses of old, mediates a covenant for the nation (see v. 8), leads them out of bondage (v. 9a), and carries out God’s original plan for Israel by positively impacting the pagan nations (see v. 6b). By living according to God’s law, Israel was to be a model of God’s standards of justice to the surrounding nations (Deut 4:6-8). The sinful nation failed, but the servant, the ideal “Israel,” will succeed by establishing justice throughout the earth.

[49:4]  ⁷ tn Or “said” (KJV, NASB, NIV, NRSV); NLT “I replied.”

[49:4]  ⁸ tn Heb “for nothing and emptiness.” Synonyms are combined to emphasize the common idea.

[49:4]  ⁹ tn Heb “But my justice is with the Lord, and my reward [or “wage”] with my God.”

[49:5]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “from the womb” (so KJV, NASB).

[49:5]  ¹¹ tn The words “he did this” are supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons. In the Hebrew text the infinitive construct of purpose is subordinated to the previous statement.

[49:5]  ¹² tn The vav (ו) + imperfect is translated here as a result clause; one might interpret it as indicating purpose, “and so I might be honored.”

[49:5]  ¹³ tn Heb “and my God is [perhaps, “having been”] my strength.” The disjunctive structure (vav [ו] + subject + verb) is interpreted here as indicating a causal circumstantial clause.

[49:6]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “the protected [or “preserved”] ones.”

[49:6]  ¹⁵ sn The question is purely rhetorical; it does not imply that the servant was dissatisfied with his commission or that he minimized the restoration of Israel.

[49:6]  ¹⁶ tn See the note at 42:6.

[49:6]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “be” (so KJV, ASV); CEV “you must take.”

[49:7]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “redeemer.” See the note at 41:14.

[49:7]  ¹⁹ sn See the note on the phrase “the Holy One of Israel” in 1:4.

[49:7]  ²⁰ tc The Hebrew text reads literally “to [one who] despises life.” It is preferable to read with the Qumran scroll 1QIsa^a לבזוי, which should be vocalized as a passive participle, לִבְזוּי (livzuy, “to the one despised with respect to life” [נֶפֶשׁ is a genitive of specification]). The consonantal sequence וי was probably misread as ה in the MT tradition. The contextual argument favors the 1QIsa^a reading. As J. N. Oswalt (Isaiah [NICOT], 2:294) points out, the three terse phrases “convey a picture of lowliness, worthlessness, and helplessness.”

[49:7]  ²¹ tn MT’s Piel participle (“to the one who rejects”) does not fit contextually. The form should be revocalized as a Pual, “to the one rejected.”

[49:7]  ²² tn Parallelism (see “rulers,” “kings,” “princes”) suggests that the singular גּוֹי (goy) be emended to a plural or understood in a collective sense (see 55:5).

[49:7]  ²³ tn For this sense of קוּם (qum), see Gen 19:1; 23:7; 33:10; Lev 19:32; 1 Sam 20:41; 25:41; 1 Kgs 2:19; Job 29:8.

[49:8]  ²⁴ tn The translation assumes the verb is derived from the root נָצָר (natsar, “protect”). Some prefer to derive it from the root יָצָר (yatsar, “form”).

[49:8]  ²⁵ tn Heb “a covenant of people.” A person cannot literally be a covenant; בְּרִית (bÿrit) is probably metonymic here, indicating a covenant mediator. Here עָם (’am, “people”) appears to refer to Israel. See the note at 42:6.

[49:8]  ²⁶ tn The Hiphil of קוּם (qum, “arise”) is probably used here in the sense of “rebuild.”

[49:8]  ²⁷ tn The “land” probably stands by metonymy for the ruins within it.

[49:9]  ²⁸ tn Heb “to say.” In the Hebrew text the infinitive construct is subordinated to what precedes.

[49:9]  ²⁹ tn Heb “in darkness” (so KJV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV); NLT “the prisoners of darkness.”

[49:9]  ³⁰ tn Heb “show yourselves” (so ASV, NAB, NASB).

[49:10]  ³¹ tn Heb “and the heat and the sun will not strike them.” In Isa 35:7, its only other occurrence in the OT, שָׁרָב (sharav) stands parallel to “parched ground” and in contrast to “pool.” In later Hebrew and Aramaic it refers to “dry heat, heat of the sun” (Jastrow 1627 s.v.). Here it likely has this nuance and forms a hendiadys with “sun.”

[49:12]  ³² tc The MT reads “Sinim” here; the Dead Sea Scrolls read “Syene,” a location in Egypt associated with modern Aswan. A number of recent translations adopt this reading: “Syene” (NAB, NRSV); “Aswan” (NIV); “Egypt” (NLT).

[49:13]  ³³ tn Or “O heavens.” The Hebrew term שָׁמַיִם (shamayim) may be translated “heavens” or “sky” depending on the context.

[49:13]  ³⁴ tn Heb “his” (so KJV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV).

[49:14]  ³⁵ tn The Hebrew term translated “sovereign master” here is אֲדֹנָי (’adonay).

[49:15]  ³⁶ tn Heb “her suckling”; NASB “her nursing child.”

[49:15]  ³⁷ tn Heb “so as not to have compassion on the son of her womb?”

[49:15]  ³⁸ tn Heb “these” (so ASV, NASB).

[49:15]  ³⁹ sn The argument of v. 15 seems to develop as follows: The Lord has an innate attachment to Zion, just like a mother does for her infant child. But even if mothers were to suddenly abandon their children, the Lord would never forsake Zion. In other words, the Lord’s attachment to Zion is like a mother’s attachment to her infant child, but even stronger.

[49:16]  ⁴⁰ tn Heb “you.” Here the pronoun is put by metonymy for the person’s name.

[49:18]  ⁴¹ tn Heb “Lift up around your eyes and see.”

[49:19]  ⁴² tn Heb “Indeed your ruins and your desolate places, and the land of your destruction.” This statement is abruptly terminated in the Hebrew text and left incomplete.

[49:20]  ⁴³ tn Heb “me.” The singular is collective.

[49:20]  ⁴⁴ tn Heb “draw near to me so I can dwell.”

[49:21]  ⁴⁵ tn Heb “and you will say in your heart.”

[49:21]  ⁴⁶ tn Or “exiled and thrust away”; NIV “exiled and rejected.”