Immediately after giving the option to choose good or evil, to choose life and a blessing, or death and a cursing, as stated in the Sanai covenant, Isaiah immediately goes into a declaration that the holy city Jerusalem has become corrupted. Though we are given the choice, we see what we ultimately have chosen, or what Isaiah predicts we will choose.
“How is the faithful city become a harlot! it was full of judgment; righteousness lodged in it; but now murderers” (Isaiah 1:21). He says this as if it is a lament of how far we have already fallen. And, just as the Lord predicts, he will clean house. “I will restore thy judges as at the first, and thy counselors as at the beginning; afterward thou shalt be called, The city of righteousness the faithful city” (Isaiah 1:26).
A common motif throughout the scriptures is symbolic imagery of a bridegroom and his bride, or a husband and his wife, with Christ being the bridegroom/husband and Zion/Jerusalem being his bride/wife. In Isaiah’s writings, there are two wives that he writes about. These wives are personified in his use of cities Throughout Isaiah’s writings, certain cities are personified as women, both virtuous and vile. Isaiah speaks of Zion as the forsaken wife, and the wife that will again be remembered. He refers to a once faithful Jerusalem as the fair woman that became a harlot. He refers to Babylon as a haughty “lady of kingdoms,” who after she falls from grace with be both a widow and childless. It is in this perspective that the Lord gives his glaring accusation, “How is the faithful city become a harlot! it was full of judgment; righteousness lodged in it; but now murderers” (Isaiah 1:21). See how Isaiah personifies the once faithful city and what the Lord will do to renew righteousness in his city.