¹ The word of Yahweh came to me, saying,

² Son of man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel, prophesy, and tell them, even to the shepherds, Thus says the Lord Yahweh: Woe to the shepherds of Israel who feed themselves! Shouldn't the shepherds feed the sheep?

³ You eat the fat, and you clothe yourself with the wool, you kill the fatlings; but you don't feed the sheep.

⁴ You haven't strengthened the diseased, neither have you healed that which was sick, neither have you bound up that which was broken, neither have you brought back that which was driven away, neither have you sought that which was lost; but with force and with rigor you have ruled over them.

⁵ They were scattered, because there was no shepherd; and they became food to all the animals of the field, and were scattered.

⁶ My sheep wandered through all the mountains, and on every high hill: yes, my sheep were scattered on all the surface of the earth; and there was none who searched or sought.

⁷ Therefore, you shepherds, hear the word of Yahweh:

⁸ As I live, says the Lord Yahweh, surely because my sheep became a prey, and my sheep became food to all the animals of the field, because there was no shepherd, neither did my shepherds search for my sheep, but the shepherds fed themselves, and didn't feed my sheep;

⁹ therefore, you shepherds, hear the word of Yahweh:

¹⁰ Thus says the Lord Yahweh: Behold, I am against the shepherds; and I will require my sheep at their hand, and cause them to cease from feeding the sheep; neither shall the shepherds feed themselves any more; and I will deliver my sheep from their mouth, that they may not be food for them.

¹¹ For thus says the Lord Yahweh: Behold, I myself, even I, will search for my sheep, and will seek them out.

¹² As a shepherd seeks out his flock in the day that he is among his sheep that are scattered abroad, so will I seek out my sheep; and I will deliver them out of all places where they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day.

¹³ I will bring them out from the peoples, and gather them from the countries, and will bring them into their own land; and I will feed them on the mountains of Israel, by the watercourses, and in all the inhabited places of the country.

¹⁴ I will feed them with good pasture; and on the mountains of the height of Israel shall their fold be: there shall they lie down in a good fold; and on fat pasture shall they feed on the mountains of Israel.

¹⁵ I myself will be the shepherd of my sheep, and I will cause them to lie down, says the Lord Yahweh.

¹⁶ I will seek that which was lost, and will bring back that which was driven away, and will bind up that which was broken, and will strengthen that which was sick: but the fat and the strong I will destroy; I will feed them in justice.

¹⁷ As for you, O my flock, thus says the Lord Yahweh: Behold, I judge between sheep and sheep, the rams and the male goats.

¹⁸ Does it seem a small thing to you to have fed on the good pasture, but you must tread down with your feet the residue of your pasture? and to have drunk of the clear waters, but you must foul the residue with your feet?

¹⁹ As for my sheep, they eat that which you have trodden with your feet, and they drink that which you have fouled with your feet.

²⁰ Therefore thus says the Lord Yahweh to them: Behold, I, even I, will judge between the fat sheep and the lean sheep.

²¹ Because you thrust with side and with shoulder, and push all the diseased with your horns, until you have scattered them abroad;

²² therefore will I save my flock, and they shall no more be a prey; and I will judge between sheep and sheep.

²³ I will set up one shepherd over them, and he shall feed them, even my servant David; he shall feed them, and he shall be their shepherd.

²⁴ I, Yahweh, will be their God, and my servant David prince among them; I, Yahweh, have spoken it.

²⁵ I will make with them a covenant of peace, and will cause evil animals to cease out of the land; and they shall dwell securely in the wilderness, and sleep in the woods.

²⁶ I will make them and the places around my hill a blessing; and I will cause the shower to come down in its season; there shall be showers of blessing.

²⁷ The tree of the field shall yield its fruit, and the earth shall yield its increase, and they shall be secure in their land; and they shall know that I am Yahweh, when I have broken the bars of their yoke, and have delivered them out of the hand of those who made slaves of them.

²⁸ They shall no more be a prey to the nations, neither shall the animals of the earth devour them; but they shall dwell securely, and none shall make them afraid.

²⁹ I will raise up to them a plantation for renown, and they shall be no more consumed with famine in the land, neither bear the shame of the nations any more.

³⁰ They shall know that I, Yahweh, their God am with them, and that they, the house of Israel, are my people, says the Lord Yahweh.

³¹ You my sheep, the sheep of my pasture, are men, and I am your God, says the Lord Yahweh.

¹ Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture! says Yahweh.

² Therefore thus says Yahweh, 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 on you the evil of your doings, says Yahweh.

³ 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.

⁴ I will set up shepherds over them, who shall feed them; and they shall fear no more, nor be dismayed, neither shall any be lacking, says Yahweh.

⁵ Behold, the days come, says Yahweh, that 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.

⁶ In his days Judah shall be saved, and Israel shall dwell safely; and this is his name by which he shall be called: Yahweh our righteousness.

⁷ Therefore, behold, the days come, says Yahweh, that they shall no more say, As Yahweh lives, who brought up the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt;

⁸ but, As Yahweh 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. They shall dwell in their own land.

⁹ Concerning 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 Yahweh, and because of his holy words.

¹⁰ For the land is full of adulterers; for because of swearing the land mourns; the pastures of the wilderness are dried up. Their course is evil, and their might is not right;

¹¹ for both prophet and priest are profane; yes, in my house have I found their wickedness, says Yahweh.

¹² Therefore their way shall be to them as slippery places in the darkness: they shall be driven on, and fall therein; for I will bring evil on them, even the year of their visitation, says Yahweh.

¹³ I have seen folly in the prophets of Samaria; they prophesied by Baal, and caused my people Israel to err.

¹⁴ In 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 none does return from his wickedness: they are all of them become to me as Sodom, and its inhabitants as Gomorrah.

¹⁵ Therefore thus says Yahweh of Armies concerning the prophets: Behold, I will feed them with wormwood, and make them drink the water of gall; for from the prophets of Jerusalem is ungodliness gone forth into all the land.

¹⁶ Thus says Yahweh of Armies, Don't listen 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 Yahweh.

¹⁷ They say continually to those who despise me, Yahweh has said, You shall have peace; and to everyone who walks in the stubbornness of his own heart they say, No evil shall come on you.

¹⁸ For who has stood in the council of Yahweh, that he should perceive and hear his word? who has marked my word, and heard it?

¹⁹ Behold, the storm of Yahweh, [even his] wrath, is gone forth, yes, a whirling storm: it shall burst on the head of the wicked.

²⁰ The anger of Yahweh shall not return, until he has executed, and until he have performed the intents of his heart: in the latter days you shall understand it perfectly.

²¹ I sent not these prophets, yet they ran: I didn't speak to them, yet they prophesied.

²² But if they had stood in my council, then had they caused my people to hear my words, and had turned them from their evil way, and from the evil of their doings.

²³ Am I a God at hand, says Yahweh, and not a God afar off?

²⁴ Can any hide himself in secret places so that I shall not see him? says Yahweh. Don't I fill heaven and earth? says Yahweh.

²⁵ I have heard what the prophets have said, who prophesy lies in my name, saying, I have dreamed, I have dreamed.

²⁶ How long shall this be in the heart of the prophets who prophesy lies, even the prophets of the deceit of their own heart?

²⁷ who 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.

²⁸ The 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 Yahweh.

²⁹ Isn't my word like fire? says Yahweh; and like a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces?

³⁰ Therefore, behold, I am against the prophets, says Yahweh, who steal my words everyone from his neighbor.

³¹ Behold, I am against the prophets, says Yahweh, who use their tongues, and say, He says.

³² Behold, I am against those who prophesy lying dreams, says Yahweh, and do tell them, and cause my people to err by their lies, and by their vain boasting: yet I didn't send them, nor commanded them; neither do they profit this people at all, says Yahweh.

³³ When this people, or the prophet, or a priest, shall ask you, saying, What is the burden of Yahweh? Then you shall tell them, What burden! I will cast you off, says Yahweh.

³⁴ As for the prophet, and the priest, and the people, who shall say, The burden of Yahweh, I will even punish that man and his house.

³⁵ You shall say everyone to his neighbor, and everyone to his brother, What has Yahweh answered? and, What has Yahweh spoken?

³⁶ You shall mention the burden of Yahweh no more: for every man's own word shall be his burden; for you have perverted the words of the living God, of Yahweh of Armies our God.

³⁷ You shall say to the prophet, What has Yahweh answered you? and, What has Yahweh spoken?

³⁸ But if you say, The burden of Yahweh; therefore thus says Yahweh: Because you say this word, The burden of Yahweh, and I have sent to you, saying, You shall not say, The burden of Yahweh;

³⁹ therefore, 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:

⁴⁰ and I will bring an everlasting reproach on you, and a perpetual shame, which shall not be forgotten.