Study Desk

And I said, "Listen, O heads of Jacob and leaders of the house of Israel! Is it not for you to know justice?

Then the seers will be disgraced, and those practicing divination will be put to shame. All of them will cover their lips, for there is no reply from God.

Its rulers judge for a bribe; its priests teach for a price; its prophets practice divination for money. But they lean on Yahweh, saying, "Is not Yahweh in our midst? Disaster will not come upon us."

And many nations will come and say, "Come! Let us go up to the mountain of Yahweh, and to the temple of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways, and that we may walk in his paths," for the law will go out from Zion, and the word of Yahweh from Jerusalem.

And he will judge between many peoples and will arbitrate for strong nations far away; and they will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks; nation will not lift up a sword against a nation, and they will no longer learn war.

But they will sit, each under his vine and under his fig tree, and no one will make them afraid, for the mouth of Yahweh of hosts has spoken.

For all the nations walk, each in the name of its god, but we will walk in the name of Yahweh our God, forever and ever.

Writhe and groan, O daughter of Zion, like a woman in labor. For now you will go forth from the city, and you will camp in the field; you will go to Babylon. There you will be rescued; there Yahweh will redeem you from the hand of your enemies.

Arise and thresh, O daughter of Zion, for your horn I will make as iron and your hooves as bronze. And you will break many peoples in pieces, and their gain you will devote to destruction to Yahweh, and their wealth to the Lord of the whole earth."

But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, too small to be among the clans of Judah, from you one will go out for me, to be ruler in Israel; and his origins are from of old, from ancient days.

And he will stand and shepherd his flock in the strength of Yahweh, in the majesty of the name of Yahweh his God. And they will live, for now he will be great unto the ends of the earth.

And this one will be peace. As for the Assyrian, when he comes into our land and when he treads on our fortresses, then we will raise up against him seven shepherds and eight leaders of men.

And the remnant of Jacob will be in the midst of many nations, like dew from Yahweh, like showers upon the grass which does not wait for a man, nor delays for the children of humankind.

Hear, O mountains, the indictment of Yahweh, and you eternal foundations of the earth, for Yahweh has an indictment against his people, and against Israel he contends.

For I brought you up from the land of Egypt, and from the house of slavery I redeemed you. And I sent Moses, Aaron, and Miriam before you.

Will Yahweh be pleased with thousands of rams, with myriads of rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?

For you have observed the regulations of Omri and all the works of the house of Ahab. And you have walked in their counsels, so that I am making you a desolation and your inhabitants an object of scorn. So you will bear the scorn of my people.

Woe is me! For I have become like the gatherings of summer, like the gleanings of the grape harvest, when there is no cluster of grapes to eat or early ripened fruit that my soul desires.

Their hands are upon evil, to do it well; the official and the judge ask for the bribe, and the great man utters the evil desire of his soul; and they weave it together.

For a son treats a father with contempt; a daughter rises up against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; the enemies of a man are the men of his own house.