1. Hear ye this word, because I raise up a lamentation upon you, O house of Israel.
2. The virgin of Israel has fallen; she shall not be able to rise again: she was forsaken upon her land; there is no one to raise her up.
3. For thus hath the Lord GOD said: The city that sent out a thousand shall have a hundred left, and that which sent forth a hundred shall have ten, in the house of Israel.
4. But thus hath the Lord said unto the house of Israel, Seek me, and ye shall live:
5. but do not seek Bethel, nor enter into Gilgal, and do not pass to Beersheba: for Gilgal shall surely go into captivity, and Bethel shall come to nought.
6. Seek the Lord, and ye shall live; lest he break out like fire in the house of Joseph and devour it, and there be no one to quench it in Bethel.
7. Ye who turn judgment to wormwood and leave off doing righteousness in the earth,
8. look unto him that makes the seven stars and Orion and turns the shadow of death into the morning and makes the day dark with night, that calls for the waters of the sea and pours them out upon the face of the earth: The Lord is his name;
9. that strengthens the spoiler against the strong, so that the spoiler shall come against the fortress.
10. They hate him that rebukes in the gate, and they abhor him that speaks uprightly.
11. Forasmuch therefore as your treading is upon the poor, and ye take from him burdens of wheat, ye have built houses of hewn stone, but ye shall not dwell in them; ye have planted pleasant vineyards, but ye shall not drink wine of them.