Isaiah 49:16-26

49:16 Look, I have inscribed your name ¹  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! ² 

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. ³ 

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, ⁴ 

make room for us so we can live here.’ ⁵ 

49:21 Then you will think to yourself, ⁶ 

‘Who bore these children for me?

I was bereaved and barren,

dismissed and divorced. ⁷ 

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.

49:23 Kings will be your children’s ⁸  guardians;

their princesses will nurse your children. ⁹ 

With their faces to the ground they will bow down to you

and they will lick the dirt on ¹⁰  your feet.

Then you will recognize that I am the Lord;

those who wait patiently for me are not put to shame.

49:24 Can spoils be taken from a warrior,

or captives be rescued from a conqueror? ¹¹ 

49:25 Indeed,” says the Lord,

“captives will be taken from a warrior;

spoils will be rescued from a conqueror.

I will oppose your adversary

and I will rescue your children.

49:26 I will make your oppressors eat their own flesh;

they will get drunk on their own blood, as if it were wine. ¹² 

Then all humankind ¹³  will recognize that

I am the Lord, your deliverer,

your protector, ¹⁴  the powerful ruler of Jacob.” ¹⁵ 

[49:16]  ¹ tn Heb “you.” Here the pronoun is put by metonymy for the person’s name.

[49:18]  ² tn Heb “Lift up around your eyes and see.”

[49:19]  ³ 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]  ⁴ tn Heb “me.” The singular is collective.

[49:20]  ⁵ tn Heb “draw near to me so I can dwell.”

[49:21]  ⁶ tn Heb “and you will say in your heart.”

[49:21]  ⁷ tn Or “exiled and thrust away”; NIV “exiled and rejected.”

[49:23]  ⁸ tn Heb “your,” but Zion here stands by metonymy for her children (see v. 22b).

[49:23]  ⁹ tn Heb “you.” See the preceding note.

[49:23]  ¹⁰ tn Or “at your feet” (NAB, NIV); NLT “from your feet.”

[49:24]  ¹¹ tc The Hebrew text has צָדִיק (tsadiq, “a righteous [one]”), but this makes no sense in the parallelism. The Qumran scroll 1QIsa^a reads correctly עריץ (“violent [one], tyrant”; see v. 25).

[49:26]  ¹² sn Verse 26a depicts siege warfare and bloody defeat. The besieged enemy will be so starved they will their own flesh. The bloodstained bodies lying on the blood-soaked battle site will look as if they collapsed in drunkenness.

[49:26]  ¹³ tn Heb “flesh” (so KJV, NASB).

[49:26]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “your redeemer.” See the note at 41:14.

[49:26]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “the powerful [one] of Jacob.” See 1:24.