“And our sovereigns, our rulers, our priests, and our fathers, have not done Your Torah, nor heeded Your commands and Your witnesses, with which You witnessed against them.
Your rulers are stubborn, and companions of thieves. Everyone loves bribes, and runs after rewards. They do not defend the fatherless, nor does the cause of the widow reach them.
because of all the evil of the children of Yisra’ĕl and the children of Yehuḏah, which they have done to provoke Me – they, their sovereigns, their heads, their priests, their prophets, and the men of Yehuḏah, and the inhabitants of Yerushalayim.
“Let me go to the great men and speak to them, for they have known the way of יהוה, the right-ruling of their Elohim.” But these have altogether broken the yoke and torn off the bonds.
“Cry and wail, son of man, for it shall be on My people, on all the leaders of Yisra’ĕl. They shall be delivered to the sword together with My people, therefore strike your thigh.
“And you shall say, ‘Thus said the Master יהוה, “The city sheds blood in her midst, that her time might come. And she has made idols within herself to become defiled.
“Of the land this is his possession in Yisra’ĕl, and My princes shall no longer oppress My people. And they shall give the land to the house of Yisra’ĕl, according to their tribes.”
Woe to those plotting wickedness, and working out evil upon their beds! In the light of the morning they practise it, because it is in the might of their hand.