When Elisha returned to Gilgal, there was a famine in the land. The sons of the prophets were sitting before him, and he said to his servant, “Put on the big cooking pot, and boil some stew for the sons of the prophets.”
Woe to the rebellious children, says the Lord, who take counsel, but not from Me, and make an alliance, but not of My Spirit, in order to add sin to sin;
Therefore thus says the Lord God: Your slain whom you have laid in the midst of it, they are the flesh and this city is the cauldron. But I will bring you out of the midst of it.
Son of man, you dwell in the midst of a rebellious house, which has eyes to see and does not see, ears to hear and does not hear, for they are a rebellious house.
For I the Lord will speak, and the word that I speak shall come to pass. It shall be no more prolonged, for in your days, O rebellious house, I will say the word, and will perform it, says the Lord God.
Say now to the rebellious house: Do you not know what these things mean? Tell them: Behold, the king of Babylon came to Jerusalem, and took its king and its officials, and led them to him in Babylon.
And He said to me: Son of man, I send you to the Israelites, to a rebellious nation that has rebelled against Me. They and their fathers have transgressed against Me even to this very day.
And you, son of man, do not be afraid of them or be afraid of their words, though briers and thorns be with you, and you dwell among scorpions. Do not be afraid of their words or be dismayed at their looks, for they are a rebellious house.
Therefore thus says the Lord God: Woe to the bloody city, to the pot whose rust is in it, and whose rust has not gone out of it! Take out of it piece by piece without choosing.
In that day they will take up a taunt against you, and they will wail a wailing lament, and say: “We are totally ruined! He diminishes the portion of my people; how He removes it from me! To a traitor He reassigns our fields!”
He said, “To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of God, but to others they are in parables, so that ‘seeing they may not see, and hearing they may not understand.’