May your loyal followers ¹  turn to me, those who know your rules.

The wicked are turned back and sent to Sheol; ¹  this is the destiny of ²  all the nations that ignore ³  God,

Then I will teach ¹  rebels your merciful ways, ²  and sinners will turn ³  to you.

They return in the evening; they growl ¹  like a dog and prowl around outside ²  the city.

May those who say, “Aha! Aha!” be driven back ¹  and disgraced! ² 

In the fourth generation ¹  your descendants ²  will return here, for the sin of the Amorites has not yet reached its limit.” ³ 

My enemies will turn back when I cry out to you for help; ¹  I know that God is on my side. ² 

You will never come back to this land to which you will long to return!” ¹ 

I will listen to what God the Lord says. ¹  For he will make ²  peace with his people, his faithful followers. ³  Yet they must not ⁴  return to their foolish ways.

Then I will reply, ¹  ‘I will bring them back from the land of the north. I will gather them in from the distant parts of the earth. Blind and lame people will come with them, so will pregnant women and women about to give birth. A vast throng of people will come back here.

They turn to Baal; ¹  they are like an unreliable bow. Their leaders will fall by the sword because their prayers to Baal ²  have made me angry. So people will disdain them in the land of Egypt. ³ 

They offer up sacrificial gifts to me, and eat the meat, but the Lord does not accept their sacrifices. ¹  Soon he will remember their wrongdoing, he will punish their sins, and they will return to Egypt.

Micaiah ¹  said, “I saw all Israel scattered on the mountains like sheep that have no shepherd. Then the Lord said, ‘They have no master. They should go home in peace.’”

Micaiah ¹  replied, “I saw all Israel scattered on the mountains like sheep that have no shepherd. Then the Lord said, ‘They have no master. They should go home in peace.’”

“Then, when they were at rest again, they went back to doing evil before you. Then you abandoned them to ¹  their enemies, and they gained dominion over them. When they again cried out to you, in your compassion you heard from heaven and rescued them time and again.

Perhaps when the people of Judah hear about all the disaster I intend to bring on them, they will all stop doing the evil things they have been doing. ¹  If they do, I will forgive their sins and the wicked things they have done.” ² 

None of the Judean remnant who have come to live in the land of Egypt will escape or survive to return to the land of Judah. Though they long to return and live there, none of them shall return except a few fugitives.’” ¹ 

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