For, behold, the LORD comes forth out of his place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity. The earth also will disclose her blood, and will no longer cover her slain.
*Because you have said, 'We have made a covenant with death, and with She'ol are we in agreement. When the overflowing scourge passes through, it won't come to us; for we have made lies our refuge, and we have hidden ourselves under falsehood.'*
The LORD will enter into judgment with the elders of his people, and their leaders: *It is you who have eaten up the vineyard. The spoil of the poor is in your houses.
*Woe to the rebellious children,* says the LORD, *who take counsel, but not from me; and who make an alliance, but not with my Spirit, that they may add sin to sin,
For you have trusted in your wickedness; you have said, None sees me; your wisdom and your knowledge, it has perverted you, and you have said in your heart, I am, and there is none else besides me.
Therefore as the tongue of fire devours the stubble, and as the dry grass sinks down in the flame, so their root shall be as rottenness, and their blossom shall go up as dust; because they have rejected the law of the LORD of Armies, and despised the word of the Holy One of Yisra'el.
For the vineyard of the LORD of Armies is the house of Yisra'el, and the men of Yehudah his pleasant plant: and he looked for justice, but, behold, oppression; for righteousness, but, behold, a cry of distress.
transgressing and denying the LORD, and turning away from following our God, speaking oppression and revolt, conceiving and uttering from the heart words of falsehood.
Thus says the LORD: *For three transgressions of Yehudah, yes, for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because they have rejected the LORD's law, and have not kept his statutes, and their lies have led them astray, after which their fathers walked;