Isaiah 58 in plain modern English. New Ground English Translation.

Cry out — full throat, nothing held back! Lift your voice like a ram's horn. Declare to my people their rebellion, to the house of Jacob their failures.

Day after day they seek me, eager to know my ways — as if they were a nation that actually does what is right and has not abandoned the justice of their God. They ask me for just decisions, they are eager to draw close to God.

"Why have we fasted," they say, "and you didn't see it? Why have we denied ourselves, and you didn't notice?" Look — on the day of your fasting you pursue your own interests and you oppress all your workers.

Look — you fast only to quarrel and fight, to strike with a vicious fist. You cannot fast the way you do today and expect your voice to be heard on high.

Is this the kind of fast I choose — a day for someone to deny themselves? To bow your head like a reed and spread out sackcloth and ashes underneath you? Is that what you call a fast, a day acceptable to Yahweh?

Is this not the fast I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to untie the straps of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and to snap every yoke in two?

Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, to bring the homeless poor into your house, to cover the naked when you see them, and not to hide from your own flesh and blood?

Then your light will break through like the dawn, and your healing will spring up quickly. Your rightness will walk before you, and the glory of Yahweh will guard you from behind.

Then you will call, and Yahweh will answer. You will cry out, and he will say, "Here I am." If you remove the yoke from among you, the finger-pointing, the speaking of harm —

if you pour yourself out for the hungry and satisfy the desire of the afflicted, then your light will rise in the darkness and your deepest night will become like noon.

Yahweh will guide you continually and satisfy your desire in scorched places and make your bones strong. You will be like a watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail.

Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins; you will raise up foundations laid long ago. You will be called Repairer of Broken Walls, Restorer of Streets Where People Live.

If you hold back your foot on the Sabbath from pursuing your own interests on my set-apart day, if you call the Sabbath a delight and Yahweh's set-apart day honorable, if you honor it by not going your own way, not pursuing your own interests, not speaking empty words —

then you will find your delight in Yahweh, and I will make you ride on the heights of the earth and feed you with the inheritance of Jacob your father — for the mouth of Yahweh has spoken.