“Contend with your mother (nation); contend,
For she is not my wife and I am not her husband;
And have her remove her [marks of] prostitution from her face
And her adultery from between her breasts [Is 50:1]
Or I will strip her naked
And expose her as on the day she was born,
And make her like a wilderness
And make her like a parched land
And slay her with thirst.
“Also, I will have no mercy on her children,
Because they are the children of prostitution.
“For their mother has played the prostitute;
She who conceived them has acted shamefully,
For she said, ‘I will pursue my lovers
Who give me my food and my water,
My wool and my flax, my oil and my [refreshing] drinks.’
“Therefore, behold, I [the LORD God] will hedge up her way with thorns;
And I will build a wall against her [shutting off her way] so that she cannot find her paths.
“She will [passionately] pursue her lovers, but she will not overtake them;
And she will seek them, but will not find them.
Then she will say, ‘Let me go and return to my first husband,
For it was better for me then than now!’
¶“For she (Israel) has not noticed nor understood nor realized that it was I [the LORD God] who gave her the grain and the new wine and the oil,
And lavished on her silver and gold,
Which they used for Baal and made into his image.
“Therefore, I will return and take back My grain at harvest time
And My new wine in its season.
I will also take away My wool and My flax
Given to cover her nakedness.
“And now I will uncover her lewdness and shame
In the sight of her lovers,
And no one will rescue her from My hand.
“I will also put an end to all her rejoicing,
Her feasts, her New Moons, her Sabbaths,
And all her festivals.
“I will destroy her vines and her fig trees
Of which she has said, ‘These are my wages
Which my lovers have given me.’
And I will make them a forest,
And the animals of the open country will devour them.
“And I will punish her for the [feast] days of the Baals,
When she used to offer sacrifices and burn incense to them
And adorn herself with her earrings and nose rings and her jewelry,
And follow her lovers, so that she forgot Me,” says the LORD.
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