Isaiah 34 · a question people ask
"Search in the book of the LORD, and read" (34:16). Which book?
The chapter doesn't say. The verse says what the reader will find: "not one of these will be missing. None will lack her mate. For my mouth has commanded, and his Spirit has gathered them" (34:16). The verses just before name creatures, from "the pelican and the porcupine" (34:11) to "the kites", "every one with her mate" (34:15), and in Hebrew 34:16's "her mate" is the same two words as 34:15's. In Hebrew the book of the LORD is sefer with the divine name, and the Hebrew Bible has the two side by side in this verse only. Earlier in the chapter the same word sefer is the scroll the sky is rolled up like (34:4) (tap book). Isaiah speaks of other books: "the words of a book that is sealed" (Isaiah 29:11), and "inscribe it in a book, that it may be for the time to come forever and ever" (Isaiah 30:8). These notes don't say whether 34:16 means either of them, or another.
The verses
“But the pelican and the porcupine will possess it. The owl and the raven will dwell in it. He will stretch the line of confusion over it, and the plumb line of emptiness.”
“The arrow snake will make her nest there, and lay, hatch, and gather under her shade. Yes, the kites will be gathered there, every one with her mate. Search in the book of the LORD, and read: not one of these will be missing. None will lack her mate. For my mouth has commanded, and his Spirit has gathered them.”
“All of the army of the sky will be dissolved. The sky will be rolled up like a scroll, and all its armies will fade away, as a leaf fades from off a vine or a fig tree.”
“All vision has become to you like the words of a book that is sealed, which men deliver to one who is educated, saying, “Read this, please;” and he says, “I can’t, for it is sealed;””