You also will command nations you do not know, and peoples unknown to you will come running to obey, because I, the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, have made you glorious.”
Parallel translations
- WEB Behold, you shall call a nation that you don’t know; and a nation that didn’t know you shall run to you, because of Yahweh your God, and for the Holy One of Israel; for he has glorified you.”
- KJV Behold, thou shalt call a nation that thou knowest not, and nations that knew not thee shall run unto thee because of the LORD thy God, and for the Holy One of Israel; for he hath glorified thee.
- BSB Surely you will summon a nation you do not know, and nations who do not know you will run to you. For the LORD your God, the Holy One of Israel, has bestowed glory on you.”
- NKJV Surely you shall call a nation you do not know, And nations who do not know you shall run to you, Because of the Lord your God, And the Holy One of Israel; For He has glorified you.”
- NASB “Behold, you will call a nation you do not know, And a nation which does not know you will run to you, Because of the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel; For He has glorified you.”
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
God says His people will summon unknown nations who will run to them because the LORD has glorified them. It matters because it foretells the ingathering of the nations to God's glory.
Overview
Nations once unknown will come eagerly, drawn not by Israel's splendor but by the LORD who has glorified His people. This continues Isaiah's vision of Gentiles streaming to the God of Israel. It is fulfilled as the gospel of Christ draws people from every nation to the glory of God displayed in His redeemed.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 24
- Isa 60:5Then you shall see and be radiant, and your heart will thrill and be enlarged; because the abundance of the sea will be turned to you. The wealth of the nations will come to you.
- Isa 60:9Surely the islands will wait for me, and the ships of Tarshish first, to bring your sons from far, their silver and their gold with them, for the name of Yahweh your God, and for the Holy One of Israel, because he has glorified you.
- Zech 2:11Many nations shall join themselves to Yahweh in that day, and shall be my people; and I will dwell among you, and you shall know that Yahweh of Armies has sent me to you.
- Rom 15:20yes, making it my aim to preach the Good News, not where Christ was already named, that I might not build on another’s foundation.
- Ps 18:43You have delivered me from the strivings of the people. You have made me the head of the nations. A people whom I have not known shall serve me.
- Gen 49:10The scepter will not depart from Judah, nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet, until he comes to whom it belongs. To him will the obedience of the peoples be.
- Isa 56:8The Lord Yahweh, who gathers the outcasts of Israel, says, “I will yet gather others to him, besides his own who are gathered.”
- John 17:1Jesus said these things, and lifting up his eyes to heaven, he said, “Father, the time has come. Glorify your Son, that your Son may also glorify you;
- Acts 5:31God exalted him with his right hand to be a Prince and a Savior, to give repentance to Israel, and remission of sins.
- Isa 55:4Behold, I have given him for a witness to the peoples, a leader and commander to the peoples.
- Isa 45:23I have sworn by myself. The word has gone out of my mouth in righteousness, and will not be revoked, that to me every knee shall bow, every tongue shall take an oath.
- Ps 110:1–3A Psalm by David. Yahweh says to my Lord, “Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool for your feet.”
- Acts 3:13The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God of our fathers, has glorified his Servant Jesus, whom you delivered up, and denied in the presence of Pilate, when he had determined to release him.
- Isa 49:6Indeed, he says, “It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel? I will also give you as a light to the nations, that you may be my salvation to the end of the earth.”
- Isa 11:10–11It will happen in that day that the nations will seek the root of Jesse, who stands as a banner of the peoples; and his resting place will be glorious.
- Eph 3:5which in other generations was not made known to the children of men, as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets in the Spirit;
- Heb 5:5So also Christ didn’t glorify himself to be made a high priest, but it was he who said to him, “You are my Son. Today I have become your father.”
- John 13:31–32When he had gone out, Jesus said, “Now the Son of Man has been glorified, and God has been glorified in him.
- Hos 1:10Yet the number of the children of Israel will be as the sand of the sea, which can’t be measured or counted; and it will come to pass that, in the place where it was said to them, ‘You are not my people,’ they will be called ‘sons of the living God.’
- Isa 52:15so he will cleanse many nations. Kings will shut their mouths at him: for they will see that which had not been told them; and they will understand that which they had not heard.
- 1 Pet 1:11searching for who or what kind of time the Spirit of Christ, which was in them, pointed to, when he predicted the sufferings of Christ, and the glories that would follow them.
- Zech 8:20–23Yahweh of Armies says: “Many peoples, and the inhabitants of many cities will yet come;
- Luke 24:26Didn’t the Christ have to suffer these things and to enter into his glory?”
- Eph 2:11Therefore remember that once you, the Gentiles in the flesh, who are called “uncircumcision” by that which is called “circumcision”, (in the flesh, made by hands);
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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 55:5 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
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