How Beautiful on the Mountains
1 Awake, awake! Put on your strength, Zion. Put on your beautiful garments, Jerusalem, the holy city, for from now on the uncircumcised and the unclean will no more come into you. 2 Shake yourself from the dust! Arise, sit up, Jerusalem! Release yourself from the bonds of your neck, captive daughter of Zion! 3 For Yahweh says, “You were sold for nothing; and you will be redeemed without money.” 4 For the Lord Yahweh says: “My people went down at the first into Egypt to live there; and the Assyrian has oppressed them without cause. 5 “Now therefore, what do I do here,” says Yahweh, “seeing that my people are taken away for nothing? Those who rule over them mock,” says Yahweh, “and my name is blasphemed continually all day long. 6 Therefore my people shall know my name. Therefore they shall know in that day that I am he who speaks. Behold, it is I.” 7 How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who publishes peace, who brings good news, who proclaims salvation, who says to Zion, “Your God reigns!” 8 Your watchmen lift up their voice. Together they sing; for they shall see eye to eye when Yahweh returns to Zion. 9 Break out into joy! Sing together, you waste places of Jerusalem; for Yahweh has comforted his people. He has redeemed Jerusalem. 10 Yahweh has made his holy arm bare in the eyes of all the nations. All the ends of the earth have seen the salvation of our God. 11 Depart! Depart! Go out from there! Touch no unclean thing! Go out from among her! Cleanse yourselves, you who carry Yahweh’s vessels. 12 For you shall not go out in haste, neither shall you go by flight; for Yahweh will go before you, and the God of Israel will be your rear guard.
A city told to get dressed, a runner coming over the ridge, and an exodus with no hurry in it.
Awake, awake! Put on your strength, Zion. Put on your beautiful garments, Jerusalem, the holy city, for from now on the uncircumcised and the unclean will no more come into you.
The third awake in two chapters, and this one is answered. The woman lying in the street is told to get up and dress.
Shake yourself from the dust! Arise, sit up, Jerusalem! Release yourself from the bonds of your neck, captive daughter of Zion!
The sequence is exact and unhurried: shake off the dust, get up, sit — the stages by which someone who has been face down gets vertical.
For Yahweh says, “You were sold for nothing; and you will be redeemed without money.”
The transaction of chapter fifty Isaiah 50:1, completed. Nothing was received when they were sold and nothing is paid to get them back, which means no third party has any claim in the matter.
“Now therefore, what do I do here,” says Yahweh, “seeing that my people are taken away for nothing? Those who rule over them mock,” says Yahweh, “and my name is blasphemed continually all day long.
The reason given for acting is what the captors are saying. Paul quotes the line against Jews whose conduct discredits the law Romans 2:24.
How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who publishes peace, who brings good news, who proclaims salvation, who says to Zion, “Your God reigns!”
The most famous verse in the chapter, and the image is precise. A messenger running from a battlefield appears first as a figure on the skyline, and the watchers cannot yet hear him — so what they look at is his feet, moving, which tell them he is bringing news worth running with.
Paul quotes it of preachers Romans 10:15, and the four participles are all about announcing rather than achieving.
Your watchmen lift up their voice. Together they sing; for they shall see eye to eye when Yahweh returns to Zion.
The sentries who spotted the runner are now singing in unison — men whose whole job is to be alert and silent.
Yahweh has made his holy arm bare in the eyes of all the nations. All the ends of the earth have seen the salvation of our God.
The gesture is a workman pushing back his sleeve.
Depart! Depart! Go out from there! Touch no unclean thing! Go out from among her! Cleanse yourselves, you who carry Yahweh’s vessels.
A second exodus, and Paul quotes the line to a church about separation 2 Corinthians 6:17.
For you shall not go out in haste, neither shall you go by flight; for Yahweh will go before you, and the God of Israel will be your rear guard.
The difference from the first exodus, stated as a contrast. That departure was eaten standing, with sandals on, in a hurry Exodus 12:11. This one has an escort at the front and at the back, and nobody needs to run.
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