1  “Woe to those who are ^oat ease in Zion,

and to those who feel secure on the mountain of Samaria,

the notable men of the first of the nations,

to whom the house of Israel comes!

2  Pass over to Calneh, and see,

and from there go to ^pHamath the great;

then go down to ^qGath of the Philistines.

^rAre you better than these kingdoms?

Or is their territory greater than your territory,

3  O ^syou who put far away the day of disaster

and bring near the seat of violence?

4  “Woe to those who lie on ^tbeds of ivory

and stretch themselves out on their couches,

and eat lambs from the flock

and calves from the midst of the stall,

5  who sing idle songs to the sound of the ^uharp

and ^vlike David invent for themselves instruments of music,

6  who ^wdrink wine in bowls

and anoint themselves with the finest oils,

but are not grieved over the ruin of Joseph!

7  Therefore they shall now be the first of those who go into ^xexile,

and the revelry of those who stretch themselves out shall pass away.”

“I abhor the ^zpride of Jacob

and hate his strongholds,

and I will ^adeliver up the city and all that is in it.”

11  For behold, the Lord commands,

and the ^dgreat house shall be struck down into fragments,

and the little house into bits.

12  Do horses run on rocks?

Does one plow there¹ with oxen?

But you have turned ^ejustice into poison

and the fruit of righteousness into wormwood²—

13  you who rejoice in Lo-debar,³

who say, “Have we not by our own strength

captured Karnaim⁴ for ourselves?”

14  “For behold, I will raise up against you a nation,

O house of Israel,” declares the Lord, the God of hosts;

“and they shall oppress you ^ffrom Lebo-hamath

to the Brook of the Arabah.”

“O Lord God, please forgive!

How can Jacob stand?

He is so small!”

3  The Lord ^hrelented concerning this:

“It shall not be,” said the Lord.

“O Lord God, please cease!

How can Jacob stand?

He is so small!”

6  The Lord relented concerning this:

“This also shall not be,” said the Lord God.

“Behold, I am setting a plumb line

in the midst of my people Israel;

I will never again pass by them;

9  the high places of Isaac shall be made desolate,

and the sanctuaries of Israel shall be laid waste,

and I will rise against the house of ^kJeroboam with the sword.”

“‘Jeroboam shall die by the sword,

and Israel must go into ⁿexile

away from his land.’”

“You say, ‘Do not prophesy against Israel,

and do not preach against the house of Isaac.’

“‘Your wife shall be a prostitute in the city,

and your sons and your daughters shall fall by the sword,

and your land shall be divided up with a measuring line;

you yourself shall die in an unclean land,

and Israel shall surely go into exile away from its land.’”

“The end⁶ has come upon my people Israel;

I will never again pass by them.

3  The songs of the temple⁷ shall become wailings⁸ in that day,”

declares the Lord God.

“So many dead bodies!”

“They are thrown everywhere!”

^s“Silence!”

4  Hear this, you who ^ttrample on the needy

and bring the poor of the land to an end,

5  saying, “When will the ^unew moon be over,

that we may sell grain?

And the Sabbath,

that we may offer wheat for sale,

that we may make the ephah small and the shekel⁹ great

and deal deceitfully with ^vfalse balances,

6  that we may ^wbuy the poor for silver

and the needy for a pair of sandals

and sell the chaff of the wheat?”

7  The Lord has sworn by the ^xpride of Jacob:

“Surely I will never forget any of their deeds.

8  Shall not the land tremble on this account,

and everyone mourn who dwells in it,

and all of it ^yrise like the Nile,

and be tossed about and sink again, like the Nile of Egypt?”

9  “And on that day,” declares the Lord God,

^z“I will make the sun go down at noon

and ^adarken the earth in broad daylight.

10  I will turn your feasts into mourning

and ^ball your songs into lamentation;

^cI will bring sackcloth on every waist

and ^dbaldness on every head;

I will make it like the mourning ^efor an only son

and the end of it like a bitter day.

11  “Behold, the days are coming,” declares the Lord God,

“when I will send a famine on the land—

not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water,

but ^fof hearing the words of the Lord.

12  They shall wander from sea to sea,

and from north to east;

they shall run to and fro, to seek the word of the Lord,

but they shall not find it.

13  “In that day the lovely virgins and the young men

shall faint for thirst.

14  Those who swear by the Guilt of Samaria,

and say, ‘As your god lives, O Dan,’

and, ‘As the Way of ^gBeersheba lives,’

they shall fall, and never rise again.”

“Strike the capitals until the thresholds shake,

and shatter them on the heads of all the people;¹¹

and those who are left of them I will kill with the sword;

not one of them shall flee away;

not one of them shall escape.

2  ^h“If they dig into Sheol,

from there shall my hand take them;

ⁱif they climb up to heaven,

from there I will bring them down.

3  If they hide themselves on the top of Carmel,

from there I will search them out and take them;

and if they hide from my sight at the bottom of the sea,

there I will command the serpent, and it shall bite them.

4  And if they go into captivity before their enemies,

there I will command the sword, and it shall kill them;

and I will fix my eyes upon them

^jfor evil and not for good.”

5  The Lord God of hosts,

he who touches the earth and it melts,

and ^kall who dwell in it mourn,

and all of it rises like the Nile,

and sinks again, like the Nile of Egypt;

6  who builds his upper chambers in the heavens

and founds his vault upon the earth;

^lwho calls for the waters of the sea

and pours them out upon the surface of the earth—

the Lord is his name.

7  “Are you not like the Cushites to me,

O people of Israel?” declares the Lord.

“Did I not bring up ^mIsrael from the land of Egypt,

and the Philistines from ⁿCaphtor and the Syrians from ^oKir?

8  Behold, the eyes of the Lord God are upon the sinful kingdom,

and I will destroy it from the surface of the ground,

except that ^pI will not utterly destroy the house of Jacob,”

declares the Lord.

9  “For behold, I will command,

and shake the house of Israel among all the nations

as one shakes with a ^qsieve,

but no pebble shall fall to the earth.

10  All the sinners of my people shall die by the sword,

^rwho say, ^s‘Disaster shall not overtake or meet us.’

11  ^t“In that day I will raise up

the booth of David that is fallen

and repair its breaches,

and raise up its ruins

and ^urebuild it as in the days of old,

12  that they may possess the remnant of Edom

and all the nations who are ^vcalled by my name,”¹²

declares the Lord who does this.

13  “Behold, the days are coming,” declares the Lord,

^w“when the plowman shall overtake the reaper

and the treader of grapes him who sows the seed;

^xthe mountains shall drip sweet wine,

and all the hills shall flow with it.

14  ^yI will restore the fortunes of my people Israel,

and they shall rebuild the ^zruined cities and inhabit them;

they shall plant vineyards and drink their wine,

and they shall make gardens and eat their fruit.

15  ^aI will plant them on their land,

and they shall never again be uprooted

out of the land that I have given them,”

says the Lord your God.