Yet the LORD testified to Yisra'el, and to Yehudah, by every prophet, and every seer, saying, Turn you from your evil ways, and keep my mitzvot and my statutes, according to all the law which I commanded your fathers, and which I sent to you by my servants the prophets.
It was so, because the children of Yisra'el had sinned against the LORD their God, who brought them up out of the land of Egypt from under the hand of Par`oh king of Egypt, and had feared other gods,
and testified against them, that you might bring them again to your law. Yet they dealt proudly, and didn't listen to your mitzvot, but sinned against your ordinances, (which if a man do, he shall live in them), and withdrew the shoulder, and hardened their neck, and would not hear.
Only acknowledge your iniquity, that you have transgressed against the LORD your God, and have scattered your ways to the strangers under every green tree, and you have not obeyed my voice, says the LORD.
Let us lie down in our shame, and let our confusion cover us; for we have sinned against the LORD our God, we and our fathers, from our youth even to this day; and we have not obeyed the voice of the LORD our God.
So Yochanan the son of Kareach, and all the captains of the forces, and all the people, didn't obey the voice of the LORD, to dwell in the land of Yehudah.
If it seem evil to you to serve the LORD, choose you this day whom you will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were beyond the River, or the gods of the Amori, in whose land you dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.
and you shall make no covenant with the inhabitants of this land; you shall break down their altars. But you have not listened to my voice: why have you done this?
and I delivered you out of the hand of the Egyptians, and out of the hand of all who oppressed you, and drove them out from before you, and gave you their land;