The Hebrew Prophets

For this doth the land mourn, And black have been the heavens above, because I have spoken--I have purposed, And I have not repented, Nor do I turn back from it.

From the voice of the horseman, And of him shooting with the bow, all the city is fleeing, They have come into thickets, And on cliffs they have gone up, All the city is forsaken, And there is no one dwelling in them.

And thou, O spoiled one, what dost thou? For thou puttest on scarlet, For thou adornest thyself with ornaments of gold. For thou rendest with pain thine eyes, In vain thou dost make thyself fair, Kicked against thee have doting ones, Thy life they do seek.

For a voice as of a sick woman I have heard, Distress, as of one bringing forth a first-born, The voice of the daughter of Zion, She bewaileth herself, she spreadeth out her hands, `Woe to me now, for weary is my soul of slayers!'

Go to and fro in streets of Jerusalem, And see, I pray you, and know, And seek in her broad places, if ye find a man, If there be one doing judgment, seeking stedfastness--Then am I propitious to her.

And if they say, `Jehovah liveth,' Surely to a falsehood they swear.

Jehovah, Thine eyes, are they not on stedfastness? Thou hast smitten them, and they have not grieved, Thou hast consumed them, They have refused to receive instruction, They made their faces harder than a rock, They have refused to turn back.

And I--I said, `Surely these are poor, They have been foolish, For they have not known the way of Jehovah, The judgment of their God.

I get me to the great, and I speak with them, For they have known the way of Jehovah, The judgment of their God.' Surely they together have broken the yoke, They have drawn away the bands.

Therefore smitten them hath a lion out of the forest, A wolf of the deserts doth spoil them, A leopard is watching over their cities, Every one who is going out of them is torn, For many have been their transgressions, Mighty have been their backslidings.

For this I am not propitious to thee, Thy sons have forsaken Me, And are satisfied by that which is not god, I satisfy them, and they commit adultery, And at the house of a harlot They gather themselves together.

Fed horses--they have been early risers, Each to the wife of his neighbour they neigh.

For these do I not lay a charge? An affirmation of Jehovah, And on a nation such as this, Doth not My soul avenge itself?

Go ye up on her walls, and destroy, And a completion make not, Turn aside her branches, for they are not Jehovah's,

For dealt treacherously against Me have the house of Israel, And the house of Judah, an affirmation of Jehovah.

They have lied against Jehovah, And they say, ` It is not He, Nor come in against us doth evil, Yea, sword and famine we do not see.

And the prophets become wind, And the word is not in them,' --thus it is done by them.

Therefore, thus said Jehovah, God of Hosts, Because of your speaking this word, Lo, I am making My words in thy mouth become fire, And this people wood, and it hath devoured them.

Lo, I am bringing against you a nation from afar, O house of Israel, an affirmation of Jehovah, A nation--strong it is , a nation--from of old it is , A nation--thou knowest not its tongue, Nor understandest what it speaketh.

Its quiver is as an open sepulchre, All of them--mighty ones.

And it hath consumed thy harvest and thy bread, They consume thy sons, and thy daughters, It consumeth thy flock, and thy herd, It consumeth thy vine, and thy fig-tree, It maketh poor thy fenced cities, In which thou art trusting--by the sword.

And even in those days, an affirmation of Jehovah, I do not make you a completion.

And it hath come to pass, when ye say, `For what hath Jehovah our God done to us all these?' That thou hast said unto them, `As ye have forsaken Me, And serve the gods of a foreigner in your land, So do ye serve strangers in a land not yours.

Declare ye this in the house of Jacob, And sound ye it in Judah, saying,

Hear ye, I pray you, this, O people, foolish and without heart, Eyes they have, and they see not, Ears they have, and they hear not.