“O Lord God, please forgive!

^cHow can Jacob stand?

He is so small!”

3  ^dThe Lord relented concerning this:

“It shall not be,” said the Lord.

“O Lord God, please cease!

^cHow can Jacob stand?

He is so small!”

6  ^dThe Lord relented concerning this:

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

“Behold, I am setting ^fa plumb line

in the midst of my people Israel;

^gI will never again pass by them;

9  ^hthe high places of Isaac shall be made desolate,

and the sanctuaries of Israel shall be laid waste,

and I will rise against ⁱthe house of Jeroboam with the sword.”

“‘Jeroboam shall die by the sword,

and ^mIsrael must go into exile

away from his land.’”

“You say, ⁿ‘Do not prophesy against Israel,

and ^wdo not preach against the house of ^xIsaac.’

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

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

and your land ^zshall be divided up with a measuring line;

you yourself shall die in an unclean land,

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

^d“The end¹ has come upon my people Israel;

I will never again pass by them.

3  ^eThe songs of the temple^{2 f}shall become wailings³ in that day,”

declares the Lord God.

^g“So many dead bodies!”

“They are thrown everywhere!”

^h“Silence!”

4  Hear this, ⁱyou who trample on the needy

and bring the poor of the land to an end,

5  saying, “When will ^jthe new moon be over,

that we may sell grain?

And ^kthe Sabbath,

that we may offer wheat for sale,

that we may make ^lthe ephah small and the shekel⁴ great

and deal deceitfully with false balances,

6  that we may buy the poor for ^msilver

and the needy for a pair of sandals

and sell the chaff of the wheat?”

7  The Lord has sworn by ⁿthe pride of Jacob:

“Surely ^oI will never forget any of their deeds.

8  ^pShall not the land tremble on this account,

and everyone mourn who dwells in it,

^qand all of it rise like the Nile,

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

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

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

and darken the earth in broad daylight.

10  ^tI will turn your feasts into mourning

and all your songs into lamentation;

^uI will bring sackcloth on every waist

^uand baldness on every head;

^vI will make it like the mourning for an only son

and the end of it like a bitter day.

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

“when ^wI will send a famine on the land—

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

^xbut of hearing the words of the Lord.

12  ^xThey shall wander from sea to sea,

and from north to east;

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

^ybut they shall not find it.

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

shall ^afaint for thirst.

14  Those who swear by ^bthe Guilt of Samaria,

and say, ‘As your god lives, O Dan,’

and, ‘As ^cthe Way of ^dBeersheba lives,’

they shall fall, and never rise again.”

^e“Strike the capitals until ^ethe thresholds ^fshake,

^gand shatter them on the heads of all the people;²

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

^hnot one of them shall flee away;

not one of them shall escape.

2  ⁱ“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 ^jthe top of Carmel,

from there I will search them out and take them;

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

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

4  ^lAnd if they go into captivity before their enemies,

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

^mand I will fix my eyes upon them

for evil and not for good.”

5  The Lord God of hosts,

he who touches the earth and ⁿit melts,

and all who dwell in it mourn,

^oand all of it rises like the Nile,

^oand sinks again, like the Nile of Egypt;

6  ^pwho builds his upper chambers in the heavens

and founds his vault upon the earth;

^qwho calls for the waters of the sea

and pours them out upon the surface of the earth—

^rthe Lord is his name.

7  “Are you not like ^sthe Cushites to me,

O people of Israel?” declares the Lord.

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

and ^uthe Philistines from ^vCaphtor and the Syrians from ^wKir?

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

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

^yexcept that I will not utterly destroy the house of Jacob,”

declares the Lord.

9  “For behold, I will command,

^zand shake the house of Israel among all the nations

as one shakes with a sieve,

but no pebble shall fall to the earth.

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

who say, ^a‘Disaster shall not overtake or meet us.’

11  “In that day ^bI will raise up

the booth of David that is fallen

and repair its breaches,

and raise up its ruins

and rebuild it as in the days of old,

12  ^cthat they may possess the remnant of Edom

and ^dall the nations who are called by my name,”³

declares the Lord who does this.

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

^e“when the plowman shall overtake the reaper

and the treader of grapes him who sows the seed;

^fthe mountains shall drip sweet wine,

and all the hills shall flow with it.

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

and ^hthey shall rebuild the ruined cities and inhabit them;

ⁱthey shall plant vineyards and drink their wine,

and they shall make gardens and eat their fruit.

15  ^jI will plant them on their land,

^kand they shall never again be uprooted

out of the land ^lthat I have given them,”

says the Lord your God.