Lexicon :: Strong's H8414 - tôû

“He found him in a desert land,

In the howling wasteland of a wilderness;

He kept circling him, He took care of him,

He protected him as the [fn]apple of His eye.

“The paths of their course wind along,

They go up into nothing and perish.

[Your counsel is as helpful to me as a dry streambed in the heat of summer.]

“He removes intelligence and understanding from the leaders of the people of the earth

And makes them wander and move blindly in a pathless waste.

“It is He who spreads out the north over emptiness

And [fn]hangs the earth on nothing.

He pours contempt on princes

And makes them wander in a pathless wasteland.

The city of chaos is broken down;

Every house is shut up so that no one may enter.

Those who cause a person to be condemned with a [false] word,

And lay a trap for him who upholds justice at the [city] gate,

And defraud the one in the right with meaningless arguments.

But the pelican and the porcupine will take possession of it;

The owl and the raven will dwell in it.

And He will stretch over it (Edom) the measuring line of desolation

And the plumb line of emptiness.

All the nations are as nothing before Him,

They are regarded by Him as less than nothing and meaningless.

It is He who reduces dignitaries to nothing,

Who makes the judges (rulers) of the earth meaningless (useless).

“In fact, all of these [pagan prophets and priests] are false;

Their works are worthless,

Their cast images are [merely] wind and emptiness.

All who make carved idols are nothing. Their precious objects are worthless [to them], and their own witnesses (worshipers) fail to see or know, so that they will be put to shame.

For the LORD, who created the heavens [fn](He is God, who formed the earth and made it; He established it and did not create it to be a wasteland, but formed it to be inhabited) says this,

“I am the LORD, and there is no one else.

Then I said, “I have labored in vain,

I have spent My strength for nothing and vanity (pride, uselessness);

However My justice is with the LORD,

And My reward is with My God.”

No one sues righteously [but for the sake of doing injury to others—to take some undue advantage], and no one pleads [his case] in truth; [but rather]

They trust in empty arguments and speak lies;

They conceive trouble and bring forth injustice.

I looked at the earth [in my vision], and behold, it was [as at the time of creation] formless and void;

And to the heavens, and they had no light.