Isaiah 16

¹ Send the lambs for the ruler of the land from Selah to the wilderness, to the mountain of the daughter of Zion.

² For it will be that as wandering birds, as a scattered nest, so will the daughters of Moab be at the fords of the Arnon.

³ Give counsel! Execute justice! Make your shade like the night in the middle of the noonday! Hide the outcasts! Don’t betray the fugitive!

⁴ Let my outcasts dwell with you! As for Moab, be a hiding place for him from the face of the destroyer. For the extortionist is brought to nothing. Destruction ceases. The oppressors are consumed out of the land.

⁵ A throne will be established in loving kindness. One will sit on it in truth, in the tent of David, judging, seeking justice, and swift to do righteousness.

⁶ We have heard of the pride of Moab, that he is very proud; even of his arrogance, his pride, and his wrath. His boastings are nothing.

⁷ Therefore Moab will wail for Moab. Everyone will wail. You will mourn for the raisin cakes of Kir Hareseth, utterly stricken.

⁸ For the fields of Heshbon languish with the vine of Sibmah. The lords of the nations have broken down its choice branches, which reached even to Jazer, which wandered into the wilderness. Its shoots were spread abroad. They passed over the sea.

⁹ Therefore I will weep with the weeping of Jazer for the vine of Sibmah. I will water you with my tears, Heshbon, and Elealeh: for on your summer fruits and on your harvest the battle shout has fallen.

¹⁰ Gladness is taken away, and joy out of the fruitful field; and in the vineyards there will be no singing, neither joyful noise. Nobody will tread out wine in the presses. I have made the shouting stop.

¹¹ Therefore my heart sounds like a harp for Moab, and my inward parts for Kir Heres.

¹² It will happen that when Moab presents himself, when he wearies himself on the high place, and comes to his sanctuary to pray, that he will not prevail.

¹³ This is the word that the LORD spoke concerning Moab in time past.

¹⁴ But now the LORD has spoken, saying, “Within three years, as a worker bound by contract would count them, the glory of Moab shall be brought into contempt, with all his great multitude; and the remnant will be very small and feeble.”

Around Isaiah 16

Context

Context for this book is being written. A note appears here only once it names its sources.

AI explanation

About Isaiah as a whole · Written by an AI model · Not reviewed by a theological reader

This explanation was written by an AI model to help you get started. It names no sources and can contain mistakes. Scripture comes first, and context with sources is shown separately on this page.

What this book is about

It begins with a vision. In the year that King Uzziah died, the prophet sees the Lord on a throne, high and lifted up, and voices call, “Holy, holy, holy, is the LORD of Armies!” Then comes a call for someone to go, and the answer, “Here I am. Send me!”

What he is sent to say is hard and then tender. To Judah and Jerusalem, the first part of the book (chapters 1 to 39) warns of the consequences of injustice and false trust, and it promises a child who will rule on David’s throne. The second part (40 to 55) opens with “Comfort, comfort my people” and speaks to a people in exile, and it tells of a servant who suffers for others. The last part (56 to 66) looks ahead to a renewed people and to a new heavens and a new earth.

Background

Isaiah son of Amoz prophesied in Jerusalem in the second half of the eighth century before Christ, while the Assyrian threat hung over the land. Many scholars think chapters 40 to 66 come from later prophets in his tradition, speaking during and after the exile. Others hold that Isaiah wrote the whole book. Either way, the book reads as one long conversation between God and a people who swing between fear and false confidence.

How Christians read it

No prophet is quoted more in the New Testament. Readers have long weighed who the suffering servant is. Christians read the servant of chapter 53 as fulfilled in the death of Jesus, and Jewish interpretation has most often understood the servant as Israel. Passages such as 7:14 and 9:6 are read by Christians as pointing to Christ, while also having a meaning in Isaiah’s own day. These are old readings held by people who love the same pages.

About this explanation

Written by Claude Sonnet 5.5, an AI model, on 20 October 2026. It draws on the WEB text and general knowledge and was not checked against sources by a person. Every quotation from Scripture is checked automatically against the WEB text.

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