Israel’s Shepherds: Good and Bad
1 Open your gates, Lebanon,
and fire will consume your cedars. v
2 Wail, cypress, w for the cedar has fallen;
the glorious trees are destroyed!
Wail, oaks of Bashan, x
for the stately forest has fallen!
3 Listen to the wail y of the shepherds, z
for their glory is destroyed.
Listen to the roar of young lions, a
for the thickets of the Jordan b are K destroyed.
4 The LORD my God says this: “Shepherd the flock intended for slaughter. 5 Those who buy them slaughter them but are not punished. c Those who sell them say: Blessed be the LORD because I have become rich! Even their own shepherds have no compassion for them. 6 Indeed, I will no longer have compassion on the inhabitants of the land”—this is the LORD’S declaration. “Instead, I will turn everyone over to his neighbor and his king. They will devastate the land, and I will not rescue it from their hand.” d
7 So I shepherded the flock intended for slaughter, the oppressed of the flock. L I took two staffs, calling one Favor e and the other Union, and I shepherded the flock. 8 In one month I got rid of three shepherds. I became impatient with them, and they also detested me. 9 Then I said, “I will no longer shepherd you. Let what is dying die, and let what is perishing perish; let the rest devour each other’s flesh.” 10 Next I took my staff called Favor and cut it in two, annulling the covenant I had made with all the peoples. 11 It was annulled on that day, and so the oppressed of the flock M who were watching me knew that it was the word of the LORD. 12 Then I said to them, “If it seems right to you, give me my wages; but if not, keep them.” So they weighed my wages, thirty pieces of silver. f
13 “Throw it to the potter,” N the LORD said to me—this magnificent price I was valued by them. So I took the thirty pieces of silver and threw it into the house of the LORD, to the potter. O,g 14 Then I cut in two my second staff, Union, annulling the brotherhood between Judah and Israel.
15 The LORD also said to me: “Take the equipment of a foolish shepherd. 16 I am about to raise up a shepherd in the land who will not care for those who are perishing, and he will not seek the lost P or heal the broken. He will not sustain the healthy, Q but he will devour the flesh of the fat sheep h and tear off their hooves.
17 Woe to the worthless shepherd
who deserts the flock! i
May a sword strike R his arm
and his right eye!
May his arm wither away
and his right eye go completely blind! ”