Isaiah 58

The Fast That He Chose: Loose the Bonds

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Shout with Strength and Do Not Spare

58:1“Shout with strength and do not spare! Raise your voice like a trumpet and announce My people’s sins to them, and Jacob’s house their lawless acts.

58:2Day after day they seek Me and desire to know My ways. Like a people who practiced righteousness and did not abandon their God’s judgment, they now ask Me righteous judgment and desire to draw near to God,

58:3saying, ‘Why did we fast, and You did not see? We humbled our lives, and You did not notice?’ For on your fasting days you pursue your wishes and prod all those under your control.

58:4If you fast for lawsuits and fights and strike a humble person with fists, why do you fast for Me as today, to make your voice heard in an outcry?

The Fast the Lord Chooses

58:5I did not choose this fast, or a day for a person to humble his life. Even if you bend your neck like a ring and spread sackcloth and ashes beneath you, you will not thereby call it an acceptable fast.

58:6‘It is not such a fast that I chose,’ says the Lord. ‘Instead, loosen every bond of injustice, undo the strangling ties of coercive agreements, release the crushed, and tear up every unjust written contract.

58:7Break your bread for the hungry and bring homeless poor people into your house. If you see someone naked, clothe him; do not overlook those belonging to your own family.

58:8Then your light will break out early, and your healings quickly rise. Your righteousness will go ahead of you, and God’s glory will enfold you.

God Will Hear Your Cry

58:9Then you will cry, and God will hear you. While you are still speaking He will say, “Look, I am present.” If you remove from yourself a bond, finger-pointing, and a word of grumbling,

58:10and give bread to the hungry from your heart and satisfy a humbled life, then your light will rise in darkness, and your darkness be like noon.

58:11Your God will be with you continually, and you will be filled as your life desires. Your bones will grow rich; you will be like a drenched garden and a spring whose water never ran out. Your bones will sprout like grass and grow rich, and they will inherit generations upon generations.

58:12Your ancient deserted places will be rebuilt, and your foundations will endure through generations upon generations. You will be called Builder of Fences, and you will put an end to the paths between.

Honoring the Sabbath

58:13If you turn your foot away from the Sabbaths, from doing your wishes on the holy day, and call the Sabbaths delightful, holy to your God, you will not lift your foot for work or speak a word in anger from your mouth,

58:14and you will trust in the Lord. He will bring you up to earth’s good things and feed you your father Jacob’s inheritance, for the Lord’s mouth has spoken these things.’”

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Saints Translation · Liturgical reading edition · V1 · working draft awaiting specialist review.