Dual Panel1Woe betide those living at ease in Zion, and those complacent on the hill of Samaria, men of mark in the first of nations, those to whom the people of Israel have recourse!
2Go over and look at Calneh, travel on to great Hamath, then go down to Gath of the Philistines -- are they better than these kingdoms, or is their territory greater than yours?
3You thrust aside all thought of the evil day and hasten the reign of violence.
4You loll on beds inlaid with ivory and lounge on your couches; you feast on lambs from the flock and stall-fed calves;
5you improvise on the lute and like David invent musical instruments,
6you drink wine by the bowlful and anoint yourselves with the richest of oils; but at the ruin of Joseph you feel no grief.
7Now, therefore, you will head the column of exiles; lounging and laughter will be at an end.
8The Lord GOD has sworn by himself: I abhor the arrogance of Jacob, I detest his palaces; I shall abandon the city and its people to their fate.
9If ten are left in one house, they will die.
10If a relative and an embalmer take up a body to carry it out of the house for burial, they will call to someone in a corner of the house, “Any more there?” and he will answer, “No”; then he will add, “Hush!” -- for the name of the LORD must not be mentioned.
11When the LORD commands, great houses will be reduced to rubble and the small houses shattered.
12Can horses gallop over rocks? Can the sea be ploughed with oxen? Yet you have turned into venom the process of law, justice itself you have turned into poison.
13Jubilant over a nothing, you boast, “Have we not won power by our own strength?”
14Israel, I am raising a nation against you, and they will harry your land from Lebo-hamath to the wadi of the Arabah. This is the word of the LORD the God of Hosts.