Yet before the sons were even born and had not done anything good or bad—so that God’s purpose and choice might stand not because of works but because of Him who calls—
I will gather all the nations against Jerusalem to wage war. The city shall be captured, the houses ransacked and the women ravished. Half of the city will be exiled but the remainder of the people will not be cut off from the city.
Though a tenth still be in it, it will again be burned. As a terebinth tree or as an oak whose stump remains when cut down, so the holy seed will be the stump.”