1Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture! says Yehovah. 2Therefore thus says Yehovah, the God of Israel, against the shepherds who feed my people: You have scattered my flock, and driven them away, and have not visited them; behold, I will visit upon you the evil of your doings, says Yehovah. 3And I will gather the remnant of my flock out of all the countries where I have driven them, and will bring them again to their folds; and they shall be fruitful and multiply. 4And I will set up shepherds over them, who shall feed them; and they shall fear no more, nor be dismayed, neither shall any be missing, says Yehovah. 5Behold, the days are coming, says Yehovah, when I will raise to David a righteous Branch, and he shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. 6In his days Judah shall be saved, and Israel shall dwell safely; and this is his name by which he shall be called: Yehovah our righteousness. 7Therefore, behold, the days are coming, says Yehovah, when they shall no more say, As Yehovah lives, who brought up the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt; 8but, As Yehovah lives, who brought up and who led the seed of the house of Israel out of the north country, and from all the countries where I had driven them. And they shall dwell in their own land. 9Concerning the prophets. My heart within me is broken, all my bones shake; I am like a drunken man, and like a man whom wine has overcome, because of Yehovah, and because of his holy words. 10For the land is full of adulterers; for because of swearing the land mourns; the pastures of the wilderness are dried up. And their course is evil, and their might is not right; 11for both prophet and priest are profane; indeed, in my house I have found their wickedness, says Yehovah. 12Therefore their way shall be to them as slippery places in the darkness: they shall be driven on, and fall in it; for I will bring evil upon them, even the year of their visitation, says Yehovah. 13And I have seen folly in the prophets of Samaria; they prophesied by Baal, and caused my people Israel to err. 14In the prophets of Jerusalem also I have seen a horrible thing: they commit adultery, and walk in lies; and they strengthen the hands of evildoers, so that no one returns from his wickedness: they have all of them become to me as Sodom, and its inhabitants as Gomorrah. 15Therefore thus says Yehovah of hosts concerning the prophets: Behold, I will feed them with wormwood, and make them drink the water of gall; for from the prophets of Jerusalem ungodliness has gone out into all the land. 16Thus says Yehovah of hosts, Do not hearken to the words of the prophets who prophesy to you: they teach you vanity; they speak a vision of their own heart, and not out of the mouth of Yehovah. 17They say continually to those who despise me, Yehovah has said, You shall have peace; and to everyone who walks in the stubbornness of his own heart they say, No evil shall come upon you. 18For who has stood in the council of Yehovah, that he should perceive and hear his word? who has marked my word, and heard it? 19Behold, the tempest of Yehovah, even his wrath, has gone out, indeed, a whirling tempest: it shall burst upon the head of the wicked. 20The anger of Yehovah shall not return, until he has executed, and until he has performed the intents of his heart: in the latter days you shall understand it perfectly. 21I did not send these prophets, yet they ran: I did not speak to them, yet they prophesied. 22But if they had stood in my council, then they would have caused my people to hear my words, and would have turned them from their evil way, and from the evil of their doings. 23Am I a God at hand, says Yehovah, and not a God afar off? 24Can anyone hide himself in secret places so that I shall not see him? says Yehovah. Do I not fill heaven and earth? says Yehovah. 25I have heard what the prophets have said, who prophesy lies in my name, saying, I have dreamed, I have dreamed. 26How long shall this be in the heart of the prophets who prophesy lies, even the prophets of the deceit of their own heart? 27who think to cause my people to forget my name by their dreams which they tell every man to his neighbor, as their fathers forgot my name for Baal. 28The prophet who has a dream, let him tell a dream; and he who has my word, let him speak my word faithfully. What is the straw to the wheat? says Yehovah. 29Is not my word like fire? says Yehovah; and like a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces? 30Therefore, behold, I am against the prophets, says Yehovah, who steal my words every one from his neighbor. 31Behold, I am against the prophets, says Yehovah, who use their tongues, and say, He says. 32Behold, I am against those who prophesy lying dreams, says Yehovah, and tell them, and cause my people to err by their lies, and by their vain boasting: yet I did not send them, nor command them; neither do they profit this people at all, says Yehovah. 33And when this people, or the prophet, or a priest, asks you, saying, What is the burden of Yehovah? then you shall say to them, What burden! I will cast you off, says Yehovah. 34And as for the prophet, and the priest, and the people, who shall say, The burden of Yehovah, I will even punish that man and his house. 35Thus you shall say every one to his neighbor, and every one to his brother, What has Yehovah answered? and, What has Yehovah spoken? 36And the burden of Yehovah you shall mention no more: for every man’s own word shall be his burden; for you have perverted the words of the living God, of Yehovah of hosts our God. 37Thus you shall say to the prophet, What has Yehovah answered you? and, What has Yehovah spoken? 38But if you say, The burden of Yehovah; therefore thus says Yehovah: Because you say this word, The burden of Yehovah, and I have sent to you, saying, You shall not say, The burden of Yehovah; 39therefore, behold, I will utterly forget you, and I will cast you off, and the city that I gave to you and to your fathers, away from my presence: 40and I will bring an everlasting reproach upon you, and a perpetual shame, which shall not be forgotten.