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Read the Bible

New Living Translation

Isaiah 50:3

I dress the skies in darkness, covering them with clothes of mourning."

Bible Study Resources

Concordances:

- Nave's Topical Bible - Colors;   God;   Jesus Continued;   Meteorology and Celestial Phenomena;   Thompson Chain Reference - Blackness;   Torrey's Topical Textbook - Sackcloth;  

Dictionaries:

- American Tract Society Bible Dictionary - Garments;   Baker Evangelical Dictionary of Biblical Theology - Color, Symbolic Meaning of;   Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible - Micah, Book of;   Righteousness;   Servant of the Lord;   Shame;   Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament - Quotations;   Sackcloth ;   Morrish Bible Dictionary - Isaiah, Book of;   Smith Bible Dictionary - Sackcloth,;  

Encyclopedias:

- International Standard Bible Encyclopedia - Blackness;   The Jewish Encyclopedia - Color;  

Parallel Translations

Christian Standard Bible®
I dress the heavens in blackand make sackcloth their clothing.
Hebrew Names Version
I clothe the heavens with blackness, and I make sackcloth their covering.
King James Version
I clothe the heavens with blackness, and I make sackcloth their covering.
English Standard Version
I clothe the heavens with blackness and make sackcloth their covering."
New American Standard Bible
"I clothe the heavens with blackness, And make sackcloth their covering."
New Century Version
I can make the skies dark; I can make them black like clothes of sadness."
Amplified Bible
"I clothe the heavens with the blackness [of storm clouds] And make sackcloth [of mourning] their clothing."
World English Bible
I clothe the heavens with blackness, and I make sackcloth their covering.
Geneva Bible (1587)
I clothe the heauens with darkenesse, and make a sacke their couering.
Legacy Standard Bible
I clothe the heavens with blacknessAnd make sackcloth their covering."
Berean Standard Bible
I clothe the heavens in black and make sackcloth their covering.
Contemporary English Version
I make the sky turn dark like the sackcloth you wear at funerals."
Complete Jewish Bible
I dress the heavens in black to mourn and make their covering sackcloth."
Darby Translation
I clothe the heavens with blackness, and I make sackcloth their covering.
Easy-to-Read Version
I can make the skies dark. I can cover the skies in darkness as black as sackcloth."
George Lamsa Translation
I clothe the heavens with darkness and make sackcloth their covering.
Good News Translation
I can make the sky turn dark, as if it were in mourning for the dead."
Lexham English Bible
I clothe the heavens with darkness, and I make their covering sackcloth."
Literal Translation
I clothe the heavens with blackness, and sackcloth makes their covering.
Miles Coverdale Bible (1535)
As for heauen, I clooth it with darcknesse, and put a sack vpon it.
American Standard Version
I clothe the heavens with blackness, and I make sackcloth their covering.
Bible in Basic English
By me the heavens are clothed with black, and I make haircloth their robe.
JPS Old Testament (1917)
I clothe the heavens with blackness, and I make sackcloth their covering.
King James Version (1611)
I clothe the heauens with blackenesse, and I make sackcloth their couering.
Bishop's Bible (1568)
As for heauen I clothe it with darknesse, and put as it were a sacke vpon it.
Brenton's Septuagint (LXX)
I will clothe the sky with darkness, and will make its covering as sackcloth.
English Revised Version
I clothe the heavens with blackness, and I make sackcloth their covering.
Wycliffe Bible (1395)
Y schal clothe heuenes with derknessis, and Y schal sette a sak the hilyng of tho.
Update Bible Version
I clothe the heavens with blackness, and I make sackcloth their covering.
Webster's Bible Translation
I clothe the heavens with blackness, and I make sackcloth their covering.
New English Translation
I can clothe the sky in darkness; I can cover it with sackcloth."
New King James Version
I clothe the heavens with blackness, And I make sackcloth their covering."
New Life Bible
I clothe the heavens with darkness. I make cloth made from hair its covering."
New Revised Standard
I clothe the heavens with blackness, and make sackcloth their covering.
J.B. Rotherham Emphasized Bible
I clothe the heavens with gloom, And, of sackcloth, make I their covering.
Douay-Rheims Bible
I will clothe the heavens with darkness, and will make sackcloth their covering.
Revised Standard Version
I clothe the heavens with blackness, and make sackcloth their covering."
Young's Literal Translation
I clothe the heavens [with] blackness, And sackcloth I make their covering.
New American Standard Bible (1995)
"I clothe the heavens with blackness And make sackcloth their covering."

Contextual Overview

1 This is what the Lord says: "Was your mother sent away because I divorced her? Did I sell you as slaves to my creditors? No, you were sold because of your sins. And your mother, too, was taken because of your sins. 2 Why was no one there when I came? Why didn't anyone answer when I called? Is it because I have no power to rescue? No, that is not the reason! For I can speak to the sea and make it dry up! I can turn rivers into deserts covered with dying fish. 3 I dress the skies in darkness, covering them with clothes of mourning."

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

Exodus 10:21, Psalms 18:11, Psalms 18:12, Matthew 27:45, Revelation 6:12

Reciprocal: Jeremiah 4:28 - the heavens Nahum 1:4 - rebuketh Mark 15:33 - darkness

Cross-References

Genesis 50:10
When they arrived at the threshing floor of Atad, near the Jordan River, they held a very great and solemn memorial service, with a seven-day period of mourning for Joseph's father.
Numbers 20:29
When the people realized that Aaron had died, all Israel mourned for him thirty days.
Deuteronomy 21:13
and change the clothes she was wearing when she was captured. She will stay in your home, but let her mourn for her father and mother for a full month. Then you may marry her, and you will be her husband and she will be your wife.
Deuteronomy 34:8
The people of Israel mourned for Moses on the plains of Moab for thirty days, until the customary period of mourning was over.

Gill's Notes on the Bible

I clothe the heavens with blackness,.... With gross and thick darkness; perhaps referring to the three days' darkness the Egyptians were in, Exodus 10:12, or with thick and black clouds, as in tempestuous weather frequently; or by eclipses of the sun; there was an extraordinary instance of great darkness at the time of Christ's crucifixion, Matthew 27:45

and I make sackcloth their covering; that being black, and used in times of mourning; the allusion may be to the tents of Kedar, which were covered with sackcloth, or such like black stuff. The fall of the Pagan empire, through the power of Christ and his Gospel, is signified by the sun becoming black as sackcloth of hair, Revelation 6:12. Jarchi interprets this parabolically of the princes of the nations, when the Lord shall come to take vengeance upon them; as Kimchi does the sea, and the rivers, in the preceding verse, of the good things of the nations of the world, which they had in great abundance, and should be destroyed.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

I clothe the heavens with blackness - With the dark clouds of a tempest - perhaps with an allusion to the remarkable clouds and tempests that encircled the brow of Sinai when he gave the law. Or possibly alluding to the thick darkness which he brought over the land of Egypt (Exodus 10:21; Grotius). In the previous verse, he had stated what he did on the earth, and referred to the exhibitions of his great power there. He here refers to the exhibition of his power in the sky; and the argument is, that he who had thus the power to spread darkness over the face of the sky, had power also to deliver his people.

I make sackcloth their covering - Alluding to the clouds. Sackcloth was a coarse and dark cloth which was usually worn as an emblem of mourning (see the note at Isaiah 3:24). The same image is used in Revelation 6:12 : ‘And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair.’ To say, therefore, that the heavens were clothed with sackcloth, is one of the most striking and impressive figures which can be conceived.


 
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