Two Kinds of Shepherds

⁴ “Thus says the Lord my God: Be a shepherd of the flock doomed to slaughter.^{(A) 5} Those who buy them kill them and go unpunished, and those who sell them say, ‘Blessed be the Lord, for I have become rich,’ and their own shepherds have no pity on them.^{(B) 6} For I will no longer have pity on the inhabitants of the earth, says the Lord. I will cause them, every one, to fall each into the hand of a neighbor and each into the hand of the king, and they shall devastate the earth, and I will deliver no one from their hand.”^(C)

⁷ So on behalf of the sheep merchants,^[a] I became the shepherd of the flock doomed to slaughter. I took two staffs; one I named Favor, the other I named Unity, and I tended the sheep.^{(D) 8} In one month I disposed of the three shepherds, for I had become impatient with them, and they also detested me.^{(E) 9} So I said, “I will not be your shepherd. What is to die, let it die; what is to be destroyed, let it be destroyed; and let those that are left devour the flesh of one another!” ¹⁰ I took my staff Favor and broke it, annulling the covenant that I had made with all the peoples.^{(F) 11} So it was annulled on that day, and the sheep merchants^[b] who were watching me knew that it was the word of the Lord.^{(G) 12} I then said to them, “If it seems right to you, give me my wages, but if not, keep them.” So they weighed out as my wages thirty shekels of silver.^{(H) 13} Then the Lord said to me, “Throw it into the treasury”^[c]—this lordly price at which I was valued by them. So I took the thirty shekels of silver and threw them into the treasury^[d] in the house of the Lord.^{(I) 14} Then I broke my second staff Unity, annulling the family ties between Judah and Israel.