I will sing to my well-beloved a song of my beloved touching his vineyard. My well beloved had a vineyard in a very fruitful hill;
and he dug it up, and gathered out the stones thereof, and planted it with the choicest vine; and he built a tower in the midst of it, and also hewed a winepress therein; and he looked that it should bring forth grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes.
And now, inhabitants of Jerusalem, and men of Judah, judge, I pray you, between me and my vineyard.
What could have been done more to my vineyard that I have not done in it? Wherefore, when I looked that it should bring forth grapes, brought it forth wild grapes?
And now let me tell you what I am about to do to my vineyard; I will take away the hedge thereof, and it shall be eaten up; and break down the wall thereof, and it shall be trodden down;
and I will lay it waste—it shall not be pruned nor hoed; but there shall come up briers and thorns: I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it.
For the vineyard of Jehovah of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah his pleasant plant: and he looked for judgment, but behold bloodshed; for righteousness, but behold a cry.
Woe unto them that join house to house, [that] lay field to field, till [there be] no room, and ye be made to dwell alone in the midst of the land!
In mine ears [saith] Jehovah of hosts, Of a truth many houses shall be desolate, [even] great and fair, without inhabitant.
For ten acres of vineyard shall yield one bath, and a homer of seed shall yield [but] an ephah.
Woe unto them that rise up early in the morning, [that] they may follow strong drink; that tarry late into the night, [till] wine inflame them!
And the harp and the lute, the tabret and the pipe, and wine, are in their feasts: but they regard not the work of Jehovah, neither have they considered the operation of his hands.
Therefore my people are gone into captivity, for lack of knowledge; and their honourable men [are] famished, and their multitude [are] parched with thirst.
Therefore Sheol hath enlarged her desire, and opened her mouth without measure; and their glory, and their multitude, and their tumult, and he that rejoiceth among them, descend [into it].
And the mean man is bowed down, and the great man is humbled, and the eyes of the lofty are humbled:
but Jehovah of hosts is exalted in judgment, and God the Holy One is sanctified in righteousness.
Then shall the lambs feed as in their pasture, and the waste places of the fat ones shall wanderers eat.
Woe unto them that draw iniquity with cords of vanity, and sin as it were with a cart rope; that say,
Let him make speed, let him hasten his work, that we may see [it]; and let the counsel of the Holy One of Israel draw nigh and come, that we may know [it]!
Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter.
Woe unto [them that are] wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight!
Woe unto [them that are] mighty to drink wine, and men of strength to mingle strong drink;
who justify the wicked for a reward, and take away the righteousness of the righteous from him!
Therefore as the tongue of fire devoureth the stubble, and as the dry grass sinketh down in the flame, [so] their root shall be as rottenness, and their blossom shall go up as dust: because they have rejected the law of Jehovah of hosts, and despised the word of the Holy One of Israel.
Therefore is the anger of Jehovah kindled against his people and he hath stretched forth his hand against them, and hath smitten them, and the hills did tremble, and their carcasses [were] as refuse in the midst of the streets. For all this his anger is not turned away, but his hand [is] stretched out still.
And he will lift up an ensign to the nations afar off, and will hiss for them from the end of the earth: and, behold, they shall come with speed swiftly:
none shall be weary nor stumble among them; none shall slumber nor sleep; neither shall the girdle of their loins be loosed, nor the latchet of their shoes be broken:
their arrows [are] sharp, and all their bows bent; their horses’ hoofs shall be counted like flint, and their wheels like a whirlwind.
Their roaring [shall be] like a lioness, they shall roar like young lions: yea, they shall growl, and lay hold of the prey, and carry [it] away safe, and there shall be none to deliver.
And they shall roar against them in that day like the roaring of the sea. And if [one] look unto the land, behold darkness [and] distress, and the light is darkened in the clouds thereof.