Daily Reading

1 Hear this word that Jehovah has spoken against you, O children of Israel, against the whole family that I brought up from the land of Egypt, saying,

2 Only you have I known / Of all the families of the earth; / Therefore I will visit upon you / All your iniquities.

3 Will two walk together / If they have not met at an appointed place?

4 Will the lion roar in the forest / When he has no prey? / Will a young lion utter his voice from his den / If he has not seized anything?

5 Will a bird fall into a trap on the earth / When there is no snare laid for it? / Will a trap spring up off the ground / When it has seized nothing at all?

6 Can a trumpet be blown in a city / And the people not dread? / Can there be ill in a city / And Jehovah did not do it?

7 Surely the Lord Jehovah will not do anything unless He reveals His secret to His servants the prophets.

8 The lion has roared — / Who will not fear? / The Lord Jehovah has spoken — / Who can but prophesy?

9 Cause it to be heard in the palaces of Ashdod / And in the palaces of the land of Egypt, and say, / Assemble yourselves in the mountains of Samaria, / And see what great tumults are in the midst of it / And what oppressions are within it;

10 And they do not know to do what is right, / Declares Jehovah, / They who store up violence and devastation in their palaces.

11 Therefore thus says the Lord Jehovah, / An adversary! Indeed one surrounding the land; / And he will bring down your strength from you, / And your palaces will be plundered.

12 Thus says Jehovah, As the shepherd rescues / Out of the mouth of the lion / Two legs or a piece of the ear, / So will the children of Israel / Who dwell in Samaria be rescued, / With the corner of a bed / And a silk cushion of a couch.

13 Hear, and testify against the house of Jacob, declares the Lord Jehovah, the God of hosts.

14 For in the day when I visit / The transgressions of Israel upon him, / I will visit the altars of Bethel, / And the horns of the altar will be cut off / And will fall to the ground.

15 And I will strike the winter house / Along with the summer house; / And the houses of ivory will perish, / And many houses will come to an end, / Declares Jehovah.

1 Hear this word, / O heifers of Bashan, which are on the mountain of Samaria, / Who oppress the poor / And crush the needy, / Who say to their lords, / Bring, and let us drink.

2 The Lord Jehovah has sworn by His holiness / Indeed days are coming upon you / When one will take you away with hooks, / And your posterity, with fish hooks.

3 And you will go out through the breaches, each one straight ahead of her; / And you will cast yourselves into Harmon, declares Jehovah.

4 Come to Bethel, and transgress; / To Gilgal, and multiply transgression; / And bring your sacrifices every morning / And your tithes every three days,

5 And offer in smoke a thank offering out of what is leavened; / And proclaim freewill offerings; make them known; / For you love them, O children of Israel, / Declares the Lord Jehovah.

6 And I also have given you / Cleanness of teeth in all your cities / And want of bread in all your places. / Yet you have not returned to Me, / Declares Jehovah.

7 And I have also withheld the rain from you / When there was yet three months until the harvest; / And I made it rain on one city, / But on another city I did not make it rain; / One portion was rained on, / And the portion that was not rained on dried up.

8 And two or three cities wandered to one city to drink water, / But they were not satisfied. / Yet you have not returned to Me, / Declares Jehovah.

9 I have stricken you with blight and mildew; / The multitudes of your gardens and your vineyards, / And your fig trees and your olive trees, the cutting locust has devoured. / Yet you have not returned to Me, / Declares Jehovah.

10 I have sent among you pestilence after the manner of Egypt; / I have slain your choice young men with the sword, taking your horses captive; / And I have caused the stench of your camp to go up even into your own nostrils. / Yet you have not returned to Me, / Declares Jehovah.

11 I have overturned cities among you, / As when God overturned Sodom and Gomorrah; / And you were like a brand plucked out of the burning. / Yet you have not returned to Me, / Declares Jehovah.

12 Therefore this is what I will do to you, O Israel; / And because I will do this to you, / Prepare to meet your God, O Israel.

13 For it is He who forms the mountains and creates the wind / And declares to man what His thought is; / He who makes the morning darkness / And treads upon the high places of the earth — / Jehovah the God of hosts is His name!

1 Hear this word that I take up as a lamentation over you, O house of Israel.

2 Fallen and no more to rise / Is the virgin of Israel; / She has been cast down upon her land; / There is none to raise her up.

3 For thus says the Lord Jehovah, The city that sent forth a thousand / Will have a hundred left, / And that which sent forth a hundred / Will have ten left, / To the house of Israel.

4 For thus says Jehovah to the house of Israel, / Seek Me, and live;

5 And do not seek Bethel, / Nor go to Gilgal, / Nor pass on to Beer-sheba; / For Gilgal will surely go into captivity, / And Bethel will become vanity.

6 Seek Jehovah, and live; / Lest He rush upon the house of Joseph like fire, / And it devour it, and there be none to extinguish the fire in Bethel.

7 They turn justice to wormwood / And thrust righteousness down to the ground.

8 He who makes the Pleiades and Orion / And turns the shadow of death into the morning / And darkens the day with the night; / He who calls for the water of the sea / And pours it upon the surface of the earth, / Jehovah is His name,

9 Who causes destruction to flash forth upon the strong, / So that destruction comes upon the fortress.

10 They hate him who reproves in the gate, / And him who speaks with integrity they abhor.

11 Therefore because you trample upon the poor / And take a forced gift of wheat from them; / You have built houses of hewn stone, / But you will not dwell in them; / You have planted desirable vineyards, / But you will not drink their wine.

12 For I know that your transgressions are many / And that your sins are mighty, / You who vex the righteous and take ransom payment / And turn aside justice for the needy in the gate.

13 Therefore he who has insight will keep silent at this time, for it is an evil time.

14 Seek good and not evil, / In order that you may live; / And so Jehovah the God of hosts will be with you, / As you say.

15 Hate evil and love good, / And set up justice in the gate. / Perhaps Jehovah the God of hosts will be gracious / To the remnant of Joseph.

16 Therefore thus says Jehovah, / The God of hosts, the Lord: / In all the open plazas there will be wailing, / And in all the streets they will say, Alas! Alas! / And they will call the farmer to mourning, / And for wailing to those skilled in lamentation.

17 In all the vineyards there will be wailing, / For I will pass through your midst, says Jehovah.

18 Woe to you who desire / The day of Jehovah! / What good is the day of Jehovah to you? / It will be darkness and not light,

19 As when a man flees from before a lion / And encounters a bear, / Or goes into the house and leans his hand against the wall, / And a serpent bites him.

20 Will not the day of Jehovah be darkness and not light, / Even deep darkness and no brightness to it?

21 I hate, I despise, your feasts, / And I will not delight in your solemn assemblies.

22 For if you offer up to Me burnt offerings / And your meal offerings, I will not accept them; / Nor will I regard the peace offerings of your fatted animals.

23 Take the noise of your songs away from Me, / For I will not hear the melody of your harps.

24 But let justice roll down like water, / And righteousness, like an ever-flowing river.

25 Did you bring Me sacrifices and meal offerings / In the wilderness for forty years, O house of Israel?

26 Indeed, you took up Sikkuth your king / And Kiyyun your images, the star of your gods that you made for yourselves.

27 Thus I will bring you into captivity / Beyond Damascus, says Jehovah; / The God of hosts is His name.

1 And when He opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven for about half an hour.

2 And I saw the seven angels who stand before God, and seven trumpets were given to them.

3 And another Angel came and stood at the altar, having a golden censer, and much incense was given to Him to offer with the prayers of all the saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne.

4 And the smoke of the incense went up with the prayers of the saints out of the hand of the Angel before God.

5 And the Angel took the censer and filled it with the fire of the altar and cast it to the earth; and there were thunders and voices and lightnings and an earthquake.

6 And the seven angels who had the seven trumpets prepared themselves to trumpet.

7 And the first trumpeted, and there was hail and fire mingled with blood, and it was cast to the earth; and the third part of the earth was burned up, and the third part of the trees were burned up, and all green grass was burned up.

8 And the second angel trumpeted, and as it were a great mountain burning with fire was cast into the sea; and the third part of the sea became blood,

9 And the third part of the creatures which were in the sea and had life died, and the third part of the ships were destroyed.

10 And the third angel trumpeted, and a great star fell out of heaven, burning like a torch, and it fell upon the third part of the rivers and upon the springs of waters.

11 And the name of the star is called Wormwood; and the third part of the waters became wormwood, and many of the men died from the waters because they were made bitter.

12 And the fourth angel trumpeted, and the third part of the sun and the third part of the moon and the third part of the stars were smitten, so that the third part of them would be darkened and the day would not appear for the third part of it, and the night likewise.