12. Behold, the nations are as a drop from a bucket,
And are accounted as the small dust of the balance;
Behold, he taketh up the isles as a very little thing.
13. All the nations are as nothing before him;

They are accounted by him as less than nothing, and vanity.
To whom then will ye liken me,

And to whom shall I be compared ? saith the Holy One. 14. Lift up your eyes to the heavens, and behold!

15.

Who hath created these?

He draweth forth their host by number,

He calleth them all by name;

Through the greatness of his strength and the mightiness of his

power,

Not one of them faileth to appear.

Why sayest thou, O Jacob, and speakest, O Israel,

My way is hidden from the LORD,

My cause passeth by before my God?"

16. Do ye not know? have ye not heard? The LORD is an everlasting God.

17. The creator of the ends of the earth; He fainteth ́not, nor is he weary ; His understanding is unsearchable. 18. He giveth power to the faint;

To the feeble abundant strength.

19. The youths shall faint and be weary,

And the young warriors shall utterly fall.

20. But they that trust in the LORD shall renew their strength; They shall mount up with wings like eagles;

They shall run and not be weary;

They shall walk and not faint.

(Ch. XL; 1-8, 12-17, 25-31.

II.

Israel, the Servant of the Lord shall not be afraid, his God will not forsake him. He appointed the deliverer in the person of Cyrus, who is conquering the nations of East.

A.

WHO hath raised up from the region of the East

Him whom victory meeteth in his march?

And given him dominion over kings?

Who hath subdued nations before him,

Who made their swords like dust,
And their bows like driven stubble?

[Cyrus]

2. He persued them, and passed in safety,

By a path which his foot had never trodden.

3. Who hath wrought and done it?

4.

I, who have called the generations from the beginning,
I, the LORD, the first; and with the last also am I.
But thou, O Israel, my servant,

Thou, Jacob, whom I have chosen,

Offspring of Abraham, my friend!

Thou, whom I have led by the hand from the ends of the earth,
And called from the extremities thereof,

And said to thee," Thou art my servant,

5. I have chosen thee, and not cast thee away!"

Fear not, for I am with thee;

Faint not, for I, thy God, will strengthen thee;

I will help thee, and sustain thee, with my right hand of salvation!

6. Behold, all who are enraged against thee

Shall be ashamed and confounded;

All that contend with thee shall come to nothing and perish. 7. Thou shalt seek and not find them that contend with thee; They shall come to nothing, and be no more,

Who make war against thee.

8. For I, the LORD, am thy God, that holdeth thee by the right hand,

That saith to thee," Fear not, I am thy helper!"

9. Fear not, thou worm Jacob, thou feeble people of Israel,

10.

I am thy helper, saith the LORD;

Thy redeemer is the Holy One of Israel.

When the poor and needy seek water, and there is none,
And their tongue is parched with thirst,

I, the LORD, will hear them;

I, the God of Israel, will not forsake them.

11. That they may see, and know,

12.

And consider, and understand together,
That the hand of the LORD hath done this,

And that the Holy One of Israel hath created it.

(Chap. XI; 2-4, 8-14, 17-20.)

Thus saith the LORD to his anointed, [Messiah]

To Cyrus, whom I hold by his right hand,

To subdue nations before him, and ungird the loins of kings;
To open before him the two-leaved gates,

And the doors shall not be shut.

13. For the sake of Jacob, my servant, And Israel, my chosen,

I have called thee by thy name;

I have spoken to thee as a friend, though thou hast not known

me.

14. I am the LORD, and none else;

There is no God besides me;

I have girded thee, though thou hast not known me.
15. That men may know from the rising of the sun,
And from the West, that there is none besides me;
I am the LORD, and none else.

16. I form the light, and create darkness;
I make peace, and create evil;

I, the LORD, do all these things.

17. Pour fourth, ye heavens from above;
Ye clouds, shower down prosperity!

Let the earth open, and bring forth salvation;
Yea, let righteousness spring up together!
I, the LORD, create it.

(Chap. XLV; 1-8.)

1.

III.

Description and mission of the Servant of God.
BEHOLD my servant, whom I uphold,

My chosen, in whom my soul delighteth,
I have put my spirit upon him;

He shall cause law to go forth to the nations.

2. He shall not cry aloud, nor lift

up

his voice, Nor cause it to be heard in the street.

3. The bruised reed shall he not break,

And the glimmering flax shall he not quench;
He shall send forth law according to truth.

4. He shall not fail, nor become weary,

5.

Until he shall have established justice in the earth.
And distant nations shall wait for his law.

Thus saith God, the Eternal,

Who created the heavens and stretched them out,

Who spread forth the earth, and that which springeth forth

from it,

Who gave breath to the people upon it,

And spirit to them that walk thereon:

6. I, the LORD, have called thee for salvation;

I will hold thee by the hand;

I will defend thee, and make thee a covenant to the people,
A light to the nations;

7. To the blind eyes,

open

To bring out the prisoners from the prison,

And them that sit in darkness out of the prison-house. 8. I am the LORD, that is my name;

And my glory will I not give to another,

Nor my praise to graven images.

9. The former things, behold! they are come to pass, And new things do I now declare;

10.

Before they spring forth, I make them known to you.

(Chap. XLII; 1-9.) But now thus saith the LORD, that created thee, O Jacob, That formed thee, O Israel:

Fear not, for I have reedeemed thee;

I have called thee by name; thou art mine!

11. When thou passest through waters, I will be with thee; And through rivers, they shall not overflow thee;

And the flame shall not consume thee.

12. For I am the LORD, thy God,

The Holy One of Israel, thy Saviour. 13. Ye are my witnesses, saith the LORD, And my servant whom I have chosen, That ye may know and believe me, And understand that I am He.

Before me was no god formed,

And after me there shall be none.

(Chap. XLIII; 1-3.)

14. I, I am the LORD, and besides me there is no Saviour.

IV.

(Chap. XLIII; 10-11.)

1.

The sins of the people defer their redemption. The promise of deliverance shall be fulfilled.

BEHOLD, the LORD's hand is not shortened, that it cannot save,

Nor is his ear heavy, that it cannot hear;

2. But your iniquities have separated you from your God,

And your sins have hidden his face from you, that he doth not hear.

3. Therefore is judgment far from us,

And deliverance doth not overtake us.
We look for light, and behold obscurity;
For brightness and we walk in darkness.

4. We grope for the wall, like the blind;

We feel our way, like those that are deprived of sight;
We stumble at noonday as in the night;

In the midst of fertile fields we are like the dead.
5. We look for judgment and it cometh not;
For salvation, and it is far from us.

6. For our transgressions are multiplied before thee,
And our sins testify against us!

For our transgressions are not hidden from us,
And our iniquities we know.

7. We have rebelled, and proved false to the LORD,

8.

9.

We have departed from our God;

We have spoken violence and rebellion;

Our hearts have conceived and brought forth words of falsehood.

(Chap. LIX; 1-2, 9-12.)

Woe to him that contendeth with his Maker!

A potsherd of the potsherds of the earth!

Shall the clay say to him that fashioneth it, What makest thou?
Or thy work say of thee, He hath no hands?

Thus saith the LORD, the Holy One of Israel, and his
maker,

Ask of me concerning things to come;

My children, the work of my hands, leave them to me!

10. I made the earth and created man upon it;

My hands spread out the heavens,

And all their host did I arrange.

11. I have raised him [Cyrus] up for salvation, And I will make all his ways plain;

He shall build my city, and release my captives,

Not for price, and not for ransom, saith the LORD of hosts.

12. Israel shall be saved by the LORD with an everlasting salvation; Ye shall never be ashamed, nor confounded.

13.

For thus saith the LORD, who created the heavens ;

The God that formed the earth and made it; he that made it

firm;

He created it not in vain: he formed it to be inhabited:

I am the LORD and none else.

14. I have not spoken in secret, in a dark place of the earth; I have not said to the race of Jacob, seek ye me in vain! I, the LORD speak truth; I declare that which is right. (Chap. XLV; 9,11-13, 17-19.