God

At that time it shall be said to this people, and to Jerusalem: A burning wind is in the ways that are in the desert of the way of the daughter of my people, not to fan, nor to cleanse.

A full wind from these places shall come to me: and now I will speak my judgments with them.

They are set round about her, as keepers of fields: because she hath provoked me to wrath, saith the Lord.

For my foolish people have not known me: they are foolish and senseless children: they are wise to do evil, but to do good they have no knowledge.

I looked, and behold Carmel was a wilderness: and all its cities were destroyed at the presence of the Lord, and at the presence of the wrath of his indignation.

For thus saith the Lord: All the land shall be desolate, but yet I will not utterly destroy.

The Earth shall mourn, and the heavens shall lament from above: because I have spoken, I have purposed, and I have not repented, neither am I turned away from it.

For I have heard the voice as of a woman in travail, anguishes as of a woman in labour of a child. The voice of the daughter of Sion, dying away, spreading her hands: Woe is me, for my soul hath fainted because of them that are slain.

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.

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

O 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.

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

I 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.

How 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.

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

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

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

They 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.

Thus 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.

Behold 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.

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

And 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.

Will 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.

And 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.

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