Listen, all you nations! ¹  Pay attention, all inhabitants of earth! ²  The sovereign Lord will testify ³  against you; the Lord will accuse you ⁴  from his majestic palace. ⁵ 

I will destroy the cities of your land, and tear down all your fortresses.

Lift your hand triumphantly against your adversaries; ¹  may all your enemies be destroyed! ² 

Though all the nations follow their respective gods, ¹  we will follow ²  the Lord our God forever.

All her carved idols will be smashed to pieces; all her metal cult statues will be destroyed by fire. ¹  I will make a waste heap ²  of all her images. Since ³  she gathered the metal ⁴  as a prostitute collects her wages, the idols will become a prostitute’s wages again.” ⁵ 

Nations will see this and be disappointed by ¹  all their strength, they will put their hands over their mouths, and act as if they were deaf. ² 

The prophets ¹  will be ashamed; the omen readers will be humiliated. All of them will cover their mouths, ²  for they will receive no divine oracles.” ³ 

Listen to this, you leaders of the family ¹  of Jacob, you rulers of the nation ²  of Israel! You ³  hate justice and pervert all that is right.

You implement the regulations of Omri, and all the practices of Ahab’s dynasty; ¹  you follow their policies. ²  Therefore I will make you an appalling sight, ³  the city’s ⁴  inhabitants will be taunted derisively, ⁵  and nations will mock all of you.” ⁶ 

Faithful men have disappeared ¹  from the land; there are no godly men left. ²  They all wait in ambush so they can shed blood; ³  they hunt their own brother with a net. ⁴ 

All this is because of Jacob’s rebellion and ¹  the sins of the nation ²  of Israel. How has Jacob rebelled, you ask? ³  Samaria epitomizes their rebellion! ⁴  Where are Judah’s pagan worship centers, you ask? ⁵  They are right in Jerusalem! ⁶ 

In the future ¹  the Lord’s Temple Mount will be the most important mountain of all; ²  it will be more prominent than other hills. ³  People will stream to it.

They are determined to be experts at doing evil; ¹  government officials and judges take bribes, ²  prominent men make demands, and they all do what is necessary to satisfy them. ³ 

I will certainly gather all of you, O Jacob, I will certainly assemble those Israelites who remain. ¹  I will bring them together like sheep in a fold, ²  like a flock in the middle of a pasture; ³  they will be so numerous that they will make a lot of noise. ⁴ 

Don’t spread the news in Gath! ¹  Don’t shed even a single tear! ²  In Beth Leaphrah sit in the dust! ³ 

You will once again ¹  have mercy on us; you will conquer ²  our evil deeds; you will hurl our ³  sins into the depths of the sea. ⁴ 

“Get up and thresh, Daughter Zion! For I will give you iron horns; ¹  I will give you bronze hooves, and you will crush many nations.” ²  You will devote to the Lord the spoils you take from them, and dedicate their wealth to the sovereign Ruler ³  of the whole earth. ⁴ 

In that day people ¹  will come to you ²  from Assyria as far as ³  Egypt, from Egypt as far as the Euphrates River, ⁴  from the seacoasts ⁵  and the mountains. ⁶ 

You wrongly evict widows ¹  among my people from their cherished homes. You defraud their children ²  of their prized inheritance. ³ 

But you are the ones who will be forced to leave! ¹  For this land is not secure! ²  Sin will thoroughly destroy it! ³