The Restoration for Judah and Israel
1 Ask rain bfrom the Lord
in the season of cthe spring rain,
from the Lord dwho makes the storm clouds,
and ehe will give them showers of rain,
to everyone the vegetation in the field.
2 For fthe household gods gutter nonsense,
and the diviners see lies;
hthey tell false dreams
and give empty consolation.
Therefore ithe people wander like sheep;
they are afflicted for lack of a shepherd.
3 j“My anger is hot against the shepherds,
and kI will punish the leaders;1
for lthe Lord of hosts cares for his flock, the house of Judah,
and will make them like his majestic steed in battle.
4 From him shall come mthe cornerstone,
from him nthe tent peg,
from him the battle bow,
from him every ruler—oall of them together.
5 They shall be like mighty men in battle,
ptrampling the foe in the mud of the streets;
they shall fight because the Lord is with them,
and they shall put to shame qthe riders on horses.
6 r“I will strengthen the house of Judah,
and sI will save the house of Joseph.
tI will bring them back ubecause I have compassion on them,
and they shall be as though I had not rejected them,
for vI am the Lord their God and I will answer them.
7 Then Ephraim shall become like a mighty warrior,
and wtheir hearts shall be glad as with wine.
Their children shall see it and be glad;
their hearts shall rejoice in the Lord.
8 x“I will whistle for them and ygather them in,
for I have redeemed them,
and zthey shall be as many as they were before.
9 aThough I scattered them among the nations,
yet in far countries bthey shall remember me,
and with their children they shall live and return.
10 cI will bring them home from the land of Egypt,
and gather them from Assyria,
and dI will bring them to the land of Gilead and to Lebanon,
etill there is no room for them.
11 fHe shall pass through the sea of troubles
and strike down the waves of the sea,
gand all the depths of the Nile shall be dried up.
The pride of Assyria shall be laid low,
and hthe scepter of Egypt shall depart.
12 iI will make them strong in the Lord,
and jthey shall walk in his name,”
declares the Lord.
The Flock Doomed to Slaughter
1 Open your doors, kO Lebanon,
that the fire may devour your cedars!
2 Wail, O cypress, for the cedar has fallen,
for the glorious trees are ruined!
Wail, koaks of Bashan,
for the thick forest has been felled!
3 The sound of lthe wail of lthe shepherds,
for their glory is ruined!
The sound of the roar of mthe lions,
nfor the thicket of the Jordan is ruined!
4 Thus said the Lord my God: o“Become shepherd of the flock doomed to slaughter. 5 pThose who buy them slaughter them and go unpunished, and those who sell them say, ‘Blessed be the Lord, qI have become rich,’ and their own shepherds have no pity on them. 6 For rI will no longer have pity on the inhabitants of this land, declares the Lord. Behold, I will cause each of them to fall into the hand of his neighbor, and each into the hand of his king, and they shall crush the land, and I will deliver none from their hand.”
7 sSo I became the shepherd of the flock doomed to be slaughtered by the sheep traders. And I took two staffs, one I named uFavor, the other I named vUnion. sAnd I tended the sheep. 8 In one month wI destroyed the three shepherds. But I became impatient with them, and they also detested me. 9 So I said, “I will not be your shepherd. xWhat is to die, let it die. What is to be destroyed, let it be destroyed. And let those who are left devour the flesh of one another.” 10 And I took ymy staff Favor, and I broke it, annulling the covenant that I had made with all the peoples. 11 So it was annulled on that day, and the sheep traders, who were watching me, knew that it was the word of the Lord. 12 Then I said to them, “If it seems good to you, give me my wages; but if not, keep them.” And they weighed out as my wages zthirty pieces of silver. 13 Then the Lord said to me, “Throw it to the potter”—athe lordly price at which I was priced by them. So I took the zthirty pieces of silver and threw them into the house of the Lord, to the potter. 14 Then I broke bmy second staff Union, annulling the brotherhood between Judah and Israel.
15 Then the Lord said to me, “Take once more the equipment of ca foolish shepherd. 16 For behold, I am raising up in the land a shepherd dwho does not care for those being destroyed, or seek the young or heal the maimed or nourish the healthy, but edevours the flesh of the fat ones, tearing off even their hoofs.
17 f“Woe to my worthless shepherd,
gwho deserts the flock!
May the sword strike his arm
and hhis right eye!
Let his arm be wholly withered,
his right eye utterly blinded!”
The Lord Will Give Salvation
1 iThe oracle of the word of the Lord concerning Israel: Thus declares the Lord, jwho stretched out the heavens and kfounded the earth and jformed the spirit of man within him: 2 “Behold, I am about to make Jerusalem la cup of staggering to mall the surrounding peoples. The siege of Jerusalem nwill also be against Judah. 3 oOn that day I will make Jerusalem a heavy stone for all the peoples. pAll who lift it will surely hurt themselves. And mall the nations of the earth will gather against it. 4 oOn that day, declares the Lord, qI will strike every horse rwith panic, and its rider rwith madness. But for the sake of the house of Judah I will keep my eyes open, when I strike every horse of the peoples rwith blindness. 5 Then the clans of Judah shall say to themselves, ‘The inhabitants of Jerusalem have strength through the Lord of hosts, their God.’
6 o“On that day I will make the clans of Judah slike a blazing pot in the midst of wood, like a flaming torch among sheaves. And tthey shall devour to the right and to the left all the surrounding peoples, while uJerusalem shall again be inhabited in its place, in Jerusalem.
7 “And the Lord will give salvation to the tents of Judah first, that the glory of the house of David and the glory of the inhabitants of Jerusalem may not surpass that of Judah. 8 oOn that day vthe Lord will protect the inhabitants of Jerusalem, so that wthe feeblest among them on that day shall be like David, and the house of David shall be like God, xlike the angel of the Lord, going before them. 9 oAnd on that day yI will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem.
Him Whom They Have Pierced
10 “And zI will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and zpleas for mercy, so that, awhen they look on me, on him whom they have pierced, bthey shall mourn for him, cas one mourns for an only child, and weep bitterly over him, as one weeps over a firstborn. 11 oOn that day dthe mourning in Jerusalem will be as great eas the mourning for Hadad-rimmon in the plain of Megiddo. 12 The land shall mourn, feach family2 by itself: the family of the house of David by itself, and their wives by themselves; the family of the house of gNathan by itself, and their wives by themselves; 13 the family of the house of Levi by itself, and their wives by themselves; the family of hthe Shimeites by itself, and their wives by themselves; 14 and all the families that are left, each by itself, and their wives by themselves.
Come to Our Help
To the choirmaster. cA Maskil1 of the Sons of Korah.
1 O God, we have heard with our ears,
dour fathers have told us,
what deeds you performed in their days,
ein the days of old:
2 you with your own hand fdrove out the nations,
but gthem you planted;
you afflicted the peoples,
but hthem you set free;
3 for not iby their own sword did they win the land,
nor did their own arm save them,
but your right hand and your arm,
and jthe light of your face,
kfor you delighted in them.
4 lYou are my King, O God;
mordain salvation for Jacob!
5 Through you we npush down our foes;
through your name we otread down those who rise up against us.
6 For not in pmy bow do I trust,
nor can my sword save me.
7 But you have saved us from our foes
and have qput to shame those who hate us.
8 rIn God we have boasted continually,
and we will give thanks to your name forever. Selah
9 But you have srejected us and disgraced us
and thave not gone out with our armies.
10 You have made us uturn back from the foe,
and those who hate us have gotten spoil.
11 You have made us like vsheep for slaughter
and have wscattered us among the nations.
12 xYou have sold your people for a trifle,
demanding no high price for them.
13 You have made us ythe taunt of our neighbors,
the derision and zscorn of those around us.
14 You have made us aa byword among the nations,
ba laughingstock2 among the peoples.
15 All day long my disgrace is before me,
and cshame has covered my face
16 at the sound of the taunter and reviler,
at the sight of dthe enemy and the avenger.
17 eAll this has come upon us,
though we have not forgotten you,
and we have not been false to your covenant.
18 Our heart has not turned back,
nor have our fsteps gdeparted from your way;
19 yet you have hbroken us in the place of ijackals
and covered us with jthe shadow of death.
20 If we had forgotten the name of our God
or kspread out our hands to la foreign god,
21 mwould not God discover this?
nFor he knows the secrets of the heart.
22 Yet ofor your sake we are killed all the day long;
we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.
23 pAwake! Why are you sleeping, O Lord?
Rouse yourself! qDo not reject us forever!
24 Why rdo you hide your face?
Why do you forget our affliction and oppression?
25 For our ssoul is bowed down to the dust;
our belly clings to the ground.
26 Rise up; tcome to our help!
uRedeem us for the sake of your steadfast love!
