CHAPTER 10

¹Listen to the word that the LORD has spoken about you, house of Israel. ²Thus said the LORD:

                 The way of the nations do not learn,

                     and from the signs of the heavens be not terrified,

                         for the nations are terrified by them.

                 ³For the nations’ practices are mere breath,

                     for the tree he cuts down from the forest,

                         the craftsman’s handiwork with an axe.

                 ⁴In silver and gold he embellishes it,

                     with nails and hammer

                         he secures it that it not totter.

                 ⁵Like a scarecrow in a patch of greens

                     they do not speak, they are carried,

                         for they cannot walk.

                 Do not fear them, for they do no harm,

                     nor is doing good any part of them.

                 ⁶Because none is like you, O LORD,

                     great are You

                         and great Your name in might.

                 ⁷Who would not fear You,

                     King of nations?

                         For to You it is fitting.

                 For among all the nations’ wise men

                     and in all their regal state

                         there is none like You.

                 ⁸And as one they are stupid and foolish,

                     a doctrine of mere breath—it is but wood.

                 ⁹Hammered silver brought from Tarshish

                     and gold from Uphaz,

                 the craftsman’s work and the hands of the smith,

                     indigo and purple, their raiment,

                         the work of skilled men, all of them.

                 ¹⁰But the LORD is the God of truth,

                     He is the living God and eternal King.

                 From His fury the earth is shaken,

                     and nations cannot contain His wrath.

¹¹Thus shall you say to them: gods that have not made the heavens and the earth shall perish from the earth and from beneath these heavens.

                 ¹²He makes the earth through His power,

                     firmly founds the world through His wisdom,

                         and in His discernment stretches out the heavens.

                 ¹³As He sounds His voice—a roar of water in the heavens,

                     and He brings up clouds from the end of the earth.

                 Lightning for the rain He makes,

                     and He brings out wind from His storerooms.

                 ¹⁴Every human is too stupid to know,

                     every smith is shamed by the idol,

                 for the molten image is a lie,

                     and there is no spirit in them.

                 ¹⁵Mere breath are they, a work of mockery,

                     in their judgment time they shall perish.

                 ¹⁶Not like these is Jacob’s Portion,

                     for He is the Fashioner of all things,

                 and Israel is the tribe of His estate,

                     the LORD of Armies is His name.

                 ¹⁷Gather from the ground your wares,

                     you who dwell under siege.

                 ¹⁸For thus said the LORD:

                 I am about to sling away the land’s dwellers

                     this time and bring them in straits, that they may find out.

                 ¹⁹Woe is me for my disaster,

                     the blow against me is grievous,

                 and I had thought:

                     this is but illness and I shall bear it.

                 ²⁰My tent is ruined and all my cords are ripped,

                     my children have left me and are gone,

                 no one pitches my tent again

                     or sets up my tent curtains.

                 ²¹For the shepherds are stupid,

                     and they have not sought the LORD.

                 Therefore they have not prospered,

                     and all their flock is scattered.

                 ²²Hark, a sound, look, it comes

                     and a great tumult from the land of the north,

                 to make the towns of Judah

                     a desolation, a jackals’ den.

                 ²³I know, O LORD,

                     that a person’s way is not for him

                         and not for a man walking to direct his own steps.

                 ²⁴Correct me, LORD, but with justice,

                     not in Your anger, lest You diminish me.

                 ²⁵Pour out Your wrath on the nations

                     that do not know you

                 and on the clans

                     that do not call upon Your name.

                 For they have devoured Jacob and made an end of him,

                     and have devastated his home.