Isaiah 44:9-20
Read Isaiah 44 in full →The Futility of Idolatry
9Those who form 1a graven image are all of them 2futile, and their desirable things are of no profit; even their own witnesses fail to see or know, so that they will be aput to shame. 10Who has formed a god or cast a graven image to ano profit? 11Behold, all his companions will be aput to shame. The craftsmen themselves are mere men. Let them all assemble themselves, let them stand up, let them be in dread, let them together be put to shame.
12The aman crafts iron into a cutting tool and does his work over the coals, 1forming it with hammers and working it with his powerful arm. He also gets hungry and has no power; he drinks no water and becomes weary. 13aAnother crafts wood, he extends a measuring line; he outlines it with 1a stylus. He makes it with planes and outlines it with a compass and makes it like the form of a man, like the glory of bman, so that it may sit in a chouse. 14In order to cut cedars for himself, he takes a 1cypress or an oak and 2raises it for himself among the trees of the forest. He plants a fir, and the rain makes it grow. 15Then it becomes something for a man to burn, so he takes one of them and warms himself; he also kindles a fire to bake bread. He also aworks to produce a god and worships it; he makes it a graven image and bfalls down before it. 16Half of it he burns in the fire; over this half he eats meat as he roasts a roast and is satisfied. He also warms himself and says, “Aha! I am warm; I have seen the fire.” 17But the rest of it he amakes into a god, his graven image. He falls down before it and worships; he also bprays to it and says, “Deliver me, for you are my god.”
18They do not aknow, nor do they understand, for He has bsmeared over their eyes so that they cannot see and their hearts so that they will have no insight. 19No one causes this to return to his heart, nor is there aknowledge or understanding to say, “I have burned half of it in the fire and also have baked bread over its coals. I roast meat and eat it. Then 1I make the rest of it into an babomination; 2I fall down before a block of wood!” 20He 1,afeeds on ashes; a bdeceived heart has turned him aside. And he cannot deliver his soul, and he cannot say, “cIs there not a lie in my right hand?”