Isaiah · 17 verses
Isaiah 34
Every verse links to the people and places named in it, and to the passages readers connect it with.
The chapter
What happens here
Atlas's own reading, written from this chapter and nothing else, and published only once a person has approved it. Each scene names the verses it covers; the names inside it link to the people and places they name.
Edom is declared so desolate that no one will ever pass through it, and then receives an extraordinarily careful census of its new residents: owls, jackals, a wild goat, eggs, broods, and mating pairs.
The sword comes downvv. 1–8
The nations and peoples are summoned to hear, for the LORD is angry with their armies and gives them over to slaughter. The scene grows vast and rather untidy: corpses lie unburied, mountains run with blood, and the stars fall as though heaven itself were foliage. The sword, having drunk its fill in the heavens, descends upon Edom; Bozrah is named as the place of the LORD’s great sacrifice. All this is called a day of vengeance and a year of recompense for the cause of Zion.
A desolation with occupantsvv. 9–15
Edom’s streams become tar, its soil sulfur, and its land blazing pitch, with smoke ascending forever. No one will pass through it again; nevertheless, the place is not empty. Owls, ravens, jackals, ostriches, hyenas, a wild goat, and a night creature settle among the ruined towers and fortresses. The owl goes about her domestic business, laying eggs, hatching them, and sheltering her brood, while the birds of prey arrive in pairs—a remarkably well-populated wilderness for somewhere declared impassable.
The ordered inventoryvv. 16–17
The scroll is to be searched and read: none of these creatures will be missing, and none will lack her mate. Their arrangement is not left to chance; the LORD has ordered it, gathered them, allotted their portion, and measured out the land. The desolation, in other words, has a register—and the register is flourishing.
The text
Read it
Berean Standard Bible, public domain. Names the Hebrew and Greek put in the verse link to the person, place or people they name; the address beside each verse is a link to that verse, which is what a reader copies and shares.
Isa 34:1Come near, O nations, to listen; pay attention, O peoples. Let the earth hear, and all that fills it, the world and all that springs from it.
Isa 34:2The LORD is angry with all the nations and furious with all their armies. He will devote them to destruction; He will give them over to slaughter.
Isa 34:3Their slain will be left unburied, and the stench of their corpses will rise; the mountains will flow with their blood.
Isa 34:4All the stars of heaven will be dissolved. The skies will be rolled up like a scroll, and all their stars will fall like withered leaves from the vine, like foliage from the fig tree.
Isa 34:5When My sword has drunk its fill in the heavens, then it will come down upon Edom, upon the people I have devoted to destruction.
Isa 34:6The sword of the LORD is bathed in blood. It drips with fat—with the blood of lambs and goats, with the fat of the kidneys of rams. For the LORD has a sacrifice in Bozrah, a great slaughter in the land of Edom.
Isa 34:7And the wild oxen will fall with them, the young bulls with the strong ones. Their land will be drenched with blood, and their soil will be soaked with fat.
Isa 34:8For the LORD has a day of vengeance, a year of recompense for the cause of Zion.
Isa 34:9Edom’s streams will be turned to tar, and her soil to sulfur; her land will become a blazing pitch.
Isa 34:10It will not be quenched—day or night. Its smoke will ascend forever. From generation to generation it will lie desolate; no one will ever again pass through it.
Isa 34:11The desert owl and screech owl will possess it, and the great owl and raven will dwell in it. The LORD will stretch out over Edom a measuring line of chaos and a plumb line of destruction.
Isa 34:12No nobles will be left to proclaim a king, and all her princes will come to nothing.
Isa 34:13Her towers will be overgrown with thorns, her fortresses with thistles and briers. She will become a haunt for jackals, an abode for ostriches.
Isa 34:14The desert creatures will meet with hyenas, and one wild goat will call to another. There the night creature will settle and find her place of repose.
Isa 34:15There the owl will make her nest; she will lay and hatch her eggs and gather her brood under her shadow. Even there the birds of prey will gather, each with its mate.
Isa 34:16Search and read the scroll of the LORD: Not one of these will go missing, not one will lack her mate, because He has ordered it by His mouth, and He will gather them by His Spirit.
Isa 34:17He has allotted their portion; His hand has distributed it by measure. They will possess it forever; they will dwell in it from generation to generation.
02 — Read alongside
Where this is echoed
Readers' own connections, from OpenBible's crowd-voted cross-references — agreement about relevance, and not scholarly confidence. 208 passages were voted onto 17 verses of this chapter; the 16 shown lead on votes, and each is listed at the verse it was voted onto most strongly.
- 16Psalms 33:9For He spoke, and it came to be; He commanded, and it stood firm.
- 16Joshua 1:8This Book of the Law must not depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. For then you will prosper and succeed in all you do.
- 16Matthew 5:18For I tell you truly, until heaven and earth pass away, not a single jot, not a stroke of a pen, will disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished.
- 16Isaiah 30:8Go now, write it on a tablet in their presence and inscribe it on a scroll; it will be for the days to come, a witness forever and ever.
- 16Proverbs 23:12Apply your heart to instruction and your ears to words of knowledge.
- 16Luke 21:33Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will never pass away.
- 16John 10:35If he called them gods to whom the word of God came—and the Scripture cannot be broken—
- 4Revelation 6:13–14and the stars of the sky fell to the earth like unripe figs dropping from a tree shaken by a great wind.
- 16Daniel 10:21But first I will tell you what is inscribed in the Book of Truth. Yet no one has the courage to support me against these, except Michael your prince.’’
- 16Malachi 3:16At that time those who feared the LORD spoke with one another, and the LORD listened and heard them. So a scroll of remembrance was written before Him regarding those who feared the LORD and honored His name.
- 162 Peter 1:19We also have the word of the prophets as confirmed beyond doubt. And you will do well to pay attention to it, as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts.
- 16Amos 3:7Surely the Lord GOD does nothing without revealing His plan to His servants the prophets.
- 4Matthew 24:29Immediately after the tribulation of those days: ‘The sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from the sky, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken.’
- 16Deuteronomy 31:21And when many troubles and afflictions have come upon them, this song will testify against them, because it will not be forgotten from the lips of their descendants. For I know their inclination, even before I bring them into the land that I swore to give them.”
- 4Joel 3:15The sun and moon will grow dark, and the stars will no longer shine.
- 4Ezekiel 32:7–8When I extinguish you, I will cover the heavens and darken their stars. I will cover the sun with a cloud, and the moon will not give its light.
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