Do not be like your fathers, to whom the former prophets proclaimed, saying: Thus says the LORD of hosts, 'Return now from your evil ways, and from your evil doings;' but they did not hear, nor listen to me, says the LORD.

But my words and my decrees, which I commanded my servants the prophets, did not they overtake your fathers? "Then they repented and said, 'Just as the LORD of hosts determined to do to us, according to our ways, and according to our practices, so he has dealt with us.'"

"Speak to all the people of the land, and to the priests, saying, 'When you fasted and mourned in the fifth and in the seventh month for these seventy years, did you at all fast to me, really to me?

For thus says the LORD of hosts: "As I thought to do evil to you, when your fathers provoked me to wrath," says the LORD of hosts, "and I did not repent;