If someone were to go about uttering empty falsehoods, saying, “I will preach to you of wine and strong drink,” such a one would be the preacher for this people!
Then the other said to him, “I also am a prophet as you are, and an angel spoke to me by the word of the Lord, ‘Bring him back with you into your house so that he may eat food and drink water.’ ” But he was deceiving him.
Then the king of Israel gathered the prophets together, about four hundred of them, and said to them, “Shall I go to battle against Ramoth-gilead, or shall I refrain?” They said, “Go up, for the Lord will give it into the hand of the king.”
These also reel with wine and stagger with strong drink; the priest and the prophet reel with strong drink; they are confused with wine; they stagger with strong drink; they err in vision; they stumble in giving judgment.
And the Lord said to me: “The prophets are prophesying lies in my name; I did not send them, nor did I command them or speak to them. They are prophesying to you a lying vision, worthless divination, and the deceit of their own minds.
But in the prophets of Jerusalem I have seen a more shocking thing: they commit adultery and walk in lies; they strengthen the hands of evildoers, so that no one turns from wickedness; all of them have become like Sodom to me and its inhabitants like Gomorrah.
They keep saying to those who despise the word of the Lord, “It shall be well with you,” and to all who stubbornly follow their own stubborn hearts, they say, “No calamity shall come upon you.”
See, I am against those who prophesy lying dreams, says the Lord, and who tell them and who lead my people astray by their lies and their recklessness, when I did not send them or command them, so they do not profit this people at all, says the Lord.
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 you have disheartened the righteous falsely, although I have not disheartened them, and you have encouraged the wicked not to turn from their wicked way and save their lives,
Its rulers give judgment for a bribe; its priests teach for a price; its prophets give oracles for money; yet they lean upon the Lord and say, “Surely the Lord is with us! No harm shall come upon us.”
Thus says the Lord concerning the prophets who lead my people astray, who cry “Peace” when they have something to eat but declare war against those who put nothing into their mouths.