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Hard question January 5, 2026 · 50:00 · 10 min

Isaiah 29 and hyperbolic prophetic language

Ben reads Isaiah 29 aloud - woe to Jerusalem, Ariel, siege ramps and towers, nations like a dream of the night - then asks how to read prophetic language: is the poetic, hyperbolic register a fair way to say true things, like the OJ Simpson illustration (saying he murdered four people whose house burned, when he murdered two)? He notes the recent case of the man who swore on the Quran at the New York inauguration. The Ezekiel Tyre prophecy is harder: Babylon attacked Tyre as scripture said, but it was not destroyed forever, raising whether a prophet can overextend what God said.

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