Isaiah 2:17

The declaration 'the loftiness of man shall be bowed down, and the haughtiness of men shall be made low: and the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day' appears three times in Isaiah 2 (verses 11, 12, and 17), functioning as a refrain that drives home the day-of-the-Lord theology of chapter 2's judgment oracle. The structural repetition communicates a fundamental eschatological pattern: all human self-exaltation is temporary and will be collapsed before the one legitimate exaltation of Yahweh alone. The verse develops the theme of Isaiah 6:1-8 where Isaiah's vision of the exalted Lord prostrates him — direct encounter with divine majesty produces self-abasement. James 4:10 ('humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up') and 1 Peter 5:5-6 encode the same principle as present ethical imperative.