Offering false visions for you, divining lies for you, they place you over the necks of the vile, wicked ones— those whose day has come, the time of final punishment.
You are wearied with your many consultations; let those who study the heavens stand up and save you, those who gaze at the stars and at each new moon predict what shall befall you.
You, therefore, must not listen to your prophets, your diviners, your dreamers, your soothsayers, or your sorcerers, who are saying to you, “You shall not serve the king of Babylon.”
As a well keeps its water fresh, so she keeps fresh her wickedness; violence and destruction are heard within her; sickness and wounds are ever before me.
Your prophets have seen for you false and deceptive visions; they have not exposed your iniquity to restore your fortunes but have seen oracles for you that are false and misleading.
Because, in truth, because they have misled my people, saying, “Peace,” when there is no peace, and because, when the people build a flimsy wall, these prophets smear whitewash on it.
They have envisioned falsehood and lying divination; they say, “Says the Lord,” when the Lord has not sent them, and yet they wait for the fulfillment of their word!
Its prophets have smeared whitewash on their behalf, seeing false visions and divining lies for them, saying, “Thus says the Lord God,” when the Lord has not spoken.
Because you cherished an ancient enmity and gave over the people of Israel to the power of the sword at the time of their calamity, at the time of their final punishment,