It is better to go to the house of mourning than to the house of feasting, For that is the end of every mortal, and the living should take it to heart.
So he poured out wrath upon them, his anger, and the fury of battle; It blazed all around them, yet they did not realize, it burned them, but they did not take it to heart.
The just have perished, but no one takes it to heart; The steadfast are swept away, while no one understands. Yet the just are taken away from the presence of evil,
Pour out your wrath on the nations that do not know you, on the tribes that do not call your name; For they have utterly devoured Jacob, and laid waste his home.
The land is filled with adulterers; because of the curse the land mourns, the pastures of the wilderness are withered. Theirs is an evil course, theirs is unjust power.
Who is wise enough to understand this? To whom has the mouth of the Lord spoken? Let him declare it! Why is the land ravaged, scorched like a wilderness no one crosses?
Over the mountains I shall break out in cries of lamentation, over the pastures in the wilderness, in a dirge: They are scorched, and no one crosses them, no sound of lowing cattle; Birds of the air as well as beasts, all have fled and are gone.
Say to all the people of the land and to the priests: When you fasted and lamented in the fifth and in the seventh month these seventy years, was it really for me that you fasted?
And if you do not take to heart giving honor to my name, says the Lord of hosts, I will send a curse upon you and your blessing I will curse. In fact, I have already cursed it, because you do not take it to heart.