Isaiah 47

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¹“Come down, and sit in the dust, virgin daughter of Babylon. Sit on the ground without a throne, daughter of the Chaldeans. For you will no longer be called tender and delicate. ✦ ²Take the millstones, and grind flour. Remove your veil, lift up your skirt, uncover your legs, and wade through the rivers. ✦ ³Your nakedness will be uncovered. Yes, your shame will be seen. I will take vengeance, and will spare no one.” ✦ ⁴Our Redeemer, Yahweh of Armies is his name, is the Holy One of Israel. ✦ ⁵“Sit in silence, and go into darkness, daughter of the Chaldeans. For you shall no longer be called the mistress of kingdoms. ✦ ⁶I was angry with my people. I profaned my inheritance, and gave them into your hand. You showed them no mercy. You laid a very heavy yoke on the aged. ✦ ⁷You said, ‘I will be a princess forever;’ so that you did not lay these things to your heart, nor did you remember the results. ✦ ⁸“Now therefore hear this, you who are given to pleasures, who sit securely, who say in your heart, ‘I am, and there is no one else besides me. I shall not sit as a widow, neither shall I know the loss of children.’ ✦ ⁹But these two things shall come to you in a moment in one day, the loss of children and widowhood. They will come on you in their full measure, in the multitude of your sorceries, and the great abundance of your enchantments. ✦ ¹⁰For you have trusted in your wickedness. You have said, ‘No one sees me.’ Your wisdom and your knowledge has perverted you. You have said in your heart, ‘I am, and there is no one else besides me.’ ✦ ¹¹Therefore disaster will come on you. You won’t know when it dawns. Mischief will fall on you. You won’t be able to put it away. Desolation will come on you suddenly, which you don’t understand. ✦ ¹²“Stand now with your enchantments, and with the multitude of your sorceries, in which you have labored from your youth; as if you might profit; as if you might prevail. ✦ ¹³You are wearied in the multitude of your counsels. Now let the astrologers, the stargazers, and the monthly prognosticators, stand up and save you from the things that will come on you. ✦ ¹⁴Behold, they are like stubble. The fire will burn them. They won’t deliver themselves from the power of the flame. It won’t be a coal to warm at or a fire to sit by. ✦ ¹⁵The things that you labored in will be like this: those who have trafficked with you from your youth will each wander in his own way. There will be no one to save you. ✦

Tap any verse for its study page. Underlined terms mark a concept, person, or place; ✦ marks verses with cross-references.

Where this chapter connects

Jer 51 ·16 Rev 18 ·12 Dan 5 ·10 Isa 47 ·8 Isa 14 ·5 Jer 13 ·5 Ezek 28 ·5 Jer 50 ·5

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 47 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.

Resources, by level

Lay

★ Start hereVideoBibleProject — video overviews & word studiesBibleProject · 5–10 min · Free · evangelical
Free animated overviews of every book of the Bible, plus themes and Hebrew/Greek word studies — the best visual on-ramp to any book. (Biblical-theology, broadly evangelical, not distinctly Reformed.)
★ Start hereAudioThrough the WordThrough the Word · ~10 min/chapter · Free · evangelical
A clear ~10-minute audio teaching for every one of the Bible's 1,189 chapters — the most systematic free way to study chapter by chapter.

Pastoral

SermonChuck Smith — C2000 SeriesChuck Smith · Free · evangelical
Free verse-by-verse audio through the entire Bible from the founder of Calvary Chapel.

Seminary

★ Start hereCommentaryThe Book of Isaiah (NICOT)John N. Oswalt · Paid · evangelical
The standard evangelical commentary on Isaiah — thorough and devotionally warm.

Commentaries & study tools

VideoBibleProject — Isaiah videosBibleProject · Lay · Free · evangelical
Free animated overview and word-study videos for this book.
VideoWatch teaching on Isaiah 47YouTube · Lay · Free
Sermons and chapter teaching from across YouTube.
CommentaryEnduring Word — Isaiah 47David Guzik · Lay · Free · evangelical
Readable, verse-by-verse exposition of the whole chapter.
CommentaryMatthew Henry on IsaiahMatthew Henry · Pastoral · Free · evangelical
The beloved Puritan exposition of this whole book — warm, devotional, and verse by verse (free, CCEL).
ReferenceBlue Letter Bible — Isaiah 47Blue Letter Bible · Seminary · Free
Interlinear, lexicon, and study tools across the chapter.

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