The elite send their servants for water, but when they come to the cisterns, they are bone dry. So, they return with their vessels empty. Humiliated, they cover their faces with shame.
“My people are guilty of a double sin: they have abandoned me, the Spring of Living Water, and they have dug for themselves cisterns — cracked cisterns that hold no water.”
But Yahweh is a mighty, fearless warrior standing at my side. My persecutors are the ones who will fall down and fail; disgraced by their failure, they will not succeed. Their shame will stick to them forever.
So let my Satan-like accusers fail! Make them look ridiculous if they try to come against me. Clothe them with a robe of guilty shame from this day on!
Therefore, I have withheld the rains, and the spring showers have not come. Yet, there you sit with the shameless, brazen look of a prostitute who refuses to blush.
Why must my pain be endless? Why are my wounds incurable? Why won’t they heal? You’ve been to me like a deceitful spring that stops flowing, like a brook that goes dry.”
The nursing babies have such thirst that their tongues stick to the roofs of their mouths. Little children ask for bread, but no one gives them a crumb.