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Psalms 107:34
A fruitful land into barrenness, For the wickedness of those who dwell in it.
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Deuteronomy 28:1-68
“ Now it shall come to pass, if you diligently obey the voice of the Lord your God, to observe carefully all His commandments which I command you today, that the Lord your God will set you high above all nations of the earth.And all these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you, because you obey the voice of the Lord your God:“ Blessed shall you be in the city, and blessed shall you be in the country.“ Blessed shall be the fruit of your body, the produce of your ground and the increase of your herds, the increase of your cattle and the offspring of your flocks.“ Blessed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl.“ Blessed shall you be when you come in, and blessed shall you be when you go out.“ The Lord will cause your enemies who rise against you to be defeated before your face; they shall come out against you one way and flee before you seven ways.“ The Lord will command the blessing on you in your storehouses and in all to which you set your hand, and He will bless you in the land which the Lord your God is giving you.“ The Lord will establish you as a holy people to Himself, just as He has sworn to you, if you keep the commandments of the Lord your God and walk in His ways.Then all peoples of the earth shall see that you are called by the name of the Lord, and they shall be afraid of you.And the Lord will grant you plenty of goods, in the fruit of your body, in the increase of your livestock, and in the produce of your ground, in the land of which the Lord swore to your fathers to give you.The Lord will open to you His good treasure, the heavens, to give the rain to your land in its season, and to bless all the work of your hand. You shall lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow.And the Lord will make you the head and not the tail; you shall be above only, and not be beneath, if you heed the commandments of the Lord your God, which I command you today, and are careful to observe them.So you shall not turn aside from any of the words which I command you this day, to the right or the left, to go after other gods to serve them.“ But it shall come to pass, if you do not obey the voice of the Lord your God, to observe carefully all His commandments and His statutes which I command you today, that all these curses will come upon you and overtake you:“ Cursed shall you be in the city, and cursed shall you be in the country.“ Cursed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl.“ Cursed shall be the fruit of your body and the produce of your land, the increase of your cattle and the offspring of your flocks.“ Cursed shall you be when you come in, and cursed shall you be when you go out.“ The Lord will send on you cursing, confusion, and rebuke in all that you set your hand to do, until you are destroyed and until you perish quickly, because of the wickedness of your doings in which you have forsaken Me.The Lord will make the plague cling to you until He has consumed you from the land which you are going to possess.The Lord will strike you with consumption, with fever, with inflammation, with severe burning fever, with the sword, with scorching, and with mildew; they shall pursue you until you perish.And your heavens which are over your head shall be bronze, and the earth which is under you shall be iron.The Lord will change the rain of your land to powder and dust; from the heaven it shall come down on you until you are destroyed.“ The Lord will cause you to be defeated before your enemies; you shall go out one way against them and flee seven ways before them; and you shall become troublesome to all the kingdoms of the earth.Your carcasses shall be food for all the birds of the air and the beasts of the earth, and no one shall frighten them away.The Lord will strike you with the boils of Egypt, with tumors, with the scab, and with the itch, from which you cannot be healed.The Lord will strike you with madness and blindness and confusion of heart.And you shall grope at noonday, as a blind man gropes in darkness; you shall not prosper in your ways; you shall be only oppressed and plundered continually, and no one shall save you.“ You shall betroth a wife, but another man shall lie with her; you shall build a house, but you shall not dwell in it; you shall plant a vineyard, but shall not gather its grapes.Your ox shall be slaughtered before your eyes, but you shall not eat of it; your donkey shall be violently taken away from before you, and shall not be restored to you; your sheep shall be given to your enemies, and you shall have no one to rescue them.Your sons and your daughters shall be given to another people, and your eyes shall look and fail with longing for them all day long; and there shall be no strength in your hand.A nation whom you have not known shall eat the fruit of your land and the produce of your labor, and you shall be only oppressed and crushed continually.So you shall be driven mad because of the sight which your eyes see.The Lord will strike you in the knees and on the legs with severe boils which cannot be healed, and from the sole of your foot to the top of your head.“ The Lord will bring you and the king whom you set over you to a nation which neither you nor your fathers have known, and there you shall serve other gods— wood and stone.And you shall become an astonishment, a proverb, and a byword among all nations where the Lord will drive you.“ You shall carry much seed out to the field but gather little in, for the locust shall consume it.You shall plant vineyards and tend them, but you shall neither drink of the wine nor gather the grapes; for the worms shall eat them.You shall have olive trees throughout all your territory, but you shall not anoint yourself with the oil; for your olives shall drop off.You shall beget sons and daughters, but they shall not be yours; for they shall go into captivity.Locusts shall consume all your trees and the produce of your land.“ The alien who is among you shall rise higher and higher above you, and you shall come down lower and lower.He shall lend to you, but you shall not lend to him; he shall be the head, and you shall be the tail.“ Moreover all these curses shall come upon you and pursue and overtake you, until you are destroyed, because you did not obey the voice of the Lord your God, to keep His commandments and His statutes which He commanded you.And they shall be upon you for a sign and a wonder, and on your descendants forever.“ Because you did not serve the Lord your God with joy and gladness of heart, for the abundance of everything,therefore you shall serve your enemies, whom the Lord will send against you, in hunger, in thirst, in nakedness, and in need of everything; and He will put a yoke of iron on your neck until He has destroyed you.The Lord will bring a nation against you from afar, from the end of the earth, as swift as the eagle flies, a nation whose language you will not understand,a nation of fierce countenance, which does not respect the elderly nor show favor to the young.And they shall eat the increase of your livestock and the produce of your land, until you are destroyed; they shall not leave you grain or new wine or oil, or the increase of your cattle or the offspring of your flocks, until they have destroyed you.“ They shall besiege you at all your gates until your high and fortified walls, in which you trust, come down throughout all your land; and they shall besiege you at all your gates throughout all your land which the Lord your God has given you.You shall eat the fruit of your own body, the flesh of your sons and your daughters whom the Lord your God has given you, in the siege and desperate straits in which your enemy shall distress you.The sensitive and very refined man among you will be hostile toward his brother, toward the wife of his bosom, and toward the rest of his children whom he leaves behind,so that he will not give any of them the flesh of his children whom he will eat, because he has nothing left in the siege and desperate straits in which your enemy shall distress you at all your gates.The tender and delicate woman among you, who would not venture to set the sole of her foot on the ground because of her delicateness and sensitivity, will refuse to the husband of her bosom, and to her son and her daughter,her placenta which comes out from between her feet and her children whom she bears; for she will eat them secretly for lack of everything in the siege and desperate straits in which your enemy shall distress you at all your gates.“ If you do not carefully observe all the words of this law that are written in this book, that you may fear this glorious and awesome name, THE LORD YOUR GOD,then the Lord will bring upon you and your descendants extraordinary plagues— great and prolonged plagues— and serious and prolonged sicknesses.Moreover He will bring back on you all the diseases of Egypt, of which you were afraid, and they shall cling to you.Also every sickness and every plague, which is not written in this Book of the Law, will the Lord bring upon you until you are destroyed.You shall be left few in number, whereas you were as the stars of heaven in multitude, because you would not obey the voice of the Lord your God.And it shall be, that just as the Lord rejoiced over you to do you good and multiply you, so the Lord will rejoice over you to destroy you and bring you to nothing; and you shall be plucked from off the land which you go to possess.“ Then the Lord will scatter you among all peoples, from one end of the earth to the other, and there you shall serve other gods, which neither you nor your fathers have known— wood and stone.And among those nations you shall find no rest, nor shall the sole of your foot have a resting place; but there the Lord will give you a trembling heart, failing eyes, and anguish of soul.Your life shall hang in doubt before you; you shall fear day and night, and have no assurance of life.In the morning you shall say,‘ Oh, that it were evening!’ And at evening you shall say,‘ Oh, that it were morning!’ because of the fear which terrifies your heart, and because of the sight which your eyes see.“ And the Lord will take you back to Egypt in ships, by the way of which I said to you,‘ You shall never see it again.’ And there you shall be offered for sale to your enemies as male and female slaves, but no one will buy you.”
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Deuteronomy 4:6-8
Therefore be careful to observe them; for this is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples who will hear all these statutes, and say,‘ surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.’“ For what great nation is there that has God so near to it, as the Lord our God is to us, for whatever reason we may call upon Him?And what great nation is there that has such statutes and righteous judgments as are in all this law which I set before you this day?
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Deuteronomy 29:18-28
so that there may not be among you man or woman or family or tribe, whose heart turns away today from the Lord our God, to go and serve the gods of these nations, and that there may not be among you a root bearing bitterness or wormwood;and so it may not happen, when he hears the words of this curse, that he blesses himself in his heart, saying,‘ I shall have peace, even though I follow the dictates of my heart’— as though the drunkard could be included with the sober.“ The Lord would not spare him; for then the anger of the Lord and His jealousy would burn against that man, and every curse that is written in this book would settle on him, and the Lord would blot out his name from under heaven.And the Lord would separate him from all the tribes of Israel for adversity, according to all the curses of the covenant that are written in this Book of the Law,so that the coming generation of your children who rise up after you, and the foreigner who comes from a far land, would say, when they see the plagues of that land and the sicknesses which the Lord has laid on it:‘ The whole land is brimstone, salt, and burning; it is not sown, nor does it bear, nor does any grass grow there, like the overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrah, Admah, and Zeboiim, which the Lord overthrew in His anger and His wrath.’All nations would say,‘ Why has the Lord done so to this land? What does the heat of this great anger mean?’Then people would say:‘ Because they have forsaken the covenant of the Lord God of their fathers, which He made with them when He brought them out of the land of Egypt;for they went and served other gods and worshiped them, gods that they did not know and that He had not given to them.Then the anger of the Lord was aroused against this land, to bring on it every curse that is written in this book.And the Lord uprooted them from their land in anger, in wrath, and in great indignation, and cast them into another land, as it is this day.’
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Jeremiah 2:2-25
“ Go and cry in the hearing of Jerusalem, saying,‘ Thus says the Lord:“ I remember you, The kindness of your youth, The love of your betrothal, When you went after Me in the wilderness, In a land not sown.Israel was holiness to the Lord, The firstfruits of His increase. All that devour him will offend; Disaster will come upon them,” says the Lord.’”Hear the word of the Lord, O house of Jacob and all the families of the house of Israel.Thus says the Lord:“ What injustice have your fathers found in Me, That they have gone far from Me, Have followed idols, And have become idolaters?Neither did they say,‘ Where is the Lord, Who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, Who led us through the wilderness, Through a land of deserts and pits, Through a land of drought and the shadow of death, Through a land that no one crossed And where no one dwelt?’I brought you into a bountiful country, To eat its fruit and its goodness. But when you entered, you defiled My land And made My heritage an abomination.The priests did not say,‘ Where is the Lord?’ And those who handle the law did not know Me; The rulers also transgressed against Me; The prophets prophesied by Baal, And walked after things that do not profit.“ Therefore I will yet bring charges against you,” says the Lord,“ And against your children’s children I will bring charges.For pass beyond the coasts of Cyprus and see, Send to Kedar and consider diligently, And see if there has been such a thing.Has a nation changed its gods, Which are not gods? But My people have changed their Glory For what does not profit.Be astonished, O heavens, at this, And be horribly afraid; Be very desolate,” says the Lord.“ For My people have committed two evils: They have forsaken Me, the fountain of living waters, And hewn themselves cisterns— broken cisterns that can hold no water.“ Is Israel a servant? Is he a homeborn slave? Why is he plundered?The young lions roared at him, and growled; They made his land waste; His cities are burned, without inhabitant.Also the people of Noph and Tahpanhes Have broken the crown of your head.Have you not brought this on yourself, In that you have forsaken the Lord your God When He led you in the way?And now why take the road to Egypt, To drink the waters of Sihor? Or why take the road to Assyria, To drink the waters of the River?Your own wickedness will correct you, And your backslidings will rebuke you. Know therefore and see that it is an evil and bitter thing That you have forsaken the Lord your God, And the fear of Me is not in you,” Says the Lord GOD of hosts.“ For of old I have broken your yoke and burst your bonds; And you said,‘ I will not transgress,’ When on every high hill and under every green tree You lay down, playing the harlot.Yet I had planted you a noble vine, a seed of highest quality. How then have you turned before Me Into the degenerate plant of an alien vine?For though you wash yourself with lye, and use much soap, Yet your iniquity is marked before Me,” says the Lord GOD.“ How can you say,‘ I am not polluted, I have not gone after the Baals’? See your way in the valley; Know what you have done: You are a swift dromedary breaking loose in her ways,A wild donkey used to the wilderness, That sniffs at the wind in her desire; In her time of mating, who can turn her away? All those who seek her will not weary themselves; In her month they will find her.Withhold your foot from being unshod, and your throat from thirst. But you said,‘ There is no hope. No! For I have loved aliens, and after them I will go.’
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Judges 2:6-14
And when Joshua had dismissed the people, the children of Israel went each to his own inheritance to possess the land.So the people served the Lord all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders who outlived Joshua, who had seen all the great works of the Lord which He had done for Israel.Now Joshua the son of Nun, the servant of the Lord, died when he was one hundred and ten years old.And they buried him within the border of his inheritance at Timnath Heres, in the mountains of Ephraim, on the north side of Mount Gaash.When all that generation had been gathered to their fathers, another generation arose after them who did not know the Lord nor the work which He had done for Israel.Then the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord, and served the Baals;and they forsook the Lord God of their fathers, who had brought them out of the land of Egypt; and they followed other gods from among the gods of the people who were all around them, and they bowed down to them; and they provoked the Lord to anger.They forsook the Lord and served Baal and the Ashtoreths.And the anger of the Lord was hot against Israel. So He delivered them into the hands of plunderers who despoiled them; and He sold them into the hands of their enemies all around, so that they could no longer stand before their enemies.
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Ezekiel 16:1-63
Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying,“ Son of man, cause Jerusalem to know her abominations,and say,‘ Thus says the Lord GOD to Jerusalem:“ Your birth and your nativity are from the land of Canaan; your father was an Amorite and your mother a Hittite.As for your nativity, on the day you were born your navel cord was not cut, nor were you washed in water to cleanse you; you were not rubbed with salt nor wrapped in swaddling cloths.No eye pitied you, to do any of these things for you, to have compassion on you; but you were thrown out into the open field, when you yourself were loathed on the day you were born.“ And when I passed by you and saw you struggling in your own blood, I said to you in your blood,‘ Live!’ Yes, I said to you in your blood,‘ Live!’I made you thrive like a plant in the field; and you grew, matured, and became very beautiful. Your breasts were formed, your hair grew, but you were naked and bare.“ When I passed by you again and looked upon you, indeed your time was the time of love; so I spread My wing over you and covered your nakedness. Yes, I swore an oath to you and entered into a covenant with you, and you became Mine,” says the Lord God.“ Then I washed you in water; yes, I thoroughly washed off your blood, and I anointed you with oil.I clothed you in embroidered cloth and gave you sandals of badger skin; I clothed you with fine linen and covered you with silk.I adorned you with ornaments, put bracelets on your wrists, and a chain on your neck.And I put a jewel in your nose, earrings in your ears, and a beautiful crown on your head.Thus you were adorned with gold and silver, and your clothing was of fine linen, silk, and embroidered cloth. You ate pastry of fine flour, honey, and oil. You were exceedingly beautiful, and succeeded to royalty.Your fame went out among the nations because of your beauty, for it was perfect through My splendor which I had bestowed on you,” says the Lord GOD.“ But you trusted in your own beauty, played the harlot because of your fame, and poured out your harlotry on everyone passing by who would have it.You took some of your garments and adorned multicolored high places for yourself, and played the harlot on them. Such things should not happen, nor be.You have also taken your beautiful jewelry from My gold and My silver, which I had given you, and made for yourself male images and played the harlot with them.You took your embroidered garments and covered them, and you set My oil and My incense before them.Also My food which I gave you— the pastry of fine flour, oil, and honey which I fed you— you set it before them as sweet incense; and so it was,” says the Lord GOD.“ Moreover you took your sons and your daughters, whom you bore to Me, and these you sacrificed to them to be devoured. Were your acts of harlotry a small matter,that you have slain My children and offered them up to them by causing them to pass through the fire?And in all your abominations and acts of harlotry you did not remember the days of your youth, when you were naked and bare, struggling in your blood.“ Then it was so, after all your wickedness—‘ Woe, woe to you!’ says the Lord GOD—that you also built for yourself a shrine, and made a high place for yourself in every street.You built your high places at the head of every road, and made your beauty to be abhorred. You offered yourself to everyone who passed by, and multiplied your acts of harlotry.You also committed harlotry with the Egyptians, your very fleshly neighbors, and increased your acts of harlotry to provoke Me to anger.“ Behold, therefore, I stretched out My hand against you, diminished your allotment, and gave you up to the will of those who hate you, the daughters of the Philistines, who were ashamed of your lewd behavior.You also played the harlot with the Assyrians, because you were insatiable; indeed you played the harlot with them and still were not satisfied.Moreover you multiplied your acts of harlotry as far as the land of the trader, Chaldea; and even then you were not satisfied.“ How degenerate is your heart!” says the Lord God,“ seeing you do all these things, the deeds of a brazen harlot.“ You erected your shrine at the head of every road, and built your high place in every street. Yet you were not like a harlot, because you scorned payment.You are an adulterous wife, who takes strangers instead of her husband.Men make payment to all harlots, but you made your payments to all your lovers, and hired them to come to you from all around for your harlotry.You are the opposite of other women in your harlotry, because no one solicited you to be a harlot. In that you gave payment but no payment was given you, therefore you are the opposite.”‘ Now then, O harlot, hear the word of the Lord!Thus says the Lord GOD:“ Because your filthiness was poured out and your nakedness uncovered in your harlotry with your lovers, and with all your abominable idols, and because of the blood of your children which you gave to them,surely, therefore, I will gather all your lovers with whom you took pleasure, all those you loved, and all those you hated; I will gather them from all around against you and will uncover your nakedness to them, that they may see all your nakedness.And I will judge you as women who break wedlock or shed blood are judged; I will bring blood upon you in fury and jealousy.I will also give you into their hand, and they shall throw down your shrines and break down your high places. They shall also strip you of your clothes, take your beautiful jewelry, and leave you naked and bare.“ They shall also bring up an assembly against you, and they shall stone you with stones and thrust you through with their swords.They shall burn your houses with fire, and execute judgments on you in the sight of many women; and I will make you cease playing the harlot, and you shall no longer hire lovers.So I will lay to rest My fury toward you, and My jealousy shall depart from you. I will be quiet, and be angry no more.Because you did not remember the days of your youth, but agitated Me with all these things, surely I will also recompense your deeds on your own head,” says the Lord GOD.“ And you shall not commit lewdness in addition to all your abominations.“ Indeed everyone who quotes proverbs will use this proverb against you:‘ Like mother, like daughter!’You are your mother’s daughter, loathing husband and children; and you are the sister of your sisters, who loathed their husbands and children; your mother was a Hittite and your father an Amorite.“ Your elder sister is Samaria, who dwells with her daughters to the north of you; and your younger sister, who dwells to the south of you, is Sodom and her daughters.You did not walk in their ways nor act according to their abominations; but, as if that were too little, you became more corrupt than they in all your ways.“ As I live,” says the Lord God,“ neither your sister Sodom nor her daughters have done as you and your daughters have done.Look, this was the iniquity of your sister Sodom: She and her daughter had pride, fullness of food, and abundance of idleness; neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy.And they were haughty and committed abomination before Me; therefore I took them away as I saw fit.“ Samaria did not commit half of your sins; but you have multiplied your abominations more than they, and have justified your sisters by all the abominations which you have done.You who judged your sisters, bear your own shame also, because the sins which you committed were more abominable than theirs; they are more righteous than you. Yes, be disgraced also, and bear your own shame, because you justified your sisters.“ When I bring back their captives, the captives of Sodom and her daughters, and the captives of Samaria and her daughters, then I will also bring back the captives of your captivity among them,that you may bear your own shame and be disgraced by all that you did when you comforted them.When your sisters, Sodom and her daughters, return to their former state, and Samaria and her daughters return to their former state, then you and your daughters will return to your former state.For your sister Sodom was not a byword in your mouth in the days of your pride,before your wickedness was uncovered. It was like the time of the reproach of the daughters of Syria and all those around her, and of the daughters of the Philistines, who despise you everywhere.You have paid for your lewdness and your abominations,” says the Lord.For thus says the Lord GOD:“ I will deal with you as you have done, who despised the oath by breaking the covenant.“ Nevertheless I will remember My covenant with you in the days of your youth, and I will establish an everlasting covenant with you.Then you will remember your ways and be ashamed, when you receive your older and your younger sisters; for I will give them to you for daughters, but not because of My covenant with you.And I will establish My covenant with you. Then you shall know that I am the Lord,that you may remember and be ashamed, and never open your mouth anymore because of your shame, when I provide you an atonement for all you have done,” says the Lord God.’”
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Hosea 13:1
When Ephraim spoke, trembling, He exalted himself in Israel; But when he offended through Baal worship, he died.
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Ezekiel 22:1-23
Moreover the word of the Lord came to me, saying,“ Now, son of man, will you judge, will you judge the bloody city? Yes, show her all her abominations!Then say,‘ Thus says the Lord GOD:“ The city sheds blood in her own midst, that her time may come; and she makes idols within herself to defile herself.You have become guilty by the blood which you have shed, and have defiled yourself with the idols which you have made. You have caused your days to draw near, and have come to the end of your years; therefore I have made you a reproach to the nations, and a mockery to all countries.Those near and those far from you will mock you as infamous and full of tumult.“ Look, the princes of Israel: each one has used his power to shed blood in you.In you they have made light of father and mother; in your midst they have oppressed the stranger; in you they have mistreated the fatherless and the widow.You have despised My holy things and profaned My Sabbaths.In you are men who slander to cause bloodshed; in you are those who eat on the mountains; in your midst they commit lewdness.In you men uncover their fathers’ nakedness; in you they violate women who are set apart during their impurity.One commits abomination with his neighbor’s wife; another lewdly defiles his daughter-in-law; and another in you violates his sister, his father’s daughter.In you they take bribes to shed blood; you take usury and increase; you have made profit from your neighbors by extortion, and have forgotten Me,” says the Lord GOD.“ Behold, therefore, I beat My fists at the dishonest profit which you have made, and at the bloodshed which has been in your midst.Can your heart endure, or can your hands remain strong, in the days when I shall deal with you? I, the Lord, have spoken, and will do it.I will scatter you among the nations, disperse you throughout the countries, and remove your filthiness completely from you.You shall defile yourself in the sight of the nations; then you shall know that I am the Lord.”’”The word of the Lord came to me, saying,“ Son of man, the house of Israel has become dross to Me; they are all bronze, tin, iron, and lead, in the midst of a furnace; they have become dross from silver.Therefore thus says the Lord GOD:‘ Because you have all become dross, therefore behold, I will gather you into the midst of Jerusalem.As men gather silver, bronze, iron, lead, and tin into the midst of a furnace, to blow fire on it, to melt it; so I will gather you in My anger and in My fury, and I will leave you there and melt you.Yes, I will gather you and blow on you with the fire of My wrath, and you shall be melted in its midst.As silver is melted in the midst of a furnace, so shall you be melted in its midst; then you shall know that I, the Lord, have poured out My fury on you.’”And the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
