5

A Lament for Israel

¹Hear this word which I ⚓take up against you, a lamentation, O house of Israel:
²The virgin of Israel has fallen;
She will rise no more.
She lies forsaken on her land;
There is no one to raise her up.
³For thus says the Lord God:
“The city that goes out by a thousand
Shall have a hundred left,
And that which goes out by a hundred
Shall have ten left to the house of Israel.”

A Call to Repentance

⁴For thus says the Lord to the house of Israel:
⚓“Seek Me ⚓and live;
⁵But do not seek ⚓Bethel,
Nor enter Gilgal,
Nor pass over to ⚓Beersheba;
For Gilgal shall surely go into captivity,
And ⚓Bethel shall come to nothing.
⁶⚓Seek the Lord and live,
Lest He break out like fire in the house of Joseph,
And devour it,
With no one to quench it in Bethel—
⁷You who ⚓turn justice to wormwood,
And lay righteousness to rest in the earth!”
⁸He made the ⚓Pleiades and Orion;
He turns the shadow of death into morning
⚓And makes the day dark as night;
He ⚓calls for the waters of the sea
And pours them out on the face of the earth;
⚓The Lordis His name.
⁹He rains ruin upon the strong,
So that fury comes upon the fortress.
¹⁰⚓They hate the one who rebukes in the gate,
And they ⚓abhor the one who speaks uprightly.
¹¹⚓Therefore, because you tread down the poor
And take grain taxes from him,
Though ⚓you have built houses of hewn stone,
Yet you shall not dwell in them;
You have planted pleasant vineyards,
But you shall not drink wine from them.
¹²For I ⚓know your manifold transgressions
And your mighty sins:
⚓Afflicting the just and taking bribes;
⚓Diverting the poor from justice at the gate.
¹³Therefore ⚓the prudent keep silent at that time,
For it is an evil time.
¹⁴Seek good and not evil,
That you may live;
So the Lord God of hosts will be with you,
⚓As you have spoken.
¹⁵⚓Hate evil, love good;
Establish justice in the gate.
⚓It may be that the Lord God of hosts
Will be gracious to the remnant of Joseph.

The Day of the Lord

¹⁶Therefore the Lord God of hosts, the Lord, says this:
“There shall be wailing in all streets,
And they shall say in all the highways,
‘Alas! Alas!’
They shall call the farmer to mourning,
⚓And skillful lamenters to wailing.
¹⁷In all vineyards there shall be wailing,
For ⚓I will pass through you,”
Says the Lord.
¹⁸⚓Woe to you who desire the day of the Lord!
For what good is⚓the day of the Lord to you?
It will be darkness, and not light.
¹⁹It will be⚓as though a man fled from a lion,
And a bear met him!
Or as though he went into the house,
Leaned his hand on the wall,
And a serpent bit him!
²⁰Is not the day of the Lord darkness, and not light?
Is it not very dark, with no brightness in it?
²¹“I⚓ hate, I despise your feast days,
And ⚓I do not savor your sacred assemblies.
²²⚓Though you offer Me burnt offerings and your grain offerings,
I will not accept them,
Nor will I regard your fattened peace offerings.
²³Take away from Me the noise of your songs,
For I will not hear the melody of your stringed instruments.
²⁴⚓But let justice run down like water,
And righteousness like a mighty stream.
²⁵“Did⚓ you offer Me sacrifices and offerings
In the wilderness forty years, O house of Israel?
²⁶You also carried Sikkuth ⚓your king
And Chiun, your idols,
The star of your gods,
Which you made for yourselves.
²⁷Therefore I will send you into captivity ⚓beyond Damascus,”
Says the Lord, ⚓whose name is the God of hosts.

5

A Lament and Call to Repentance

¹Hear this word, Israel, this lament I take up concerning you:
²“Fallen is Virgin Israel,
never to rise again,
deserted in her own land,
with no one to lift her up.”
³This is what the Sovereign Lord says to Israel:
“Your city that marches out a thousand strong
will have only a hundred left;
your town that marches out a hundred strong
will have only ten left.”
⁴This is what the Lord says to Israel:
“Seek me and live;
⁵do not seek Bethel,
do not go to Gilgal,
do not journey to Beersheba.
For Gilgal will surely go into exile,
and Bethel will be reduced to nothing.⚓ ”
⁶Seek the Lord and live,
or he will sweep through the tribes of Joseph like a fire;
it will devour them,
and Bethel will have no one to quench it.

⁷There are those who turn justice into bitterness
and cast righteousness to the ground.

⁸He who made the Pleiades and Orion,
who turns midnight into dawn
and darkens day into night,
who calls for the waters of the sea
and pours them out over the face of the land—
the Lord is his name.
⁹With a blinding flash he destroys the stronghold
and brings the fortified city to ruin.

¹⁰There are those who hate the one who upholds justice in court
and detest the one who tells the truth.

¹¹You levy a straw tax on the poor
and impose a tax on their grain.
Therefore, though you have built stone mansions,
you will not live in them;
though you have planted lush vineyards,
you will not drink their wine.
¹²For I know how many are your offenses
and how great your sins.

There are those who oppress the innocent and take bribes
and deprive the poor of justice in the courts.
¹³Therefore the prudent keep quiet in such times,
for the times are evil.

¹⁴Seek good, not evil,
that you may live.
Then the Lord God Almighty will be with you,
just as you say he is.
¹⁵Hate evil, love good;
maintain justice in the courts.
Perhaps the Lord God Almighty will have mercy
on the remnant of Joseph.
¹⁶Therefore this is what the Lord, the Lord God Almighty, says:
“There will be wailing in all the streets
and cries of anguish in every public square.
The farmers will be summoned to weep
and the mourners to wail.
¹⁷There will be wailing in all the vineyards,
for I will pass through your midst,”

The Day of the Lord

¹⁸Woe to you who long
for the day of the Lord!
Why do you long for the day of the Lord?
That day will be darkness, not light.
¹⁹It will be as though a man fled from a lion
only to meet a bear,
as though he entered his house
and rested his hand on the wall
only to have a snake bite him.
²⁰Will not the day of the Lord be darkness, not light—
pitch-dark, without a ray of brightness?

²¹“I hate, I despise your religious festivals;
your assemblies are a stench to me.
²²Even though you bring me burnt offerings and grain offerings,
I will not accept them.
Though you bring choice fellowship offerings,
I will have no regard for them.
²³Away with the noise of your songs!
I will not listen to the music of your harps.
²⁴But let justice roll on like a river,
righteousness like a never-failing stream!

²⁵“Did you bring me sacrifices and offerings
forty years in the wilderness, people of Israel?
²⁶You have lifted up the shrine of your king,
the pedestal of your idols,
the star of your god⚓ —
which you made for yourselves.
²⁷Therefore I will send you into exile beyond Damascus,”
says the Lord, whose name is God Almighty.