Bible Strands
Isaiah 42:15
I will lay waste the mountains and hills and dry up all their vegetation. I will turn the rivers into dry land and drain the marshes.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — Yahweh addresses Israel, shifting from prolonged silence to immediate, forceful action. He announces a deliberate destruction of the natural landscape to clear the way for deliverance.
The words — אַחֲרִ֤יב ('a.cha.Riv) translates literally to "I will lay waste," and אוֹבִ֑ישׁ ('o.Vish) means "I will dry up." These verbs specify the divine dismantling of mountains, hills, and waterways.
The thread — This pattern of God drying up waters and land appears in Isaiah 44:27, Isaiah 50:2, and Nahum 1:4. Each passage records divine sovereignty over creation to execute judgment or redemption.
Why it lands — The text requires acknowledging that God's power to dismantle geography precedes His power to guide the blind. It asks the reader to accept that divine intervention may begin with the removal of familiar structures.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
I will make waste mountains and hills, and dry up all their herbs; and I will make the rivers islands, and I will dry up the pools.
Cross-references
- Isaiah 50:2 Why was no one there when I arrived? Why did no one answer when I called? Is My hand too short to redeem you? Or do I lack the strength to deliver you? Behold, My rebuke dries up the sea; I turn the rivers into a desert; the fish rot for lack of water and die of thirst.
- Nahum 1:4 He rebukes the sea and dries it up; He makes all the rivers run dry. Bashan and Carmel wither, and the flower of Lebanon wilts.
- Isaiah 44:27 who says to the depths of the sea, ‘Be dry, and I will dry up your currents,’
- Isaiah 2:12 For the Day of the LORD of Hosts will come against all the proud and lofty, against all that is exalted—it will be humbled—
- Revelation 20:11 Then I saw a great white throne and the One seated on it. Earth and heaven fled from His presence, and no place was found for them.
- Psalms 18:7 Then the earth shook and quaked, and the foundations of the mountains trembled; they were shaken because He burned with anger.
- Psalms 107:33 He turns rivers into deserts, springs of water into thirsty ground,
- Psalms 114:3 The sea observed and fled; the Jordan turned back;
- Isaiah 11:15 The LORD will devote to destruction the gulf of the Sea of Egypt; with a scorching wind He will sweep His hand over the Euphrates. He will split it into seven streams for men to cross with dry sandals.
- Isaiah 49:11 I will turn all My mountains into roads, and My highways will be raised up.