Isaiah 29:1-14

1It will be very bad for Ariel, the city where David lived. Continue to have your usual feasts every year, but trouble will come!

2I will bring trouble to Ariel. The people there will be very sad and they will weep. Ariel will become like my altar for burnt offerings.

3I will bring an army to attack you. There will be soldiers all round the city so that nobody can leave. I will build strong towers against the city's walls.

4Then you will fall down to the ground. While you lie there, you will speak. Your words will come quietly from deep down in the dirt. It will seem like the voice of a dead person's spirit. You will sound like a magician who is speaking magic words.

5Your enemies will be like an army of dust. The wind will blow away that crowd of cruel men as if they are chaff. That will all happen very suddenly!

6The Lord Almighty will come with great power. He will come with thunder, earthquake and a loud noise. There will be a great storm with strong winds and a fire that burns up everything.

7The great crowd of armies from all the nations that attack Ariel will quickly disappear. They will soon come to an end, like a dream that someone sees in the night. All the weapons that they bring to attack the city's walls will disappear!

8A hungry man may dream that he is eating a big meal. But as soon as he wakes up, he knows that he is still hungry! A thirsty man may dream that he is drinking. But as soon as he wakes up, he knows that he is still weak and thirsty. That is what it will be like for the great armies from all the nations that have come to attack Mount Zion.

9You are so surprised that you do not believe what I say. You have become completely blind. You are stupid, like people who are drunk, but not from wine! You fall over, but not because you have drunk too much beer!

10It is the Lord who has caused you to be like that. He has caused you to be completely asleep. He has shut the eyes of your prophets and he has covered the heads of your seers.

11You do not understand this vision that the Lord has given to me. It is like the words in a closed book. Give the book to someone who can read. Say to him, ‘Read this, please.’ But he will answer, ‘I cannot read it, because someone has closed it.’

12Give the book to someone who cannot read and tell them, ‘Read it, please.’ But he will answer, ‘I do not know how to read.’

13The Lord God says, ‘These people open their mouths to worship me. They use their lips to say that I am great. But they are not really thinking about me. When they worship me, they use rules that people have taught them.

14So now I will surprise these people again. I will surprise them with great miracles! Wise people will not seem wise any more. Clever people will no longer seem to be clever.’