Therefore, the Lord said: Because this people draw near with their mouths and honor Me with their lips, but have removed their hearts far from Me, and their fear toward Me is tradition by the precept of men,
Hear this, O house of Jacob, who are called by the name of Israel, and have come forth from the waters of Judah; who swear by the name of the Lord, and invoke the God of Israel, but not in truth or in righteousness;
Yet they seek Me daily and delight to know My ways, as a nation that has done righteousness and has not forsaken the ordinance of their God. They ask Me for the ordinances of justice; they take delight in approaching God.
transgressing, and lying against the Lord, and departing away from our God, speaking oppression and revolt, conceiving and uttering from the heart words of falsehood.
They come to you as people come, and they sit before you as My people, and they hear your words, but they will not do them. They do the lustful desires in their mouth, and their heart goes after their covetousness.
the oracle of the one hearing the words of God, and knowing the knowledge of the Most High, who sees the vision of the Almighty, falling into a trance, but having his eyes open:
And we know that the law is not given for a righteous person, but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and for sinners, for the unholy and the profane, for those who kill their fathers and mothers, for murderers,
We also were once foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving various desires and pleasures, living in evil and envy, filled with hatred and hating each other.
For there are some men who secretly crept in, who were marked long ago for this condemnation. They are ungodly men, who pervert the grace of our God into immorality and deny the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ.
No unclean thing shall ever enter it, nor shall anyone who commits abomination or falsehood, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life.
But the cowardly, the unbelieving, the abominable, the murderers, the sexually immoral, the sorcerers, the idolaters, and all liars shall have their portion in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone. This is the second death.”
Samuel said, “Does the Lord delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as much as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, obedience is better than sacrifice, a listening ear than the fat of rams.
Saul said to Samuel, “I have sinned, for I have transgressed the commandment of the Lord, and your words, because I feared the people, and obeyed their voice.