Study Desk

O Yahweh, do not your eyes look for honesty? You have struck them, but they felt no pain, you have destroyed them, they refused to take discipline. They have hardened their faces more than rock, they have refused to turn back.

"How can I forgive you? Your children have forsaken me, and they have sworn by those who are not gods. But I fed them to the full, and they committed adultery, and flocked to the house of a prostitute.

Go up through her vineyards and destroy, but you must not make complete destruction. Remove her branches, for they are not to Yahweh.

"But even in those days," declares Yahweh, "I will not make you a complete destruction.

‘Hear this please, O foolish and senseless people, who have eyes but do not see, who have ears but do not hear.'

Do you not revere me?" declares Yahweh, "Do you not tremble before me? For I have placed the sand as a boundary for the sea, as an everlasting limit, and it cannot pass over it, and they rise and fall loudly, but they cannot prevail, and its waves roar, but they cannot pass over it.

But for this people is a stubborn and rebellious heart, they have turned aside and have gone away.

The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests rule by their own authority, and my people love it so much. But what will you do when the end comes?

But I am full with the wrath of Yahweh, I struggle to hold it in. Pour it out on the children in the street, and on the assemblies of young men at the same time. For even husband with wife will get trapped, the old with him who is full of days.

And they have treated the wound of my people lightly, saying, ‘Peace, peace,' but there is no peace.

Thus says Yahweh: "Stand at the roads and look, and ask for the ancient paths, where the way of the good is, and walk in it, and find rest for your inner selves. But they said, ‘We will not walk in it.'

And I raised up watchmen over you: ‘Listen attentively to the sound of a horn.' But they said, ‘We will not listen attentively.'

The bellows are burned up, lead is consumed by fire. In vain he keeps on refining, but the wicked are not torn apart.

But I only commanded them this word, saying, ‘Obey my voice, and I will be to you God, and you will be to me people, and you must walk in all of the way that I command you, so that it goes well with you.'

Yet they did not obey, and they did not incline their ear, but they walked in their own plans, in the stubbornness of their evil heart, and they became worse instead of better.

Yet they have not listened to me and they have not inclined their ear, but they have hardened their neck, they did more evil than their ancestors.

So you shall speak to them all these words, but they will not listen to you, and you shall call to them, but they will not answer you.

Therefore look, days are about to come," declares Yahweh, "and it will no longer be called Topheth or the Valley of Ben Hinnom, but the Valley of the Slaughter, and they will bury in Topheth until there is no more place.

Even the stork in heaven knows its appointed time, and the turtledove, and the swallow, and the song bird, they observe the time of their coming. But my people do not know the ordinance of Yahweh.

And they have treated the wound of the daughter of my people lightly, saying, ‘Peace, peace,' but there is no peace.