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Jerusalem — an Unfaithful Wife
Then another message came to me from the LORD:
Then another message came to me from the LORD:
God’s Love for Jerusalem
Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
“Son of man, confront Jerusalem with her detestable sins.
“Son of man, cause Jerusalem to know her abominations,
Give her this message from the Sovereign LORD: You are nothing but a Canaanite! Your father was an Amorite and your mother a Hittite.
On the day you were born, no one cared about you. Your umbilical cord was not cut, and you were never washed, rubbed with salt, and wrapped in cloth.
As for your nativity, on the day you were born your navel cord was not cut, nor were you washed in water to cleanse you; you were not rubbed with salt nor wrapped in swaddling cloths.
No one had the slightest interest in you; no one pitied you or cared for you. On the day you were born, you were unwanted, dumped in a field and left to die.
“But I came by and saw you there, helplessly kicking about in your own blood. As you lay there, I said, ‘Live!’
“And when I passed by you and saw you struggling in your own blood, I said to you in your blood, ‘Live!’ Yes, I said to you in your blood, ‘Live!’
And I helped you to thrive like a plant in the field. You grew up and became a beautiful jewel. Your breasts became full, and your body hair grew, but you were still naked.
And when I passed by again, I saw that you were old enough for love. So I wrapped my cloak around you to cover your nakedness and declared my marriage vows. I made a covenant with you, says the Sovereign LORD, and you became mine.
“Then I bathed you and washed off your blood, and I rubbed fragrant oils into your skin.
“Then I washed you in water; yes, I thoroughly washed off your blood, and I anointed you with oil.
I gave you expensive clothing of fine linen and silk, beautifully embroidered, and sandals made of fine goatskin leather.
I gave you lovely jewelry, bracelets, beautiful necklaces,
I adorned you with ornaments, put bracelets on your wrists, and a chain on your neck.
a ring for your nose, earrings for your ears, and a lovely crown for your head.
And so you were adorned with gold and silver. Your clothes were made of fine linen and costly fabric and were beautifully embroidered. You ate the finest foods — choice flour, honey, and olive oil — and became more beautiful than ever. You looked like a queen, and so you were!
Thus you were adorned with gold and silver, and your clothing was of fine linen, silk, and embroidered cloth. You ate pastry of fine flour, honey, and oil. You were exceedingly beautiful, and succeeded to royalty.
Your fame soon spread throughout the world because of your beauty. I dressed you in my splendor and perfected your beauty, says the Sovereign LORD.
Your fame went out among the nations because of your beauty, for it was perfect through My splendor which I had bestowed on you,” says the Lord God.
“But you thought your fame and beauty were your own. So you gave yourself as a prostitute to every man who came along. Your beauty was theirs for the asking.
Jerusalem’s Harlotry
“But you trusted in your own beauty, played the harlot because of your fame, and poured out your harlotry on everyone passing by who would have it.
“But you trusted in your own beauty, played the harlot because of your fame, and poured out your harlotry on everyone passing by who would have it.
You used the lovely things I gave you to make shrines for idols, where you played the prostitute. Unbelievable! How could such a thing ever happen?
You took the very jewels and gold and silver ornaments I had given you and made statues of men and worshiped them. This is adultery against me!
You have also taken your beautiful jewelry from My gold and My silver, which I had given you, and made for yourself male images and played the harlot with them.
You used the beautifully embroidered clothes I gave you to dress your idols. Then you used my special oil and my incense to worship them.
You took your embroidered garments and covered them, and you set My oil and My incense before them.
Imagine it! You set before them as a sacrifice the choice flour, olive oil, and honey I had given you, says the Sovereign LORD.
“Then you took your sons and daughters — the children you had borne to me — and sacrificed them to your gods. Was your prostitution not enough?
“Moreover you took your sons and your daughters, whom you bore to Me, and these you sacrificed to them to be devoured. Were your acts of harlotry a small matter,
Must you also slaughter my children by sacrificing them to idols?
that you have slain My children and offered them up to them by causing them to pass through the fire?
In all your years of adultery and detestable sin, you have not once remembered the days long ago when you lay naked in a field, kicking about in your own blood.
And in all your abominations and acts of harlotry you did not remember the days of your youth, when you were naked and bare, struggling in your blood.
“What sorrow awaits you, says the Sovereign LORD. In addition to all your other wickedness,
“Then it was so, after all your wickedness — ‘Woe, woe to you!’ says the Lord God —
you built a pagan shrine and put altars to idols in every town square.
On every street corner you defiled your beauty, offering your body to every passerby in an endless stream of prostitution.
You built your high places at the head of every road, and made your beauty to be abhorred. You offered yourself to everyone who passed by, and multiplied your acts of harlotry.
Then you added lustful Egypt to your lovers, provoking my anger with your increasing promiscuity.
You also committed harlotry with the Egyptians, your very fleshly neighbors, and increased your acts of harlotry to provoke Me to anger.
That is why I struck you with my fist and reduced your boundaries. I handed you over to your enemies, the Philistines, and even they were shocked by your lewd conduct.
You have prostituted yourself with the Assyrians, too. It seems you can never find enough new lovers! And after your prostitution there, you still were not satisfied.
You also played the harlot with the Assyrians, because you were insatiable; indeed you played the harlot with them and still were not satisfied.
Moreover you multiplied your acts of harlotry as far as the land of the trader, Chaldea; and even then you were not satisfied.
“What a sick heart you have, says the Sovereign LORD, to do such things as these, acting like a shameless prostitute.
“How degenerate is your heart!” says the Lord God, “seeing you do all these things, the deeds of a brazen harlot.
You build your pagan shrines on every street corner and your altars to idols in every square. In fact, you have been worse than a prostitute, so eager for sin that you have not even demanded payment.
Yes, you are an adulterous wife who takes in strangers instead of her own husband.
You are an adulterous wife, who takes strangers instead of her husband.
Prostitutes charge for their services — but not you! You give gifts to your lovers, bribing them to come and have sex with you.
So you are the opposite of other prostitutes. You pay your lovers instead of their paying you!
You are the opposite of other women in your harlotry, because no one solicited you to be a harlot. In that you gave payment but no payment was given you, therefore you are the opposite.”
Judgment on Jerusalem’s Prostitution
“Therefore, you prostitute, listen to this message from the LORD!
Jerusalem’s Lovers Will Abuse Her
‘Now then, O harlot, hear the word of the Lord!
‘Now then, O harlot, hear the word of the Lord!
Thus says the Lord God: “Because your filthiness was poured out and your nakedness uncovered in your harlotry with your lovers, and with all your abominable idols, and because of the blood of your children which you gave to them,
this is what I am going to do. I will gather together all your allies — the lovers with whom you have sinned, both those you loved and those you hated — and I will strip you naked in front of them so they can stare at you.
surely, therefore, I will gather all your lovers with whom you took pleasure, all those you loved, and all those you hated; I will gather them from all around against you and will uncover your nakedness to them, that they may see all your nakedness.
I will punish you for your murder and adultery. I will cover you with blood in my jealous fury.
And I will judge you as women who break wedlock or shed blood are judged; I will bring blood upon you in fury and jealousy.
Then I will give you to these many nations who are your lovers, and they will destroy you. They will knock down your pagan shrines and the altars to your idols. They will strip you and take your beautiful jewels, leaving you stark naked.
They will band together in a mob to stone you and cut you up with swords.
“They shall also bring up an assembly against you, and they shall stone you with stones and thrust you through with their swords.
They will burn your homes and punish you in front of many women. I will stop your prostitution and end your payments to your many lovers.
They shall burn your houses with fire, and execute judgments on you in the sight of many women; and I will make you cease playing the harlot, and you shall no longer hire lovers.
“Then at last my fury against you will be spent, and my jealous anger will subside. I will be calm and will not be angry with you anymore.
So I will lay to rest My fury toward you, and My jealousy shall depart from you. I will be quiet, and be angry no more.
But first, because you have not remembered your youth but have angered me by doing all these evil things, I will fully repay you for all of your sins, says the Sovereign LORD. For you have added lewd acts to all your detestable sins.
Everyone who makes up proverbs will say of you, ‘Like mother, like daughter.’
More Wicked than Samaria and Sodom
“Indeed everyone who quotes proverbs will use this proverb against you: ‘Like mother, like daughter!’
“Indeed everyone who quotes proverbs will use this proverb against you: ‘Like mother, like daughter!’
For your mother loathed her husband and her children, and so do you. And you are exactly like your sisters, for they despised their husbands and their children. Truly your mother was a Hittite and your father an Amorite.
“Your older sister was Samaria, who lived with her daughters in the north. Your younger sister was Sodom, who lived with her daughters in the south.
“Your elder sister is Samaria, who dwells with her daughters to the north of you; and your younger sister, who dwells to the south of you, is Sodom and her daughters.
But you have not merely sinned as they did. You quickly surpassed them in corruption.
You did not walk in their ways nor act according to their abominations; but, as if that were too little, you became more corrupt than they in all your ways.
As surely as I live, says the Sovereign LORD, Sodom and her daughters were never as wicked as you and your daughters.
“As I live,” says the Lord God, “neither your sister Sodom nor her daughters have done as you and your daughters have done.
Sodom’s sins were pride, gluttony, and laziness, while the poor and needy suffered outside her door.
Look, this was the iniquity of your sister Sodom: She and her daughter had pride, fullness of food, and abundance of idleness; neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy.
“Even Samaria did not commit half your sins. You have done far more detestable things than your sisters ever did. They seem righteous compared to you.
“Samaria did not commit half of your sins; but you have multiplied your abominations more than they, and have justified your sisters by all the abominations which you have done.
Shame on you! Your sins are so terrible that you make your sisters seem righteous, even virtuous.
You who judged your sisters, bear your own shame also, because the sins which you committed were more abominable than theirs; they are more righteous than you. Yes, be disgraced also, and bear your own shame, because you justified your sisters.
“But someday I will restore the fortunes of Sodom and Samaria, and I will restore you, too.
“When I bring back their captives, the captives of Sodom and her daughters, and the captives of Samaria and her daughters, then I will also bring back the captives of your captivity among them,
Then you will be truly ashamed of everything you have done, for your sins make them feel good in comparison.
that you may bear your own shame and be disgraced by all that you did when you comforted them.
Yes, your sisters, Sodom and Samaria, and all their people will be restored, and at that time you also will be restored.
When your sisters, Sodom and her daughters, return to their former state, and Samaria and her daughters return to their former state, then you and your daughters will return to your former state.
In your proud days you held Sodom in contempt.
For your sister Sodom was not a byword in your mouth in the days of your pride,
This is your punishment for all your lewdness and detestable sins, says the LORD.
You have paid for your lewdness and your abominations,” says the Lord.
“Now this is what the Sovereign LORD says: I will give you what you deserve, for you have taken your solemn vows lightly by breaking your covenant.
For thus says the Lord God: “I will deal with you as you have done, who despised the oath by breaking the covenant.
Yet I will remember the covenant I made with you when you were young, and I will establish an everlasting covenant with you.
An Everlasting Covenant
“Nevertheless I will remember My covenant with you in the days of your youth, and I will establish an everlasting covenant with you.
“Nevertheless I will remember My covenant with you in the days of your youth, and I will establish an everlasting covenant with you.
Then you will remember with shame all the evil you have done. I will make your sisters, Samaria and Sodom, to be your daughters, even though they are not part of our covenant.
Then you will remember your ways and be ashamed, when you receive your older and your younger sisters; for I will give them to you for daughters, but not because of My covenant with you.
And I will reaffirm my covenant with you, and you will know that I am the LORD.
And I will establish My covenant with you. Then you shall know that I am the Lord,
You will remember your sins and cover your mouth in silent shame when I forgive you of all that you have done. I, the Sovereign LORD, have spoken!”
that you may remember and be ashamed, and never open your mouth anymore because of your shame, when I provide you an atonement for all you have done,” says the Lord God.’ ”