Study Desk

Notwithstanding the children rebelled against mee: they walked not in my statutes, nor kept my iudgements to doe them, which if a man doe, hee shall liue in them, but they polluted my Sabbaths: then I thought to powre out mine indignation vpo them, and to accomplish my wrath against them in the wildernes.

Because they had not executed my iudgements, but had cast away my statutes and had polluted my Sabbaths, and their eyes were after their fathers idoles.

Wherefore I gaue them also statutes that were not good, and iudgements, wherein they should not liue.

And I polluted them in their owne giftes in that they caused to passe by the fire all that first openeth ye wombe, that I might destroy them, to the ende, that they might know that I am ye Lord.

Therefore, sonne of man, speake vnto the house of Israel, and say vnto them, Thus saith the Lorde God, Yet in this your fathers haue blasphemed me, though they had before grieuously transgressed against me.

For when I had brought them into the land, for the which I lifted vp mine hand to giue it to them, then they saw euery hie hill, and all the thicke trees, and they offred there their sacrifices, and there they presented their offering of prouocation: there also they made their sweete sauour, and powred out there their drinke offerings.

And I wil chuse out from among you the rebels, and them that transgresse against mee: I will bring them out of the land where they dwel, and they shall not enter into the lande of Israel, and you shall knowe that I am the Lord.

And if they say vnto thee, Wherefore mournest thou? then answere, Because of the bruite: for it commeth, and euery heart shall melt, and all handes shall be weake, and all mindes shall faint, and all knees shall fall away as water: beholde, it commeth, and shall be done, saith the Lord God.

And it shalbe vnto them as a false diuination in their sight for the othes made vnto them: but hee will call to remembrance their iniquitie, to the intent they should be taken.

In thee haue they despised father and mother: in the middes of thee haue they oppressed the stranger: in thee haue they vexed the fatherlesse and the widowe.

In thee haue they taken giftes to shed blood: thou hast taken vsurie and the encrease, and thou hast defrauded thy neighbours by extortion, & hast forgotten me, saith the Lord God.

Sonne of man, the house of Israel is vnto me as drosse: all they are brasse, and tinne, and yron, and leade in the mids of the fornace: they are euen the drosse of siluer.

As they gather siluer and brasse, and yron, and leade, and tinne into the middes of the fornace, to blowe the fire vpon it to melt it, so wil I gather you in mine anger and in my wrath, and wil put you there and melt you.

There is a conspiracie of her prophets in the mids thereof like a roaring lyon, rauening the praye: they haue deuoured soules: they haue taken the riches and precious things: they haue made her many widowes in the mids thereof.

Her Priests haue broken my Lawe, and haue defiled mine holy things: they haue put no difference betweene the holy and prophane, neither discerned betweene the vncleane, and the cleane, and haue hid their eyes from my Sabbaths, and I am prophaned among them.

The people of the land haue violently oppressed by spoyling and robbing, and haue vexed the poore and the needy: yea, they haue oppressed the stranger against right.

And they committed fornication in Egypt, they committed fornication in their youth: there were their breasts pressed, and there they bruised the teates of their virginitie.

And the names of them were Aholah the elder, & Aholibah her sister: and they were mine, and they bare sonnes and daughters: thus were their names. Samaria is Aholah, and Ierusalem Aholibah.

Which were clothed with blewe silke, both captaines and princes: they were all pleasant yong men, and horsemen riding vpon horses.

Neither left she her fornications, learned of the Egyptians: for in her youth they lay with her, and they bruised the breasts of her virginitie, and powred their whoredome vpon her.