For your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity. Your lips have spoken lies. Your tongue mutters wickedness.
Parallel Translations
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For your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity. Your lips have spoken lies. Your tongue mutters wickedness.
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For your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity; your lips have spoken lies, your tongue hath muttered perverseness.
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For your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity; your lips have spoken lies, your tongue muttereth wickedness.
Cross-references (20)
Passages linked to Isaiah 59:3 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Isaiah 1:15 When you spread out your hands, I will hide my eyes from you. Yes, when you make many prayers, I will not hear. Your hands are full of blood.
- Ezekiel 13:8 “ ‘Therefore the Lord Yahweh says: “Because you have spoken falsehood and seen lies, therefore, behold, I am against you,” says the Lord Yahweh.
- Jeremiah 2:34 Also the blood of the souls of the innocent poor is found in your skirts. You didn’t find them breaking in, but it is because of all these things.
- Isaiah 1:21 How the faithful city has become a prostitute! She was full of justice. Righteousness lodged in her, but now there are murderers.
- Jeremiah 2:30 “I have struck your children in vain. They received no correction. Your own sword has devoured your prophets, like a destroying lion.
- Jeremiah 7:8 Behold, you trust in lying words that can’t profit.
- Ezekiel 7:23 “ ‘Make chains; for the land is full of bloody crimes, and the city is full of violence.
- Ezekiel 9:9 Then he said to me, “The iniquity of the house of Israel and Judah is exceedingly great, and the land is full of blood, and the city full of perversion; for they say, ‘Yahweh has forsaken the land, and Yahweh doesn’t see.’
- Ezekiel 35:6 therefore, as I live,” says the Lord Yahweh, “I will prepare you for blood, and blood will pursue you. Since you have not hated blood, therefore blood will pursue you.
- Hosea 4:2 There is cursing, lying, murder, stealing, and committing adultery; they break boundaries, and bloodshed causes bloodshed.
- Hosea 7:13 Woe to them! For they have wandered from me. Destruction to them! For they have trespassed against me. Though I would redeem them, yet they have spoken lies against me.
- Micah 6:12 Her rich men are full of violence, her inhabitants speak lies, and their tongue is deceitful in their speech.
- Micah 7:2 The godly man has perished out of the earth, and there is no one upright among men. They all lie in wait for blood; every man hunts his brother with a net.
- Jeremiah 9:3-6 “They bend their tongue, as their bow, for falsehood. They have grown strong in the land, but not for truth; for they proceed from evil to evil, and they don’t know me,” says Yahweh. “Everyone beware of his neighbor, and don’t trust in any brother; for every brother will utterly supplant, and every neighbor will go around like a slanderer. Friends deceive each other, and will not speak the truth. They have taught their tongue to speak lies. They weary themselves commiting iniquity. Your habitation is in the middle of deceit. Through deceit, they refuse to know me,” says Yahweh.
- Jeremiah 22:17 But your eyes and your heart are only for your covetousness, for shedding innocent blood, for oppression, and for doing violence.”
- Ezekiel 22:2 “You, son of man, will you judge? Will you judge the bloody city? Then cause her to know all her abominations.
- Hosea 7:3 They make the king glad with their wickedness, and the princes with their lies.
- Micah 3:10-12 They build up Zion with blood, and Jerusalem with iniquity. Her leaders judge for bribes, and her priests teach for a price, and her prophets of it tell fortunes for money: yet they lean on Yahweh, and say, “Isn’t Yahweh among us? No disaster will come on us.” Therefore Zion for your sake will be plowed like a field, and Jerusalem will become heaps of rubble, and the mountain of the temple like the high places of a forest.
- Matthew 27:4 saying, “I have sinned in that I betrayed innocent blood.” But they said, “What is that to us? You see to it.”
- 1 Timothy 4:2 through the hypocrisy of men who speak lies, branded in their own conscience as with a hot iron,
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this verse (14 sources)
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Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain Read Isa. 1:15.
Read Isa. 1:15.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain Isa 59:3 For your hands are defiled with blood,…
Isa 59:3 For your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity; your lips have spoken lies, your tongue hath muttered perverseness.
Ver. 3. For your hands are defiled with blood.] The prophet well knew that these perverse Jews would stand upon their justification, and put God to his proofs, as their posterity also did, {Jer 2:35} catalogum ergo bene longum texit; therefore he here brings in a long bead roll of their sins, wherein their hands, lips, heart, feet, &c., were found guilty of high offence. See Isa 1:15.
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Your lips have spoken lies.] Those very "lips" of yours that have uttered prayers, have muttered lies. See Jas 3:10.
And your tongue hath muttered perverseness.] How this was done, none hath better set forth than the prophet Jeremiah {Jer 9:3-8}
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain Your hands are defiled with blood: here the prophet…
Your hands are defiled with blood: here the prophet comes from a more general to a more particular charge against them; by blood we are to understand either murders and bloodshed properly so called; or ways of injustice, extortion, oppression, and cruelties, whereby men are deprived of a livelihood; hence hating our brother is called murder, 1Jo 3:15, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem called murderers. See how the prophet phraseth their oppression, Mic 3:1-3.
Your fingers: this is not added to protract the discourse, but to aggravate their sin: q.d. Not only your hands, but your fingers; you are not free from the least part of injustice.
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Your lips have spoken lies; not only properly so called, but perjuries, and wronging’ your neighbours by slanders and false accusations; wherein he shows they did not only offer violence by the hand, but they had ways of circumventing with their lips.
Your tongue hath muttered: the verb doth properly signify to muse, or meditate; then the meaning is, that what they mutter, or utter with the tongue, they do it out of premeditated malice, from a perverse spirit; you may have a larger comment upon this Jer 9:3-6.
Perverseness: perverse words are such as are contrary to God’s word, and it is put here in the abstract, to intimate that their words were every way contrary to God’s will.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain For your hands are defiled with blood, and your…
For your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity,.... From a general charge, the prophet proceeds to a particular enumeration of sins they were guilty of; and idolatry not being mentioned, as Jerom observes, shows that the prophecy belongs to other times than Isaiah's, when that sin greatly prevailed. He begins the account with the sin of shedding blood; the blood of innocents, as the Targum; designing either the sin of murder, now frequently committed in Christian nations; or wars between Christian princes, by means of which much blood is shed; or persecutions of Christian brethren, by casting them into prisons, which have issued in their death; and at least want of brotherly love, or, the hatred of brethren, which is called murder, Jo1 3:15 a prevailing sin in the present Sardian state; and which will not be removed till the spiritual reign or Philadelphian state takes place: and this sin is of a defiling nature; it "defiles" the "hands" or actions; and without love all works signify nothing, Co1 13:1, yea, even their "fingers" are said to be defiled "with iniquity"; meaning either their lesser actions; or rather those more curiously and nicely performed, and seemingly more agreeable to the divine will; and yet defiled with some sin or other, as hypocrisy, vain glory, or the like: or it may be this may design the same as putting forth the fingers, and smiting with the fist, Isa 58:4, as Kimchi and Ben Melech observe; and so may have respect to some sort of persecution of their brethren for conscience sake, as there.
Your lips have spoken lies: or "falsehood" (q); that is, false doctrines, so called because contrary to the word of truth, and which deceive men:
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your tongue hath muttered perverseness: that which is a perversion of the Gospel of Christ, and of the souls of men; what is contrary to the sacred Scriptures, the standard of faith and practice, and that premeditated, as the word (r) signifies; done with design, and on purpose: the abounding of errors and heresies in the present day, openly taught and divulged, to the ruin of souls, seems here to be pointed at. In the Talmud (s) these are explained of the several sorts of men in a court of judicature; the "hands" of the judges; the "fingers" of, the Scribes; the "lips" of advocates and solicitors; and the "tongue" of adversaries, or the contending parties.
(q) "falsitatem", Montanus, Cocceius; "falsum", Junius & Tremeliius, Piscator. (r) Sept.; "meditabitur", Montanus; "meditatur", Piscator; "meditatam effert", Junius & Tremellius. (s) T. Bab. Sabbat. fol. 139. 1.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain Perverseness - Perverse words are such as are contrary…
Perverseness - Perverse words are such as are contrary to God's word. Words every way contrary to God's will.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Verse 3. Your tongue - "And your tongue"] An…
Verse 3. Your tongue - "And your tongue"] An ancient MS., and the Septuagint and Vulgate, add the conjunction.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain Isa 59:3. Your hands are defiled with blood —…
Isa 59:3. Your hands are defiled with blood — Here the prophet proceeds from a more general to a more particular charge against them. By blood, we are to understand, either murders and bloodshed, properly so called, or ways of injustice, extortion, oppression, and cruelties, whereby men are deprived of a livelihood: hence, hating our brother is called murder, 1Jn 3:15, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem murderers, Isa 1:21. And your fingers with iniquity — This is added to aggravate their sin; as if he had said, Not only your hands, but your fingers are defiled, and not the least part of you is free from injustice. Your lips have spoken lies — Not only properly so called, but perjuries, slanders, and false accusations: you have not only offered violence to your neighbours by your hands, but circumvented them by your lips. Your tongue hath muttered perverseness — Perverse words, or such as were contrary to God’s word and will. When they could not, for shame, utter their malice against their neighbours aloud, nor dared to do it for fear of being convicted of falsehood, and put to confusion, they muttered it secretly.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain For your hands are defiled with blood - The…
For your hands are defiled with blood - The prophet proceeds here more particularly to specify the sins of which they were guilty; and in order to show the extent and depth of their depravity, he specifies the various members of the body - the hands, the fingers, the lips, the tongue, the feet as the agents by which people commit iniquity. See a similar argument on the subject of depravity in Rom 3:13-15, where a part of the description which the prophet here gives is quoted by Paul, and applied to the Jews in his own time. The phrase ‘your hands are defiled with blood,’ means with the blood of the innocent; that is, they were guilty of murder, oppression, and cruelty. See a similar statement in Isa 1:15, where the phrase ‘your hands are full of blood’ occurs. The word rendered here ‘defiled’ (גאל gā'al) means commonly to redeem, to ransom; then to avenge, or to demand and inflict punishment for bloodshed. In the sense of defiling it occurs only in the later Hebrew writers - perhaps used in this sense because those who were avengers became covered, that is, defiled with blood.
And your fingers with iniquity - The fingers in the Scriptures are represented as the agents by which any purpose is executed Isa 2:8, ‘Which their own fingers have made’ (compare Isa 17:8). Some have supposed that the phrase used here means the same as the preceding, that they were guilty of murder and cruelty. But it seems more probable that the idea suggested by Grotius is the true sense, that it means that they were guilty of rapine and theft. The fingers are the instruments by which theft - especially the lighter and more delicate kinds of theft - is executed. Thus we use the word ‘light-fingered’ to denote anyone who is dexterous in taking and conveying away anything, or anyone who is addicted to petty thefts.
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Your lips have spoken lies - The nation is false, and no confidence can be reposed in the declarations which are made.
Your tongue hath muttered - On the word rendered ‘muttered’ (הגה hâgâh), see the notes at Isa 8:19. Probably there is included in the word here, the idea that they not only spoke evil, but that they did it with a complaining, discontented, or malicious spirit. It may also mean that they calumniated the government of God, and complained of his laws; or it may mean, as Grotius supposes, that they calumniated others - that is, that slander abounded among them.
Perverseness - Hebrew, עולה ‛avlâh - ‘Evil ‘ - the word from which our word evil is derived.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain (Isa 1:15; Rom 3:13-15).
(Isa 1:15; Rom 3:13-15).
hands . . . fingers--Not merely the "hands" perpetrate deeds of grosser enormity ("blood"), but the "fingers" commit more minute acts of "iniquity."
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lips . . . tongue--The lips "speak" openly "lies," the tongue "mutters" malicious insinuations ("perverseness"; perverse misrepresentations of others) (Jer 6:28; Jer 9:4).
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain 3, 4. Hands… fingers… lips — The sins of…
3, 4. Hands… fingers… lips — The sins of Israel are sins of deed and word, by which accusation is to be found in every organ.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 3. your hands are defiled with blood] Cf. ch.…
3. your hands are defiled with blood] Cf. ch. Isa_1:15.
hath uttered] Better muttereth (as R.V.).
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (3) Your hands are defiled with blood.—The accusation of…
(3) Your hands are defiled with blood.—The accusation of the “grand indictment” of Isa_1:15 is reproduced verbatim.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain Your hands are defiled with blood. (comp. Isa_1:15, Isa_1:21)…
Your hands are defiled with blood. (comp. Isa_1:15, Isa_1:21) (On the "innocent blood" shed by the Jews of the later Judaean kingdom, see 2Ki_21:6, 16 24:4 25:25 2Ch_24:21 2Ch_28:3 2Ch_33:6 2Ch_36:16, etc.) It consisted in
(1) sacrifices of children to Moloch;
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(2) persecution of prophets; and
(3) judicial murders, either actual (like that of Naboth, in Israel) or virtual, i.e. such perversion of justice as produced general poverty and misery, and tended to shorten men"s lives. (see the comment on Isa_1:15) Your lips have spoken lies. (comp. Isa_32:7) The wicked oppressors "devised wicked devices to destroy the poor with lying words."
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 General Information:
General Information:
Isaiah continues speaking to the people of Israel.
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For your hands are stained with blood and your fingers with sin
Here "hands" and "fingers" refers to their actions. This means they are guilty of doing violent and sinful things. "Your" is plural. AT: "For you have committed violent sins" (See: Metonymy and Forms of You)
Your lips speak lies and your tongue speaks maliciously
The parts of the body that make speech represent what people say. AT: "You speak lies and malicious things" (See: Metonymy)
they conceive trouble and give birth to sin
"Conceiving" and "giving birth" emphasize how carefully they plan to do sinful things. Here "they" still refers to the people of Israel. AT: "they work hard to do sinful things" (See: Metaphor)
translationWords
hand
blood
sin
tongue
call
righteous
true
trust
word
trouble
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.