Isaiah 6:5-13 ▼

5 Then I said, “Woe is me, I am doomed! For I am a man of unclean lips, living among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts!”

6 Then one of the seraphim flew to me, holding an ember which he had taken with tongs from the altar.

7 He touched my mouth with it. “See,” he said, “now that this has touched your lips, your wickedness is removed, your sin purged.”

8 Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send? Who will go for us?” “Here I am,” I said; “send me!”

9 And he replied: Go and say to this people: Listen carefully, but do not understand! Look intently, but do not perceive!

10 Make the heart of this people sluggish, dull their ears and close their eyes; Lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and their heart understand, and they turn and be healed.

11 “How long, O Lord?” I asked. And he replied: Until the cities are desolate, without inhabitants, Houses, without people, and the land is a desolate waste.

12 Until the LORD sends the people far away, and great is the desolation in the midst of the land.

13 If there remain a tenth part in it, then this in turn shall be laid waste; As with a terebinth or an oak whose trunk remains when its leaves have fallen. Holy offspring is the trunk.