Chapter 3

1 “Ifd a man divorces his wife

and she goes from him

and becomes another man’s wife,

will he return to her?

Would not that land be greatly polluted?

You have played the harlot with many lovers;

and would you return to me?

says the Lord.

2 Lift up your eyes to the bare heights, and see!

Where have you not been lain with?

By the waysides you have sat awaiting lovers

like an Arab in the wilderness.

You have polluted the land

with your vile harlotry.

3 Therefore the showers have been withheld,

and the spring rain has not come;

yet you have a harlot’s brow,

you refuse to be ashamed.

4 Have you not just now called to me,

‘My father, thou art the friend of my youth—

5 will he be angry for ever,

will he be indignant to the end?’

Behold, you have spoken,

but you have done all the evil that you could.”

6 The Lord said to me in the days of King Josiah: “Have you seen what she did, that faithless one, Israel, how she went up on every high hill and under every green tree, and there played the harlot? 7 And I thought, ‘After she has done all this she will return to me’; but she did not return, and her false sister Judah saw it. 8 She saw that for all the adulteries of that faithless one, Israel, I had sent her away with a decree of divorce; yet her false sister Judah did not fear, but she too went and played the harlot. 9 Because harlotry was so light to her, she polluted the land, committing adultery with stone and tree. 10 Yet for all this her false sister Judah did not return to me with her whole heart, but in pretense, says the Lord.”

11 And the Lord said to me, “Faithless Israel has shown herself less guilty than false Judah. 12 Go, and proclaim these words toward the north, and say,

‘Return, faithless Israel,

says the Lord.

I will not look on you in anger,

for I am merciful,

says the Lord;

I will not be angry for ever.

13 Only acknowledge your guilt,

that you rebelled against the Lord your God

and scattered your favors among strangers under every green tree,

and that you have not obeyed my voice,

says the Lord.

14 Return, O faithless children,

says the Lord;

for I am your master;

I will take you, one from a city and two from a family,

and I will bring you to Zion.

15 “ ‘And I will give you shepherds after my own heart, who will feed you with knowledge and understanding. 16 And when you have multiplied and increased in the land, in those days, says the Lord, they shall no more say, “The ark of the covenant of the Lord.” It shall not come to mind, or be remembered, or missed; it shall not be made again. 17 At that time Jerusalem shall be called the throne of the Lord, and all nations shall gather to it, to the presence of the Lord in Jerusalem, and they shall no more stubbornly follow their own evil heart. 18 In those days the house of Judah shall join the house of Israel, and together they shall come from the land of the north to the land that I gave your fathers for a heritage.

19 “ ‘I thought

how I would set you among my sons,

and give you a pleasant land,

a heritage most beauteous of all nations.

And I thought you would call me, My Father,

and would not turn from following me.

20 Surely, as a faithless wife leaves her husband,

so have you been faithless to me, O house of Israel,

says the Lord.’ ”

21 A voice on the bare heights is heard,

the weeping and pleading of Israel’s sons,

because they have perverted their way,

they have forgotten the Lord their God.

22 “Return, O faithless sons,

I will heal your faithlessness.”

“Behold, we come to thee;

for thou art the Lord our God.

23 Truly the hills are a delusion,

the orgies on the mountains.

Truly in the Lord our God

is the salvation of Israel.

24 “But from our youth the shameful thing has devoured all for which our fathers labored, their flocks and their herds, their sons and their daughters. 25 Let us lie down in our shame, and let our dishonor cover us; for we have sinned against the Lord our God, we and our fathers, from our youth even to this day; and we have not obeyed the voice of the Lord our God.”

Chapter 31

1 “At that time, says the Lord, I will be the God of all the families of Israel, and they shall be my people.”

2 Thus says the Lord:

“The people who survived the sword

found grace in the wilderness;

when Israel sought for rest,

3 the Lord appeared to himd from afar.

I have loved you with an everlasting love;

therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you.

4 Again I will build you, and you shall be built,

O virgin Israel!

Again you shall adorn yourself with timbrels,

and shall go forth in the dance of the merrymakers.

5 Again you shall plant vineyards

upon the mountains of Samaria;

the planters shall plant,

and shall enjoy the fruit.

6 For there shall be a day when watchmen will call

in the hill country of Ephraim:

‘Arise, and let us go up to Zion,

to the Lord our God.’ ”

7 For thus says the Lord:

“Sing aloud with gladness for Jacob,

and raise shouts for the chief of the nations;

proclaim, give praise, and say,

‘The Lord has saved his people,

the remnant of Israel.’

8 Behold, I will bring them from the north country,

and gather them from the farthest parts of the earth,

among them the blind and the lame,

the woman with child and her who is in travail, together;

a great company, they shall return here.

9 With weeping they shall come,

and with consolations* I will lead them back,

I will make them walk by brooks of water,

in a straight path in which they shall not stumble;

for I am a father to Israel,

and Ephraim is my first-born.

10 “Hear the word of the Lord, O nations,

and declare it in the coastlands afar off;

say, ‘He who scattered Israel will gather him,

and will keep him as a shepherd keeps his flock.’

11 For the Lord has ransomed Jacob,

and has redeemed him from hands too strong for him.

12 They shall come and sing aloud on the height of Zion,

and they shall be radiant over the goodness of the Lord,

over the grain, the wine, and the oil,

and over the young of the flock and the herd;

their life shall be like a watered garden,

and they shall languish no more.

13 Then shall the maidens rejoice in the dance,

and the young men and the old shall be merry.

I will turn their mourning into joy,

I will comfort them, and give them gladness for sorrow.

14 I will feast the soul of the priests with abundance,

and my people shall be satisfied with my goodness,

says the Lord.”

15 Thus says the Lord:

“A voice is heard in Ramah,

lamentation and bitter weeping.

Rachel is weeping for her children;

she refuses to be comforted for her children,

because they are not.”

16 Thus says the Lord:

“Keep your voice from weeping,

and your eyes from tears;

for your work shall be rewarded,

says the Lord,

and they shall come back from the land of the enemy.

17 There is hope for your future,

says the Lord,

and your children shall come back to their own country.

18 I have heard Ephraim bemoaning,

‘Thou hast chastened me, and I was chastened,

like an untrained calf;

bring me back that I may be restored,

for thou art the Lord my God.

19 For after I had turned away I repented;

and after I was instructed, I smote upon my thigh;

I was ashamed, and I was confounded,

because I bore the disgrace of my youth.’

20 Is Ephraim my dear son?

Is he my darling child?

For as often as I speak against him,

I do remember him still.

Therefore my heart yearns for him;

I will surely have mercy on him,

says the Lord.

21 “Set up waymarks for yourself,

make yourself guideposts;

consider well the highway,

the road by which you went.

Return, O virgin Israel,

return to these your cities.

22 How long will you waver,

O faithless daughter?

For the Lord has created a new thing on the earth:

a woman protects a man.”

23 Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: “Once more they shall use these words in the land of Judah and in its cities, when I restore their fortunes:

‘The Lord bless you, O habitation of righteousness,

O holy hill!’

24 And Judah and all its cities shall dwell there together, and the farmers and those who wander* with their flocks. 25 For I will satisfy the weary soul, and every languishing soul I will replenish.”

26 Thereupon I awoke and looked, and my sleep was pleasant to me.

27 “Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will sow the house of Israel and the house of Judah with the seed of man and the seed of beast. 28 And it shall come to pass that as I have watched over them to pluck up and break down, to overthrow, destroy, and bring evil, so I will watch over them to build and to plant, says the Lord. 29 In those days they shall no longer say:

‘The fathers have eaten sour grapes,

and the children’s teeth are set on edge.’

30 But every one shall die for his own sin; each man who eats sour grapes, his teeth shall be set on edge.

31 “Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, 32 not like the covenant which I made with their fathers when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant which they broke, though I was …