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Acknowledgment of Transgressions

[a]That is why judgment is far from us
    and justice does not reach us.
We look for light, but there is darkness;
    for brightness, and we walk in gloom!(A)

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Footnotes

  1. 59:9–15 The turning point in the poem comes when the people acknowledge their transgressions and describe the horror of their present state. Light is a metaphor for salvation (cf. 9:1; 42:16; 60:1–3, 19–20) and darkness represents sin and disaster.

14 Judgment is turned away,
    and justice stands far off;
For truth stumbles in the public square,
    and uprightness cannot enter.(A)

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19 Those in the west shall fear the name of the Lord,
    and those in the east, his glory,
Coming like a pent-up stream
    driven on by the breath of the Lord.
20 Then for Zion shall come a redeemer,
    to those in Jacob who turn from transgression—oracle of the Lord.(A)

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