¹⁷ “‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance;
    we sang a dirge, and you did not mourn.’

^9 (A)“To whom will he teach knowledge,
    and to whom will he explain the message?
Those who are weaned from the milk,
    those taken from the breast?
¹⁰ For it is precept upon precept, precept upon precept,
    line upon line, line upon line,
    here a little, there a little.”

^11 (B)For by people of strange lips
    and with a foreign tongue
the Lord will speak to this people,
¹²     to whom he has said,
^(C)“This is rest;
    give rest to the weary;
and this is repose”;
    yet they would not hear.
¹³ And the word of the Lord will be to them
precept upon precept, precept upon precept,
    line upon line, line upon line,
    here a little, there a little,
^(D)that they may go, and fall backward,
    and be broken, and snared, and taken.

¹⁷ Thus says the Lord of hosts:
^(A)“Consider, and call for the mourning women to come;
    send for the skillful women to come;
¹⁸ let them make haste ^(B)and raise a wailing over us,
    ^(C)that our eyes may run down with tears
    and our eyelids flow with water.
¹⁹ For a sound of wailing is heard from Zion:
    ^(D)‘How we are ruined!
    We are utterly shamed,
because we have left the land,
    because they have cast down our dwellings.’”

²⁰ Hear, O women, the word of the Lord,
    and let your ear receive the word of his mouth;
teach to your daughters a lament,
    and each to her neighbor a dirge.