Many peoples will come and say, “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the temple of the God of Jacob. He will teach us his ways, so that we may walk in his paths.” The law will go out from Zion, the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.

Youths oppress my people, women rule over them. My people, your guides lead you astray; they turn you from the path.

The path of the righteous is level; you, the Upright One, make the way of the righteous smooth.

Leave this way, get off this path, and stop confronting us with the Holy One of Israel!”

Whom did the Lord consult to enlighten him, and who taught him the right way? Who was it that taught him knowledge, or showed him the path of understanding?

He pursues them and moves on unscathed, by a path his feet have not traveled before.

I will lead the blind by ways they have not known, along unfamiliar paths I will guide them; I will turn the darkness into light before them and make the rough places smooth. These are the things I will do; I will not forsake them.

This is what the Lord says— he who made a way through the sea, a path through the mighty waters,

The way of peace they do not know; there is no justice in their paths. They have turned them into crooked roads; no one who walks along them will know peace.

This is what the Lord says: “Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls. But you said, ‘We will not walk in it.’

Yet my people have forgotten me; they burn incense to worthless idols, which made them stumble in their ways, in the ancient paths. They made them walk in byways, on roads not built up.

“Therefore their path will become slippery; they will be banished to darkness and there they will fall. I will bring disaster on them in the year they are punished,” declares the Lord.

They will come with weeping; they will pray as I bring them back. I will lead them beside streams of water on a level path where they will not stumble, because I am Israel’s father, and Ephraim is my firstborn son.

He has barred my way with blocks of stone; he has made my paths crooked.

he dragged me from the path and mangled me and left me without help.

Therefore I will block her path with thornbushes; I will wall her in so that she cannot find her way.

The prophet, along with my God, is the watchman over Ephraim, yet snares await him on all his paths, and hostility in the house of his God.

So I will be like a lion to them, like a leopard I will lurk by the path.

Many nations will come and say, “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the temple of the God of Jacob. He will teach us his ways, so that we may walk in his paths.” The law will go out from Zion, the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.

This is he who was spoken of through the prophet Isaiah: “A voice of one calling in the wilderness, ‘Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him.’”

As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up.

When anyone hears the message about the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what was sown in their heart. This is the seed sown along the path.

“a voice of one calling in the wilderness, ‘Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him.’”

As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up.

Some people are like seed along the path, where the word is sown. As soon as they hear it, Satan comes and takes away the word that was sown in them.