How tragic that the once-faithful city has become a prostitute! She was once a center of justice, fairness resided in her, but now only murderers.

I am not angry. I wish I could confront some thorns and briers! Then I would march against them for battle; I would set them all on fire,

No resident of Zion will say, “I am ill”; the people who live there will have their sin forgiven.

He will go back the way he came – he will not enter this city,’ says the Lord.

Jerusalem will bring me joy, and my people will bring me happiness. The sound of weeping or cries of sorrow will never be heard in her again.

So Death will open up its throat, and open wide its mouth; Zion’s dignitaries and masses will descend into it, including those who revel and celebrate within her.

Even if only a tenth of the people remain in the land, it will again be destroyed, like one of the large sacred trees or an Asherah pole, when a sacred pillar on a high place is thrown down. That sacred pillar symbolizes the special chosen family.”

They will pass through the land destitute and starving. Their hunger will make them angry, and they will curse their king and their God as they look upward.

So a treaty curse devours the earth; its inhabitants pay for their guilt. This is why the inhabitants of the earth disappear, and are reduced to just a handful of people.

Every blow from his punishing cudgel, with which the Lord will beat them, will be accompanied by music from the tambourine and harp, and he will attack them with his weapons.

Night and day it will burn; its smoke will ascend continually. Generation after generation it will be a wasteland and no one will ever pass through it again.

Owls and wild animals will live there, all kinds of wild birds will settle in it. The Lord will stretch out over her the measuring line of ruin and the plumb line of destruction.

He assigns them their allotment; he measures out their assigned place. They will live there permanently; they will settle in it through successive generations.

Because you rage against me and the uproar you create has reached my ears, I will put my hook in your nose, and my bridle between your lips, and I will lead you back the way you came.”

This is what the true God, the Lord, says – the one who created the sky and stretched it out, the one who fashioned the earth and everything that lives on it, the one who gives breath to the people on it, and life to those who live on it:

The people who do this will be blessed, the people who commit themselves to obedience, who observe the Sabbath and do not defile it, who refrain from doing anything that is wrong.

They are unfamiliar with peace; their deeds are unjust. They use deceitful methods, and whoever deals with them is unfamiliar with peace.

Be happy for Jerusalem and rejoice with her, all you who love her! Share in her great joy, all you who have mourned over her!

For the burial place is already prepared; it has been made deep and wide for the king. The firewood is piled high on it. The Lord’s breath, like a stream flowing with brimstone, will ignite it.

Certainly the Lord will console Zion; he will console all her ruins. He will make her wilderness like Eden, her desert like the Garden of the Lord. Happiness and joy will be restored to her, thanksgiving and the sound of music.