O Lord, God of Israel, you are just, but we have escaped as a remnant, as is now the case. Here we are before you in our guilt, though no one can face you because of this.”
A voice on the bare heights is heard, the plaintive weeping of Israel’s children, because they have perverted their way; they have forgotten the Lord their God:
With weeping they shall come, and with consolations I will lead them back; I will let them walk by brooks of water, in a straight path where they shall not stumble, for I have become a father to Israel, and Ephraim is my firstborn.
so that none of the remnant of Judah who have come to settle in the land of Egypt shall escape or survive or return to the land of Judah. Although they long to go back to live there, they shall not go back, except some fugitives.
And those who escape the sword shall return from the land of Egypt to the land of Judah, few in number, and all the remnant of Judah who have come to the land of Egypt to settle shall know whose words will stand, mine or theirs!
For a sound of wailing is heard from Zion: “How we are ruined! We are utterly shamed because we have left the land, because they have cast down our dwellings.”
Yet survivors shall be left in it, sons and daughters who will be brought out; they will come out to you. When you see their ways and their deeds, you will be consoled for the evil that I have brought upon Jerusalem, for all that I have brought upon it.
My sheep were scattered; they wandered over all the mountains and on every high hill; my sheep were scattered over all the face of the earth, with no one to search or seek for them.
Then you shall remember your evil ways and your dealings that were not good, and you shall loathe yourselves for your iniquities and your abominable deeds.