Then they sat down to eat bread. When they looked up, behold, there was a caravan of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead, with their camels carrying gum, balsam, and myrrh—going to bring them down to Egypt.
Then their father Israel said to them, “If it must be so, then do this: take some of the best products of the land in your bags, and bring an offering down to the man—a little balsam and a little honey, gum and myrrh, pistachios and almonds.
Have You utterly rejected Judah? Has Your soul loathed Zion? Why have You smitten us, and there is no healing for us? We looked for shalom, but nothing good came, and for a time of healing, but suddenly, terror!
For thus says Adonai concerning the house of the king of Judah: “You are Gilead to Me— the summit of Lebanon, yet I will surely make you into a wilderness, uninhabited cities.
If only I had a travelers’ lodging place in the wilderness, then I might leave my people and get away from them! For they are all adulterers, a bunch of traitors.
Who is the one wise enough to understand this? To whom has the mouth of Adonai spoken that he may explain it? Why is the land ruined, laid waste like a wilderness, so that no one passes through?”
How can I admonish you? To what can I compare you, O daughter of Jerusalem? To what can I liken you, so that I might console you, O virgin daughter of Zion? For your wound is as deep as the sea! Who can heal you?