The Preacher's Bible

“Run back and forth through the streets of Jerusalem, and see now, and know, and seek in its wide places, if you can find a man, if there is anyone who does justly, who seeks truth, then I will pardon her. ²Though they say, ‘As Jehovah lives,’ surely they swear falsely.”

³O Jehovah, don’t your eyes look on truth? You have stricken them, but they were not grieved. You have consumed them, but they have refused to receive correction. They have made their faces harder than a rock. They have refused to return.

⁴Then I said, “Surely these are poor. They are foolish; for they don’t know Jehovah’s way, nor the law of their God. ⁵I will go to the great men and will speak to them, for they know the way of Jehovah, and the law of their God.” But these with one accord have broken the yoke, and burst the bonds. ⁶Therefore a lion out of the forest will kill them. A wolf of the evenings will destroy them. A leopard will watch against their cities. Everyone who goes out there will be torn in pieces, because their transgressions are many and their backsliding has increased.

⁷“How can I pardon you? Your children have forsaken me, and sworn by what are no gods. When I had fed them to the full, they committed adultery, and assembled themselves in troops at the prostitutes’ houses. ⁸They were as fed horses roaming at large. Everyone neighed after his neighbor’s wife. ⁹Shouldn’t I punish them for these things?” says Jehovah. “Shouldn’t my soul be avenged on such a nation as this?

¹⁰“Go up on her walls, and destroy, but don’t make a full end. Take away her branches, for they are not Jehovah’s. ¹¹For the house of Israel and the house of Judah have dealt very treacherously against me,” says Jehovah.

¹²They have denied Jehovah, and said, “It is not he. Evil won’t come on us. We won’t see sword or famine. ¹³The prophets will become wind, and the word is not in them. Thus it will be done to them.”

¹⁴Therefore Jehovah, the God of Armies says, “Because you speak this word, behold, I will make my words in your mouth fire, and this people wood, and it will devour them. ¹⁵Behold, I will bring a nation on you from far away, house of Israel,” says Jehovah. “It is a mighty nation. It is an ancient nation, a nation whose language you don’t know and don’t understand what they say. ¹⁶Their quiver is an open tomb. They are all mighty men. ¹⁷They will eat up your harvest and your bread, which your sons and your daughters should eat. They will eat up your flocks and your herds. They will eat up your vines and your fig trees. They will beat down your fortified cities in which you trust with the sword.

¹⁸“But even in those days,” says Jehovah, “I will not make a full end of you. ¹⁹It will happen when you say, ‘Why has Jehovah our God done all these things to us?’ Then you shall say to them, ‘Just as you have forsaken me and served foreign gods in your land, so you will serve strangers in a land that is not yours.’

²⁰“Declare this in the house of Jacob, and publish it in Judah, saying, ²¹‘Hear this now, foolish people without understanding, who have eyes, and don’t see, who have ears, and don’t hear: ²²Don’t you fear me?’ says Jehovah; ‘Won’t you tremble at my presence, who have placed the sand for the bound of the sea by a perpetual decree, that it can’t pass it? Though its waves toss themselves, yet they can’t prevail. Though they roar, they still can’t pass over it.’

²³“But this people has a revolting and a rebellious heart. They have revolted and gone. ²⁴They don’t say in their heart, ‘Let’s now fear Jehovah our God, who gives rain, both the former and the latter, in its season, who preserves to us the appointed weeks of the harvest.’

²⁵“Your iniquities have turned away these things, and your sins have withheld good from you. ²⁶For wicked men are found among my people. They watch, as fowlers lie in wait. They set a trap. They catch men. ²⁷As a cage is full of birds, so are their houses full of deceit. Therefore they have become great, and grew rich. ²⁸They have grown fat. They shine; yes, they excel in deeds of wickedness. They don’t plead the cause, the cause of the fatherless, that they may prosper; and they don’t defend the rights of the needy.

²⁹“Shouldn’t I punish for these things?” says Jehovah. “Shouldn’t my soul be avenged on such a nation as this?

³⁰“An astonishing and horrible thing has happened in the land. ³¹The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests rule by their own authority; and my people love to have it so. What will you do in the end of it?