²⁰ But when they came to the nations, wherever they came, they profaned my holy name, in that it was said of them, “These are the people of the Lord, yet they had to go out of his land.”^(A)

²⁴ For, as it is written, “The name of God is blasphemed^[a] among the gentiles because of you.”^(A)

⁵ Now therefore what am I doing here, says the Lord, seeing that my people are taken away without cause? Their rulers howl, says the Lord, and continually, all day long, my name is despised.^(A)

²⁴ Have you not observed how these people say, “The two families that the Lord chose have been rejected by him,” and how they hold my people in such contempt that they no longer regard them as a nation?^(A)

¹¹ But Moses implored the Lord his God and said, “O Lord, why does your wrath burn hot against your people, whom you brought out of the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand?^{(A) 12} Why should the Egyptians say, ‘It was with evil intent that he brought them out to kill them in the mountains and to consume them from the face of the earth’? Turn from your fierce wrath; change your mind and do not bring disaster on your people.^{(B) 13} Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants, how you swore to them by your own self, saying to them, ‘I will multiply your descendants like the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have promised I will give to your descendants, and they shall inherit it forever.’ ”^(C)

¹⁵ Now if you are ready, when you hear the sound of the horn, pipe, lyre, trigon, harp, drum, and entire musical ensemble, you should fall down and worship the statue that I have made. But if you do not worship, you shall immediately be thrown into a furnace of blazing fire, and who is the god who will deliver you out of my hands?”^(A)

¹⁶ But I will let a few of them escape from the sword, from famine and pestilence, so that they may tell of all their abominations among the nations where they go; then they shall know that I am the Lord.^(A)

¹⁰ “Thus shall you speak to King Hezekiah of Judah: Do not let your God on whom you rely deceive you by promising that Jerusalem will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.^{(A) 11} See, you have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands, destroying them utterly. Shall you be delivered? ¹² Have the gods of the nations delivered them, the nations that my predecessors destroyed: Gozan, Haran, Rezeph, and the people of Eden who were in Telassar?^(B)

³⁵ Who among all the gods of the countries have delivered their countries out of my hand, that the Lord should deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?”

³⁰ Do not let Hezekiah make you rely on the Lord by saying, ‘The Lord will surely deliver us, and this city will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.’