Go about through the streets of Jerusalem, and see, and consider, and seek in the broad places thereof, if you can find a man that executeth judgment, and seeketh faith: and I will be merciful unto it.

²And though they say: The Lord liveth; this also they will swear falsely.

³O Lord, thy eyes are upon truth: thou hast struck them, and they have not grieved: thou hast bruised them, and they have refused to receive correction: they have made their faces harder than the rock, and they have refused to return.

⁴But I said: Perhaps these are poor and foolish, that know not the way of the Lord, the judgment of their God.

⁵I will go therefore to the great men, and will speak to them: for they have known the way of the Lord, the judgment of their God: and behold these have altogether broken the yoke more, and have burst the bonds.

⁶Wherefore a lion out of the wood hath slain them, a wolf in the evening hath spoiled them, a leopard watcheth for their cities: every one that shall go out thence shall be taken, because their transgressions are multiplied, their rebellions are strengthened.

⁷How can I be merciful to thee? thy children have forsaken me, and swear by them that are not gods: I fed them to the full, and they committed adultery, and rioted in the harlot’s house.

⁸They are become as amorous horses and stallions: every one neighed after his neighbour’s wife.

⁹Shall I not visit for these things, saith the Lord? and shall not my soul take revenge on such a nation?

¹⁰Scale the walls thereof, and throw them down, but do not utterly destroy: take away the branches thereof, because they are not the Lord’s.

¹¹For the house of Israel, and the house of Juda have greatly transgressed against me, saith the Lord.

¹²They have denied the Lord, and said, It is not he: and the evil shall not come upon us: we shall not see the sword and famine.

¹³The prophets have spoken in the wind, and there was no word of God in them: these things therefore shall befall them.

¹⁴Thus saith the Lord the God of hosts: because you have spoken this word, behold I will make my words in thy mouth as fire, and this people as wood, and it shall devour them.

¹⁵Behold I will bring upon you a nation from afar, O house of Israel, saith the Lord: a strong nation, an ancient nation, a nation whose language thou shalt not know, nor understand what they say.

¹⁶Their quiver is as an open sepulchre, they are all valiant.

¹⁷And they shall eat up thy corn, and thy bread: they shall devour thy sons, and thy daughters: they shall eat up thy flocks, and thy herds: they shall eat thy vineyards, and thy figs: and with the sword they shall destroy thy strong cities, wherein thou trustest.

¹⁸Nevertheless in those days, saith the Lord, I will not bring you to utter destruction.

¹⁹And if you shall say: Why hath the Lord our God done all these things to us? thou shalt say to them: As you have forsaken me, and served a strange god in your own land, so shall you serve strangers in a land that is not your own.

²⁰Declare ye this to the house of Jacob, and publish it in Juda, saying:

²¹Hear, O foolish people, and without understanding: who have eyes, and see not: and ears, and hear not.

²²Will not you then fear me, saith the Lord: and will you not repent at my presence? I have set the sand a bound for the sea, an everlasting ordinance, which it shall not pass over: and the waves thereof shall toss themselves, and shall not prevail: they shall swell, and shall not pass over it.

²³But the heart of this people is become hard of belief and provoking, they are revolted and gone away.

²⁴And they have not said in their heart: Let us fear the Lord our God, who giveth us the early and the latter rain in due season: who preserveth for us the fulness of the yearly harvest.

²⁵Your iniquities have turned these things away, and your sins have withholden good things from you.

²⁶For among my people are found wicked men, that lie in wait as fowlers, setting snares and traps to catch men.

²⁷As a net is full of birds, so their houses are full of deceit: therefore are they become great and enriched.

²⁸They are grown gross and fat: and have most wickedly transgressed my words. They have not judged the cause of the widow, they have not managed the cause of the fatherless, and they have not judged the judgment of the poor.

²⁹Shall I not visit for these things, saith the Lord? or shall not my soul take revenge on such a nation?

³⁰Astonishing and wonderful things have been done in the land.

³¹The prophets prophesied falsehood, and the priests clapped their hands: and my people loved such things: what then shall be done in the end thereof?

Chapter 6

Strengthen yourselves, ye sons of Benjamin, in the midst of Jerusalem, and sound the trumpet in Thecua, and set up the standard over Bethacarem: for evil is seen out of the north, and a great destruction.

²I have likened the daughter of Sion to a beautiful and delicate woman.

³The shepherds shall come to her with their flocks: they have pitched their tents against her round about: every one shall feed them that are under his hand.

⁴Prepare ye war against her: arise, and let us go up at midday: woe unto us, for the day is declined, for the shadows of the evening are grown longer.

⁵Arise, and let us go up in the night, and destroy her houses.

⁶For thus saith the Lord of hosts: Hew down her trees, cast up a trench about Jerusalem: this is the city to be visited, all oppression is in the midst of her.

⁷As a cistern maketh its water cold, so hath she made her wickedness cold: violence and spoil shall be heard in her, infirmity and stripes are continually before me.

⁸Be thou instructed, O Jerusalem, lest my soul depart from thee, lest I make thee desolate, a land uninhabited.

⁹Thus saith the Lord of hosts: They shall gather the remains of Israel, as in a vine, even to one cluster: turn back thy hand, as a grapegatherer into the basket.

¹⁰To whom shall I speak? and to whom shall I testify, that he may hear? behold, their ears are uncircumcised, and they cannot hear: behold the word of the Lord is become unto them a reproach: and they will not receive it.

¹¹Therefore am I full of the fury of the Lord, I am weary with holding in: pour it out upon the child abroad, and upon the council of the young men together: for man and woman shall be taken, the ancient and he that is full of days.

¹²And their houses shall be turned over to others, with their lands and their wives together: for I will stretch forth my hand upon the inhabitants of the land, saith the Lord.

¹³For from the least of them even to the greatest, all are given to covetousness: and from the prophet even to the priest, all are guilty of deceit.

¹⁴And they healed the breach of the daughter of my people disgracefully, saying: Peace, peace: and there was no peace.

¹⁵They were confounded, because they committed abomination: yea, rather they were not confounded with confusion, and they knew not how to blush: wherefore they shall fall among them that fall: in the time of their visitation they shall fall down, saith the Lord.

¹⁶Thus saith the Lord: Stand ye on the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, which is the good way, and walk ye in it: and you shall find refreshment for your souls. And they said: We will not walk.

¹⁷And I appointed watchmen over you, saying: Hearken ye to the sound of the trumpet. And they said: We will not hearken.

¹⁸Therefore hear, ye nations, and know, O congregation, what great things I will do to them.

¹⁹Hear, O earth: Behold I will bring evils upon this people, the fruits of their own thoughts: because they have not heard my words, and they have cast away my law.

²⁰To what purpose do you bring me frankincense from Saba, and the sweet smelling cane from a far country? your holocausts are not acceptable, nor are your sacrifices pleasing to me.

²¹Therefore thus saith the Lord: Behold I will bring destruction upon this people, by which fathers and sons together shall fall, neighbour and kinsman shall perish.

²²Thus saith the Lord: Behold a people cometh from the land of the north, and a great nation shall rise up from the ends of the earth.

²³They shall lay hold on arrow and shield: they are cruel, and will have no mercy. Their voice shall roar like the sea: and they shall mount upon horses, prepared as men for war, against thee, O daughter of Sion.

²⁴We have heard the fame thereof, our hands grow feeble: anguish hath taken hold of us, as a woman in labour.

²⁵Go not out into the fields, nor walk in the highway: for the sword of the enemy, and fear is on every side.

²⁶Gird thee with sackcloth, O daughter of my people, and sprinkle thee with ashes: make thee mourning as for an only son, a bitter lamentation, because the destroyer shall suddenly come upon us.

²⁷I have set thee for a strong trier among my people: and thou shalt know, and prove their way.

²⁸All these princes go out of the way, they walk deceitfully, they are brass and iron: they are all corrupted.

²⁹The bellows have failed, the lead is consumed in the fire, the founder hath melted in vain: for their wicked deeds are not consumed.

³⁰Call them reprobate silver, for the Lord hath rejected them.

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