Yesaya 35:5-9

35:5 Then blind eyes will open,

deaf ears will hear.

35:6 Then the lame will leap like a deer,

the mute tongue will shout for joy;

for water will flow ¹  in the desert,

streams in the wilderness. ² 

35:7 The dry soil will become a pool of water,

the parched ground springs of water.

Where jackals once lived and sprawled out,

grass, reeds, and papyrus will grow.

35:8 A thoroughfare will be there –

it will be called the Way of Holiness. ³ 

The unclean will not travel on it;

it is reserved for those authorized to use it ⁴  –

fools ⁵  will not stray into it.

35:9 No lions will be there,

no ferocious wild animals will be on it ⁶  –

they will not be found there.

Those delivered from bondage will travel on it,

[35:6]  ¹ tn Heb “burst forth” (so NAB); KJV “break out.”

[35:6]  ² tn Or “Arabah” (NASB); KJV, NIV, NRSV, NLT “desert.”

[35:8]  ³ tc The Hebrew text reads literally, “and there will be there a road and a way, and the Way of Holiness it will be called.” וְדֶרֶךְ (vÿderekh, “and a/the way”) is accidentally duplicated; the Qumran scroll 1QIsa^a does not reflect the repetition of the phrase.

[35:8]  ⁴ tn The precise meaning of this line is uncertain. The text reads literally “and it is for them, the one who walks [on the] way.” In this context those authorized to use the Way of Holiness would be morally upright people who are the recipients of God’s deliverance, in contrast to the morally impure and foolish who are excluded from the new covenant community.

[35:8]  ⁵ tn In this context “fools” are those who are morally corrupt, not those with limited intellectual capacity.

[35:9]  ⁶ tn Heb “will go up on it”; TEV “will pass that way.”