Chapter 58

Cry aloud, never ceasing, raise thy voice like a trumpet-call, and tell my people of their transgressions, call the sons of Jacob to account.

Day after day they besiege me, arraign my dealings with them, a nation, you would think, ever dutiful, one that never swerved from the divine will. Proof they ask of my faithfulness, would fain bring a plea against their God.

Why hadst thou no eyes for it, say they, when we fasted; why didst thou pass by unheeding, when we humbled ourselves before thee? Fasting, when you follow your own whim, distrain upon all your debtors!

Naught comes of it but law-suit and quarrelling; angry blows profane it. A better fast you must keep than of old, ere plea of yours makes itself heard above.

With such fasting, with a day’s penance, should I be content? Is it enough that a man should bow down to earth, make his bed on sackcloth and ashes? Think you, by such a fasting-day, to win the Lord’s favour?

Nay, fast of mine is something other. The false claim learn to forgo, ease the insupportable burden, set free the over-driven; away with every yoke that galls!

Share thy bread with the hungry, give the poor and the vagrant a welcome to thy house; meet thou the naked, clothe him; from thy own flesh and blood turn not away.

Then, sudden as the dawn, the welcome light shall break on thee, in a moment thy health shall find a new spring; divine favour shall lead thee on thy journey, brightness of the Lord’s presence close thy ranks behind.

Then the Lord will listen to thee when thou callest on him; cry out, and he will answer, I am here at thy side. Banish from thy midst oppression, and the finger pointed scornfully, and the plotting of harm,

spend thyself giving food to the hungry, relieving the afflicted; then shall light spring up for thee in the darkness, and thy dusk shall be noonday;

the Lord will give thee rest2 continually, fill thy soul with comfort, thy body with ease.3 Not more secure the well-watered garden, the spring whose waters never fail.

Rebuilt, in thy land, the immemorial ruins; restored, the foundations of long ago; this thy task shall be, to repair the broken walls, to reclaim the by-ways.

Walk warily, keep my sabbath unprofaned. Here is a day I have sanctified, not for thy self-pleasing; a precious thing the Lord has made holy and honourable; and wilt thou dishonour it? Wilt thou go thy own way, use it for thy own pleasure, while it away in gossip?

Thou shalt yet have joy in the Lord; I will carry thee aloft, high above the high places of the land, satisfy thy longing for Jacob’s patrimony; the Lord’s lips have promised it.