I have struck your children to no effect; they have not accepted discipline. Your own sword has devoured your prophets. Your generation is like a raging lion.
And he responded: "I have been very zealous on behalf of the Lord, the God of hosts. For the sons of Israel have forsaken your covenant. They have torn down your altars. They have killed your prophets with the sword. I alone remain. And they are seeking my life, so that they may take it away."
"I have been very zealous on behalf of the Lord, the God of hosts. For the sons of Israel have forsaken your covenant. They have torn down your altars. They have killed your prophets with the sword. I alone remain. And they are seeking my life, so that they may take it away."
But they ridiculed the messengers of God, and they gave little weight to his words, and they mocked the prophets, until the fury of the Lord ascended against his people, and there was no remedy.
But they provoked you to wrath, and they withdrew from you, and they cast your law behind their backs. And they killed your prophets, who contended with them so that they might return to you. And they committed great blasphemies.
Listening, I heard Ephraim going into captivity: 'You have chastised me, and I was instructed, like a young untamed bull. Convert me, and I shall be converted. For you are the Lord my God.
"Announce it to Egypt, and make it heard in Migdol, and let it resonate in Memphis and in Tahpanhes. Say this: Stand and prepare yourself! For the sword will devour everything around you.
O Lord, your eyes look with favor upon faith. You have struck them, and they have not grieved. You have bruised them, and they have refused to accept discipline. They have hardened their faces more than rock, and they are not willing to return.
And you will say to them: This is the nation that has not listened to the voice of the Lord their God, nor accepted discipline. Faith has perished and been taken away from their mouth.
Your uncleanness is execrable. For I wanted to cleanse you, and you have not been cleansed from your filth. So then, neither will you be cleansed before I cause my indignation over you to cease.
Just as it has been written in the law of Moses, all this evil has come upon us, and we did not entreat your face, O Lord our God, so that we might turn back from our iniquities and consider your truth.
Which of the Prophets have your fathers not persecuted? And they killed those who foretold the advent of the Just One. And you have now become the betrayers and murderers of him.
And men were scorched by the great heat, and they blasphemed the name of God, who holds power over these afflictions, but they did not repent, so as to give him glory.