1 "Woe be to the pastors that destroy and scatter the sheep of My pasture!" Says Jehovah.
2 Therefore thus says Jehovah God of Israel against the pastors that feed My people: "You have scattered My flock and driven them away and have not visited them. I will visit the evil of your doings upon you," says Jehovah.
3 "And I will gather the remnant of My flock out of all countries where I have driven them and will bring them again to their folds, and they shall be fruitful and increase.
4 And I will set up shepherds over them who shall feed them, and they shall fear no more nor be dismayed, neither shall they be lacking," says Jehovah.
5 "The days come," says Jehovah, "that I will raise to David a righteous Branch, and a King shall reign and prosper and shall execute judgment and justice in the Earth.
6 In His days Judah shall be saved, and Israel shall dwell safely. And this is His Name by which He will be called, THE Jehovah OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS."
7 "Therefore, the days come," says Jehovah, "that they shall no more say, 'Jehovah lives, Who brought up the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt,'
8 but, 'Jehovah lives, Who brought up and Who led the seed of the house of Israel out of the North Country, and from all countries where I had driven them,' and they shall dwell in their own land."
9 My mind within me is broken because of the prophets; all my bones shake; I am like a drunken man, and like a man whom wine has overcome, because of Jehovah, and because of the words of His Holiness.
10 For the land is full of adulterers, for because of swearing the land mourns. The pleasant places of the wilderness are dried up, and their course is evil, and their force is not right.
11 For both prophet and priest are profane. "Yes, in My House have I found their wickedness," says Jehovah.
12 "Therefore their way shall be to them as slippery ways in the darkness. They shall be driven on and fall therein, for I will bring evil upon them, even the year of their visitation," says Jehovah.
13 And I have seen folly in the prophets of Samaria; they prophesied in Baal, and caused my people Israel to err.
14 I have also seen a horrible thing in the prophets of Jerusalem. They commit adultery and walk in lies. They also strengthen the hands of evildoers so that no one returns from their wickedness. All of them are as the inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah to Me.
15 Therefore thus says Jehovah of hosts concerning the prophets; I will feed them with wormwood, and make them drink the water of gall, for profaneness gone forth into all the land from the prophets of Jerusalem.
16 Thus says Jehovah of hosts, "Don't listen to the words of the prophets who prophesy to you. They make you vain. They speak a vision of their own mind and not out of the Mouth of Jehovah. * *
17 They keep saying to those who despise me, "Jehovah has said, you shall have peace;" and they say to everyone who walks after the imagination of their own mind, "No evil shall come upon you."
18 For who has stood in the counsel of Jehovah and has perceived and heard His Utterance? Who has paid attention to His Utterance, and heard it?
19 A whirlwind of Jehovah is gone forth in fury, a twisting whirlwind. It shall twist the head of the wicked.
20 The anger of Jehovah shall not return until He has executed and until He has performed the Thoughts of His Mind. In the latter days you shall consider it with understanding and discernment.
21 "I have not sent these prophets, yet they ran. I have not spoken to them, yet they prophesied. *
22 But if they had stood in My Counsel and had caused my people to hear My words, then they should have turned them from their evil way, and from the evil of their doings. *
23 Am I a God at hand," says Jehovah, "and not a God afar off?"
24 "Can any hide himself in secret places that I shall not see him?" Says Jehovah. "Don't I fill Heaven and Earth?" Says Jehovah.
25 "I have heard what the prophets said, who prophesy lies in My Name, saying, 'I have dreamed, I have dreamed.'
26 How long shall this be in the mind of the prophets that prophesy lies? Yes, they are prophets of the deceit of their own heart,
27 who think to cause My people to forget My Name by their dreams which they tell every man to his neighbor as their fathers have forgotten My Name for Baal.
28 The prophet that has a dream, let him tell a dream; and he who has my word, let him speak my word faithfully. What is the chaff to the wheat? Says Jehovah.
29 Isn't My Utterance like a fire?" Says Jehovah, "and like a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces?"
30 "Therefore, I am against the prophets," says Jehovah, "who steal My Utterances everyone from his neighbor."
31 "I am against the prophets," says Jehovah, "who use their tongues and say, 'He says.'"
32 "I am against those who prophesy false dreams," says Jehovah, "and tell them and cause My people to err by their lies and by their lightness. Yet I didn't send them, nor did I command them. Therefore they shall not profit this people at all," says Jehovah.
33 "And when this people or the prophet or a priest shall ask you, saying, 'What is the burden of Jehovah?' You shall then say to them, 'What burden?' I will even forsake you," says Jehovah.
34 "And as for the prophet and the priest and the people that shall say, 'The burden of Jehovah,' I will even correct that man and his house.
35 Thus shall you say, everyone, to his neighbor, and, every one, to his brother, 'What has Jehovah answered?' And, 'What has Jehovah spoken?'
36 And you shall mention the burden of Jehovah no more, for every man's utterance shall be his burden, for you have perverted the Utterances of the living God, of Jehovah of hosts our God.
37 Thus shall you say to the prophet, 'What has Jehovah answered you?' And, 'What has Jehovah spoken?'"
38 "But since you say, The burden of Jehovah, therefore thus says Jehovah, 'Because you say this utterance, the burden of Jehovah,' and I have sent to you, saying, 'You shall not say, The burden of Jehovah,'
39 therefore, I, even I, will utterly forget you, and I will forsake you, and the city that I gave you and your fathers and cast you out of My Presence:
40 And I will bring a Kingdom reproach upon you and a Kingdom shame which shall not be forgotten."