Isaiah 18 :: English Standard Version (ESV)

An Oracle Concerning Cush

Isa 18:1Ah, land of whirring wings
that is beyond the rivers of Cush,[fn]

Isa 18:2which sends ambassadors by the sea,
in vessels of papyrus on the waters!
Go, you swift messengers,
to a nation tall and smooth,
to a people feared near and far,
a nation mighty and conquering,
whose land the rivers divide.

Isa 18:3

Isa 18:3All you inhabitants of the world,
you who dwell on the earth,
when a signal is raised on the mountains, look!
When a trumpet is blown, hear!

Isa 18:4

Isa 18:4For thus the LORD said to me:
“I will quietly look from my dwelling
like clear heat in sunshine,
like a cloud of dew in the heat of harvest.”

Isa 18:5

Isa 18:5For before the harvest, when the blossom is over,
and the flower becomes a ripening grape,
he cuts off the shoots with pruning hooks,
and the spreading branches he lops off and clears away.

Isa 18:6

Isa 18:6They shall all of them be left
to the birds of prey of the mountains
and to the beasts of the earth.
And the birds of prey will summer on them,
and all the beasts of the earth will winter on them.

Isa 18:7

Isa 18:7At that time tribute will be brought to the LORD of hosts
from a people tall and smooth,
from a people feared near and far,
a nation mighty and conquering,
whose land the rivers divide, to Mount Zion, the place of the name of the LORD of hosts.

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ESV Footnotes

(18:1)

Probably Nubia

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