Ah! Sinful nation, people laden with wickedness, evil offspring, corrupt children! They have forsaken the Lord, spurned the Holy One of Israel, apostatized,
He did what was right in the Lord’s sight, just as his father Uzziah had done, though he did not enter the temple of the Lord. The people, however, continued to act corruptly.
They were not to be like their ancestors, a rebellious and defiant generation, A generation whose heart was not constant, and whose spirit was not faithful to God.
Your princes are rebels and comrades of thieves; Each one of them loves a bribe and looks for gifts. The fatherless they do not defend, the widow’s plea does not reach them.
Against an impious nation I send him, and against a people under my wrath I order him To seize plunder, carry off loot, and to trample them like the mud of the street.
You will never be together with them in the grave, For you have ruined your land, you have slain your people! Let him never be named, that offshoot of evil!
For thus said the Lord God, the Holy One of Israel: By waiting and by calm you shall be saved, in quiet and in trust shall be your strength. But this you did not will.
Yet he too is wise and will bring disaster; he will not turn from his threats. He will rise up against the house of the wicked and against those who help evildoers.
When you winnow them, the wind shall carry them off, the storm shall scatter them. But you shall rejoice in the Lord; in the Holy One of Israel you shall glory.
Who say, “Let him make haste, let him speed his work, that we may see it; On with the plan of the Holy One of Israel! let it come to pass, that we may know it!”
Therefore, as the tongue of fire licks up stubble, as dry grass shrivels in the flame, Their root shall rot and their blossom scatter like dust; For they have rejected the instruction of the Lord of hosts, and scorned the word of the Holy One of Israel.
Because of their wicked avarice I grew angry; I struck them, hiding myself from them in wrath. But they turned back, following the way of their own heart.
They seek me day after day, and desire to know my ways, Like a nation that has done what is just and not abandoned the judgment of their God; They ask of me just judgments, they desire to draw near to God.
Two evils my people have done: they have forsaken me, the source of living waters; They have dug themselves cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water.
Your own wickedness chastises you, your own infidelities punish you. Know then, and see, how evil and bitter is your forsaking the Lord, your God, And your showing no fear of me, oracle of the Lord, the God of hosts.
You people of this generation, consider the word of the Lord: Have I become a wilderness to Israel, a land of gloom? Why then do my people say, “We have moved on, we will not come to you any more”?
for all the evil the Israelites and Judahites have done to provoke me—they, their kings, their princes, their priests, and their prophets, the people of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem.
Call archers out against Babylon, all who bend the bow; Encamp around them; let no one escape. Repay them for their deeds; what they have done, do to them, For they insulted the Lord, the Holy One of Israel.
Yes, you are truly the daughter of your mother who rejected her husband and children: you are truly a sister to your sisters who rejected their husbands and children—your mother was a Hittite and your father an Amorite.
The curse and the oath written in the law of Moses, the servant of God, were poured out over us for our sins, because all Israel transgressed your law and turned aside, refusing to hear your voice.
And now here you are, offspring of sinful stock, rising up in your ancestors’ place to add still more to the Lord’s blazing anger against the Israelites.
When he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath?
The Lord said to Moses, Soon you will be at rest with your ancestors, and then this people will prostitute themselves by following the foreign gods among whom they will live in the land they are about to enter. They will forsake me and break the covenant which I have made with them.
Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ on behalf of his body, which is the church,