So they approached the king and asked, "Didn't you sign an edict that for the next 30 days if anyone prays to any god or man, except to you, your majesty, he would be thrown into the lions' pit?" The king responded, "The decree has been established, in accordance with the laws of the Medes and Persians that can't be repealed."

Then these men went to the king and said to him, “You as king know it is a law of the Medes and Persians that no edict or ordinance the king establishes can be changed.”

And how can the servant of this my lord talk with this my lord? for as for me, straightway there remaineth no strength in me, neither is there breath left in me.

The king of the North who comes against him will do whatever he wants, and no one can oppose him. He will establish himself in the beautiful land with total destruction in his hand.

And though the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of the sea, which can neither be measured nor told: yet in the place where it is said unto them, 'Ye be not my people': even there shall it be thus reported of them, 'They be the children of the living God.'

Therefore, behold, I will hedge up your way with thorns, and I will build a wall against her, that she can't find her way.

Then said the LORD to me, "Go yet thy way and vow an adulterous woman, whom thy neighbour loveth as the LORD doth the children of Israel: howbeit, they have respect to strange gods, and love the wine cans."

For, as a heifer that is stubborn, hath Israel, been stubborn, - Now, can Yahweh, turn them out to pasture, like a young ram in a wide place?

Ephraim is oppressed, and can have no right of the law. For why? They follow the doctrines of men.

For I am like a lion to Ephraim
and like a young lion to the house of Judah.
Yes, I will tear them to pieces and depart.
I will carry them off,
and no one can rescue them.

He will revive us after two days,
and on the third day He will raise us up
so we can live in His presence.

What can I do unto thee, O Ephraim? What can I do unto thee, O Judah? for, your lovingkindness, is like a morning cloud, yea, like the dew, early departing!

Whithersoever they go, I will spread over them my net, like a bird of the heavens, will I bring them down, I will chastise them, by the time the report can reach the flock of them.

Israel can say unto me, "Thou art my God, we know thee,"

Thy calf, O Samaria, shall be taken away, for my wrathful indignation is gone forth against thee. How long will it be, before they can be cleansed?

For the calf came from Israel; the workman made it: therefore can it be no God, but even to a spider's web shall the calf of Samaria be turned.

Ephraim is blighted; its roots shriveled. It can bear no fruit. Even if they bear children, I will kill their cherished offspring.

For now they will say, We have no king, for we feared not Jehovah; and a king, what can he do for us?

But, my people, are bent towards turning from me, though upwards they call them, none of them can lift them.

How can I give thee up, Ephraim? abandon thee Israel? How can I make thee as Admah? set thee as Zeboim? Mine own heart, turneth against me, at once, are kindled my compassions.

But Ephraim says:
“How rich I have become;
I made it all myself.
In all my earnings,
no one can find any crime in me
that I can be punished for!”

Yet can I see no comfort, for when he is now the goodliest among the brethren, the East wind, even the wind of the LORD, shall come down from the wilderness, and dry up his conduits, and drink up his wells: he shall spoil the treasure of all pleasant vessels.

Assyria can't save us. We won't ride on horses; neither will we say any more to the work of our hands, 'Our gods.' for in you the fatherless finds mercy."

Who [is] wise that he can understand these [things]? Who is discerning that he knows them? The ways of Yahweh [are] right, and [the] righteous walk in them; but transgressors stumble in them.

{Before them} a fire devours, and behind them a flame burns. Like the garden of Eden is the land {before them}, and after them [it is like] a desolate desert, and nothing can escape them.

As to their form, they're like horses; and like chariot horses, how they can run!

And Jehovah uttereth his voice before his army; for his camp is very great; for strong is he that executeth his word: for the day of Jehovah is great and very terrible; and who can bear it?

Who can tell whether the Lord will turn and have compassion and shall leave after him a blessing? Sacrifice, and drink offering unto the LORD your God.

and sold Judah's and Jerusalem's descendants to the Greeks, so you can remove them far from their homeland!

Can two walk together, except they be agreed?

Can a bird fall in a snare upon the earth, where no gin is for him? shall one take up a snare from the earth, and have taken nothing at all?

The lion hath roared, who will not fear? the Lord GOD hath spoken, who can but prophesy?

The Lord says this to the family of Israel: "Seek me so you can live!

Seek the Lord so you can live! Otherwise he will break out like fire against Joseph's family; the fire will consume and no one will be able to quench it and save Bethel.

(But there is one who made the constellations Pleiades and Orion; he can turn the darkness into morning and daylight into night. He summons the water of the seas and pours it out on the earth's surface. The Lord is his name!

Seek good and not evil so you can live! Then the Lord, the God who commands armies, just might be with you, as you claim he is.

"'If no,' sayeth the LORD God, the God of hosts, 'there shall be mourning in all streets. Yea, they shall say in every street: alas, alas. They shall call the husbandman to lamentation; and such as can mourn, to mourning.

I hate, I despise your festivals, - and can scent no fragrance in your solemn feasts.

Who can run with horses, or plow with oxen upon the hard rocks of stone? For why? Ye have turned true judgment into bitterness, and the fruit of righteousness into wormwood.

And then when they finished eating the vegetation of the land, I said, "O Lord Yahweh, please forgive! How can Jacob stand, because he [is] small?"

Then I said, " Lord Yahweh, please stop! How can Jacob stand, because he [is] small?"

asking, “When will the New Moon be over
so we may sell grain,
and the Sabbath,
so we may market wheat?
We can reduce the measure
while increasing the price
and cheat with dishonest scales.

We can buy the poor with silver
and the needy for a pair of sandals
and even sell the chaff!”

Your presumptuous heart has deceived you,
you who live in clefts of the rock
in your home on the heights,
who say to yourself,
“Who can bring me down to the ground?”

Even if you were to soar high like an eagle, even if you were to make your nest among the stars, I can bring you down even from there!" says the Lord.

"Who can tell whether God will turn and repent, and cease from his fierce wrath, that we perish not?"

Shouldn't I be concerned for Nineveh, that great city, in which are more than one hundred twenty thousand persons who can't discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much livestock?"

Residents of Shaphir, pass by in nakedness and humiliation! The residents of Zaanan can't leave their city. Beth Ezel mourns, "He takes from you what he desires."

Harness the horses to the chariot,
you residents of Lachish.
This was the beginning of sin for Daughter Zion,
because Israel’s acts of rebellion can be traced to you.

"Therefore this is what the LORD says, "I'm crafting evil against this family, from which you can't escape. You won't strut around arrogantly, because the times are evil.'

Does the family of Jacob say, 'The Lord's patience can't be exhausted -- he would never do such things'? To be sure, my commands bring a reward for those who obey them,

"Get up and go, because there's no rest for you here! Since everything is polluted, it can only cause destruction, even heavy destruction.

The one who can break through barriers will lead them out they will break out, pass through the gate, and leave. Their king will advance before them, The Lord himself will lead them.

O ye judges, ye give sentence for gifts; O ye priests, ye teach for lucre; O ye prophets, ye prophesy for money. Yet will they be taken as those that hold upon God, and say, "Is not the LORD among us? Tush, there can no misfortune happen us."

Many nations will come, saying, "Come on! Let's go up to the Lord's mountain, to the temple of Jacob's God, so he can teach us his commands and we can live by his laws." For Zion will be the source of instruction; the Lord's teachings will proceed from Jerusalem.

Many nations have now assembled against you. They say, "Jerusalem must be desecrated, so we can gloat over Zion!"

Rise and thresh, Daughter Zion,
for I will make your horns iron
and your hooves bronze,
so you can crush many peoples.
Then you will set apart their plunder
to the Lord for destruction,
their wealth to the Lord of all the earth.

Yea, the residue of Jacob shall be among the gentiles and the multitude of people, as the lion among the beasts of the wood, and as the Lion's whelps among a flock of sheep: which, when he goeth through, treadeth down, teareth in pieces, and there is no man that can help.

Can I excuse wicked scales
or bags of deceptive weights?

Faithful men have disappeared from the land; there are no godly men left. They all wait in ambush so they can shed blood; they hunt their own brother with a net.

Who can stand before his indignation? And who can abide in the fierceness of his anger? His wrath is poured out like fire, and the rocks are broken apart by him.

What can ye devise against Yahweh? A full end, is he making, - Distress, shall not rise up twice:

Therefore thus sayeth the LORD, "Let them be as well prepared, yea and as many as they can, yet shall they be hewn down, and pass away. And as for thee, I will vex thee, but not utterly destroy thee;

Then all who see you will recoil from you, saying,
“Nineveh is devastated;
who will show sympathy to her?”
Where can I find anyone to comfort you?

Thy lords are as the grasshoppers, and thy captains as the multitude of grasshoppers: which when they be cold, remain in the hedges: but when the Sun is up, they flee away, and no man can tell where they are become.

Your shepherds are sleeping, king of Assyria! Your nobles slumber. Your people are scattered on the mountains; no one can gather them.

for the law is torn in pieces, and there can no right judgment go forth. And why? The ungodly is more set by than the righteous: this is the cause that wrong judgment proceedeth.

You are of purer eyes than to behold evil, and can not look on iniquity: why do you look upon them that deal treacherously, and hold your tongue when the wicked devours the man that is more righteous than he?

I will stand at my watch post; I will remain stationed on the city wall. I will keep watching, so I can see what he says to me and can know how I should answer when he counters my argument.

Yes, moreover, wine is treacherous. A haughty man who doesn't stay at home, who enlarges his desire as Sheol, and he is like death, and can't be satisfied, but gathers to himself all nations, and heaps to himself all peoples.

"Woe to the one who amasses profit upon unjust profit in order to establish his household, so he can establish a secure place on the heights and escape from the power of evil.

"Woe to the one who supplies his neighbor with a drink! You are forcing your bottle on him, making him drunk so you can see them naked.

Woe to him who says to wood: Wake up!
or to mute stone: Come alive!
Can it teach?
Look! It may be plated with gold and silver,
yet there is no breath in it at all.

This is how the once-proud city will end up -- the city that was so secure. She thought to herself, "I am unique! No one can compare to me!" What a heap of ruins she has become, a place where wild animals live! Everyone who passes by her taunts her and shakes his fist.

Therefore you must wait patiently for me," says the Lord, "for the day when I attack and take plunder. I have decided to gather nations together and assemble kingdoms, so I can pour out my fury on them -- all my raging anger. For the whole earth will be consumed by my fiery anger.

The Lord your God is in your midst; he is a warrior who can deliver. He takes great delight in you; he renews you by his love; he shouts for joy over you."

"Ye yourselves can find time to dwell in sealed houses: and shall this house lie waste?

"Who is left among you who saw this house in its former glory? And what does it look like now? From what you can see, it seems like nothing, doesn't it?

And he said unto me, What canst thou see? So I said, I, can see a flying volume, the length thereof, twenty by the cubit, and, the breadth thereof, ten by the cubit.

He answered me, "To the land of Shinar, so they can build a temple to the woman in the basket. Then when its preparations are complete, the basket will be set there in its place."

Moreover, the Lord who rules over all says, 'Old men and women will once more live in the plazas of Jerusalem, each one leaning on a cane because of advanced age.

"This is what the LORD of the Heavenly Armies says: "Be strong so the Temple can be built, you who are now listening to this message spoken by the prophets when the foundation was laid to the Temple of the LORD of the Heavenly Armies.

“I will bring them back from the land of Egypt
And gather them from Assyria;
And I will bring them into the land of Gilead and Lebanon
Until no room can be found for them.

At that time, a fountain will be opened for the house of David and for those who live in Jerusalem so they can be cleansed from sin and ceremonial impurity.

But now plead for God's favor that he might be gracious to us. "With this kind of offering in your hands, how can he be pleased with you?" asks the Lord who rules over all.

Who is there, even among you, that will shut the doors, so as not to set light to mine altar, for nothing? I can take no pleasure in you, saith Yahweh of hosts, and, your present, can I not accept at your hand.

And who [can] endure the day of his coming? And who [is] the one who can stand {when he appears}? For he [is] like a refiner's fire, like launderers' alkali.

“Since the days of your fathers, you have turned from My statutes; you have not kept them. Return to Me, and I will return to you,” says the Lord of Hosts.

But you ask: “How can we return?”

Can a person rob God? You indeed are robbing me, but you say, 'How are we robbing you?' In tithes and contributions!

He sent them to Bethlehem and said, “Go and search carefully for the child. When you find Him, report back to me so that I too can go and worship Him.”

and do not presume to say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham for our forefather? For I tell you, God can raise up descendants for Abraham even out of these stones.

His winnowing-fork is in His hand, and He will clean out His threshing-floor and store His wheat in His barn, but He will burn up the chaff with fire that never can be put out."

But he answered, "The Scripture says, 'Not on bread alone can man live, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.'"

"Ye are the salt of the earth: but and if the salt have lost her saltiness, what can be salted therewith? It is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden underfoot of men.

"You are the light of the world. A city located on a hill can't be hidden.

Neither does a person light an [olive oil] lamp and place it under a bushel-sized container, but on a stand where it can illuminate everything in the house.

In the [same] way let your light shine before people, so that they can see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven.

For truly I say unto you, Until heaven and earth may pass away, one jot or tittle can not pass from the law, until all things may be accomplished.

For I say unto you, that if your righteousness may not abound more than that of the scribes and Pharisees, you can not enter into the kingdom of the heavens.

Truly I say unto you, You can not go out from thence until you have paid the last farthing.