"For my people are foolish; they know me not; they are stupid children; they have no understanding. They are 'wise' -- in doing evil! But how to do good they know not."
My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge; because you have rejected knowledge, I reject you from being a priest to me. And since you have forgotten the law of your God, I also will forget your children.
When its boughs are dry, they are broken; women come and make a fire of them. For this is a people without discernment; therefore he who made them will not have compassion on them; he who formed them will show them no favor.
The master commended the dishonest manager for his shrewdness. For the sons of this world[3] are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than the sons of light.
Hear the word of the LORD, O children of Israel, for the LORD has a controversy with the inhabitants of the land. There is no faithfulness or steadfast love, and no knowledge of God in the land;
The priests did not say, 'Where is the LORD?' Those who handle the law did not know me; the shepherds[1] transgressed against me; the prophets prophesied by Baal and went after things that do not profit.
They bend their tongue like a bow; falsehood and not truth has grown strong[3] in the land; for they proceed from evil to evil, and they do not know me, declares the LORD.
[2] Oh that I had in the desert a travelers' lodging place, that I might leave my people and go away from them! For they are all adulterers, a company of treacherous men.
Their hands are on what is evil, to do it well; the prince and the judge ask for a bribe, and the great man utters the evil desire of his soul; thus they weave it together.