The Daily Office · For guilt
Holy, holy, holy
Isaiah 6:1–5
1In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and the train of his robe filled the temple.
2Above him stood the seraphim. Each had six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew.
3And one called to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!”
4And the foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of him who called, and the house was filled with smoke.
5And I said: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts!”
What's happening here
"In the year that King Uzziah died" — Isaiah is careful to date his vision. Uzziah's long reign had been a span of relative stability; his death left Judah uncertain, Assyria looming. Into that political vacuum Isaiah sees a different king, high and lifted up, his robe filling the temple. The angels above the throne cry out a single adjective three times — the only adjective in the Hebrew Bible ever applied to God in triple repetition. Isaiah's response is not awe but undoing.
The word that matters
Hebrew · holy — set apart, other, not like anything else
Qadosh does not mean "morally perfect" in the first instance. Its root sense is separateness — reserved, withdrawn from common use. The Sabbath is qadosh because it is taken out of the working week. The temple vessels are qadosh because they do not go home with anyone. When the seraphim cry the word three times, they are not saying God is unusually good; they are saying God is unlike. The triple repetition is the Hebrew way of saying superlative — the holiest of the holy of the holy.
Where else this shows up
Leviticus 11:44
"Be holy, for I am holy." The whole Levitical theology in one line: qadosh is contagious.
Revelation 4:8
John, reaching for language a millennium later, writes the seraphim's Hebrew cry verbatim in Greek.
Luke 5:8
Peter, kneeling among the fish: "depart from me, for I am a sinful man." Isaiah's response compressed into one sentence.
Across the whole Bible · guilt
Passages found by what they mean, not by keyword. Open any of them on the canvas.
Psalm 51:1–2
Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin!
Psalm 51:3–6
For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me. Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you may be justified in your words and blameless in your judgment. Behold, I…
Job 7:21
Why do you not pardon my transgression and take away my iniquity? For now I shall lie in the earth; you will seek me, but I shall not be.”
Micah 7:18–20
Who is a God like you, pardoning iniquity and passing over transgression for the remnant of his inheritance? He does not retain his anger forever, because he delights in steadfast love. He will again have compassion on…
Leviticus 5:17–19
“If anyone sins, doing any of the things that by the LORD’s commandments ought not to be done, though he did not know it, then realizes his guilt, he shall bear his iniquity. He shall bring to the priest a ram without…
Leviticus 5:1–5
“If anyone sins in that he hears a public adjuration to testify, and though he is a witness, whether he has seen or come to know the matter, yet does not speak, he shall bear his iniquity; or if anyone touches an…
Colossians 1:14
in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.
Romans 11:26–27
And in this way all Israel will be saved, as it is written, “The Deliverer will come from Zion, he will banish ungodliness from Jacob”; “and this will be my covenant with them when I take away their sins.”
Lamentations 1:22
“Let all their evildoing come before you, and deal with them as you have dealt with me because of all my transgressions; for my groans are many, and my heart is faint.”
Acts 24:15–19
having a hope in God, which these men themselves accept, that there will be a resurrection of both the just and the unjust. So I always take pains to have a clear conscience toward both God and man. Now after several…
Daniel 9:3–7
Then I turned my face to the Lord God, seeking him by prayer and pleas for mercy with fasting and sackcloth and ashes. I prayed to the LORD my God and made confession, saying, “O Lord, the great and awesome God, who…
Hebrews 10:18
Where there is forgiveness of these, there is no longer any offering for sin.