Listen, you women who lie around in ease. Listen to me, you who are so smug.
Parallel translations
- WEB Rise up, you women who are at ease! Hear my voice! You careless daughters, give ear to my speech!
- KJV Rise up, ye women that are at ease; hear my voice, ye careless daughters; give ear unto my speech.
- BSB Stand up, you complacent women; listen to me. Give ear to my word, you overconfident daughters.
- NKJV Rise up, you women who are at ease, Hear my voice; You complacent daughters, Give ear to my speech.
- NASB ¶Rise up, you women who are at ease, And hear my voice; Listen to my word, You complacent daughters.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Isaiah calls the complacent, careless women to wake up and hear his warning. It matters because false security blinds people to coming judgment.
Overview
The prophet addresses women at ease as representatives of a society lulled into complacency. He urgently summons them to listen. The call interrupts misplaced confidence with a sober warning, reflecting the prophetic concern that comfort not deafen God's people to His word and the need for repentance.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 12
- Matt 13:9He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”
- Isa 28:23Give ear, and hear my voice! Listen, and hear my speech!
- Isa 3:16Moreover Yahweh said, “Because the daughters of Zion are haughty, and walk with outstretched necks and flirting eyes, walking to trip as they go, jingling ornaments on their feet;
- Judg 9:7When they told it to Jotham, he went and stood on the top of Mount Gerizim, and lifted up his voice, cried out, and said to them, “Listen to me, you men of Shechem, that God may listen to you.
- Amos 6:1–6Woe to those who are at ease in Zion, and to those who are secure on the mountain of Samaria, the notable men of the chief of the nations, to whom the house of Israel come!
- Jer 48:11–12“Moab has been at ease from his youth, and he has settled on his lees, and has not been emptied from vessel to vessel, neither has he gone into captivity: therefore his taste remains in him, and his scent is not changed.
- Ps 49:1–2For the Chief Musician. A Psalm by the sons of Korah. Hear this, all you peoples. Listen, all you inhabitants of the world,
- Jer 6:2–6I will cut off the comely and delicate one, the daughter of Zion.
- Lam 4:5Those who fed delicately are desolate in the streets: Those who were brought up in scarlet embrace dunghills.
- Isa 47:7–8You said, ‘I will be a princess forever;’ so that you did not lay these things to your heart, nor did you remember the results.
- Zeph 2:15This is the joyous city that lived carelessly, that said in her heart, “I am, and there is no one besides me.” How she has become a desolation, a place for animals to lie down in! Everyone who passes by her will hiss, and shake their fists.
- Deut 28:56The tender and delicate woman among you, who would not venture to set the sole of her foot on the ground for delicateness and tenderness, her eye will be evil toward the husband that she loves, toward her son, toward her daughter,
Themes, concepts, people & topics
Resources, by level
Commentaries & study tools
Free animated overview and word-study videos for this book.
Sermons and teaching on this passage from across YouTube.
Clear, readable, conservative exposition — the best free place to start on any passage.
Matthew Henry, Barnes, Gill, the Pulpit Commentary, Ellicott, Cambridge, and more — stacked on one page for this exact verse.
The beloved Puritan exposition of this whole book — warm, devotional, and verse by verse (free, CCEL).
Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.
Christ at the center
Isaiah sees him most clearly: the virgin's son Immanuel, the child on David's throne, the shoot from Jesse, the light to the nations, and above all the Suffering Servant pierced for our transgressions (ch. 53).
How Isaiah 32:9 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.