The Daily Audio Bible
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21 And the word of the Lord came to me, saying:
2 Son of man, set thy face toward Jerusalem, and let thy speech flow towards the holy places, and prophesy against the land of Israel:
3 And say to the land of Israel: Thus saith the Lord God: Behold I come against thee, and I will draw forth my sword out of its sheath, and will cut off in thee the just, and the wicked.
4 And forasmuch as I have cut off in thee the just, and the wicked, therefore shall my sword go forth out of its sheath against all flesh, from the south even to the north.
5 That all flesh may know that I the Lord have drawn my sword out of its sheath not to be turned back.
6 And thou, son of man, mourn with the breaking of thy loins, and with bitterness sigh before them.
7 And when they shall say to thee: Why mournest thou? thou shalt say: For that which I hear: because it cometh, and every heart shall melt, and all hands shall be made feeble, and every spirit shall faint, and water shall run down every knee: behold it cometh, and it shall be done, saith the Lord God.
8 And the word of the Lord came to me, saying:
9 Son of man, prophesy, and say: Thus saith the Lord God: Say: The sword, the sword is sharpened, and furbished.
10 It is sharpened to kill victims: it is furbished that it may glitter: thou removest the sceptre of my son, thou hast cut down every tree.
11 And I have given it to be furbished, that it may be handled: this sword is sharpened, and it is furbished, that it may be in the hand of the slayer.
12 Cry, and howl, O son of man, for this sword is upon my people, it is upon all the princes of Israel, that are fled: they are delivered up to the sword with my people, strike therefore upon thy thigh,
13 Because it is tried: and that when it shall overthrow the sceptre, and it shall not be, saith the Lord God.
14 Thou therefore, O son of man, prophesy, and strike thy hands together, and let the sword be doubled, and let the sword of the slain be tripled: this is the sword of a great slaughter, that maketh them stand amazed,
15 And languish in heart, and that multiplieth ruins. In all their gates I have set the dread of the sharp sword, the sword that is furbished to glitter, that is made ready for slaughter.
16 Be thou sharpened, go to the right hand, or to the left, which way soever thou hast a mind to set thy face.
17 And I will clap my hands together, and will satisfy my indignation: I the Lord have spoken.
18 And the word of the Lord came to me, saying:
19 And thou son of man, set thee two ways, for the sword of the king of Babylon to come: both shall come forth out of one land: and with his hand he shall draw lots, he shall consult at the head of the way of the city.
20 Thou shalt make a way that the sword may come to Rabbath of the children of Ammon, and to Juda unto Jerusalem the strong city.
21 For the king of Babylon stood in the highway, at the head of two ways, seeking divination, shuffling arrows: he inquired of the idols, and consulted entrails.
22 On his right hand was the divination for Jerusalem, to set battering rams, to open the mouth in slaughter, to lift up the voice in howling, to set engines against the gates, to cast up a mount, to build forts.
23 And he shall be in their eyes as one consulting the oracle in vain, and imitating the leisure of sabbaths: but he will call to remembrance the iniquity that they may be taken.
24 Therefore thus saith the Lord God: Because you have remembered your iniquity, and have discovered your prevarications, and your sins have appeared in all your devices: because, I say, you have remembered, you shall be taken with the hand.
25 But thou profane wicked prince of Israel, whose day is come that hath been appointed in the time of iniquity:
26 Thus saith the Lord God: Remove the diadem, take off the crown: is it not this that hath exalted the low one, and brought down him that was high?
27 I will shew it to be iniquity, iniquity, iniquity: but this was not done till he came to whom judgment belongeth, and I will give it him.
28 And thou son of man, prophesy, and say: Thus saith the Lord God concerning the children of Ammon, and concerning their reproach, and thou shalt say: O sword, O sword, come out of the scabbard to kill, be furbished to destroy, and to glitter,
29 Whilst they see vain things in thy regard, and they divine lies: to bring thee upon the necks of the wicked that are wounded, whose appointed day is come in the time of iniquity.
30 Return into thy sheath. I will judge thee in the place wherein thou wast created, in the land of thy nativity.
31 And I will pour out upon thee my indignation: in the fire of my rage will I blow upon thee, and will give thee into the hands of men that are brutish and contrive thy destruction.
32 Thou shalt be fuel for the fire, thy blood shall be in the midst of the land, thou shalt be forgotten: for I the Lord have spoken it.
22 And the word of the Lord came to me, saying:
2 And thou son of man, dost thou not judge, dost thou not judge the city of blood?
3 And thou shalt shew her all her abominations, and shalt say: Thus saith the Lord God: This is the city that sheddeth blood in the midst of her, that her time may come: and that hath made idols against herself, to defile herself.
4 Thou art become guilty in thy blood which thou hast shed: and thou art defiled in thy idols which thou hast made: and thou hast made thy days to draw near, and hast brought on the time of thy years: therefore have I made thee a reproach to the Gentiles, and a mockery to all countries.
5 Those that are near, and those that are far from thee, shall triumph over thee: thou filthy one, infamous, great in destruction.
6 Behold the princes of Israel, every one hath employed his arm in thee to shed blood.
7 They have abused father and mother in thee, they have oppressed the stranger in the midst of thee, they have grieved the fatherless and widow in thee.
8 Thou hast despised my sanctuaries, and profaned my sabbaths.
9 Slanderers have been in thee to shed blood, and they have eaten upon the mountains in thee, they have committed wickedness in the midst of thee.
10 They have discovered the nakedness of their father in thee, they have humbled the uncleanness of the menstruous woman in thee.
11 And every one hath committed abomination with his neighbour's wife, and the father in law hath wickedly defiled his daughter in law, the brother hath oppressed his sister the daughter of his father in thee.
12 They have taken gifts in thee to shed blood: thou hast taken usury and increase, and hast covetously oppressed thy neighbours: and thou hast forgotten me, saith the Lord God.
13 Behold, I have clapped my hands at thy covetousness, which thou hast exercised: and at the blood that hath been shed in the midst of thee.
14 Shall thy heart endure, or shall thy hands prevail ill the days which I will bring upon thee: I the Lord have spoken, and will do it.
15 And I will disperse thee in the nations, and will scatter thee among the countries, and I will put an end to thy uncleanness in thee.
16 And I will possess thee in the sight of the Gentiles, and thou shalt know that I am the Lord.
17 And the word of the Lord came to me, saying:
18 Son of man, the house of Israel is become dross to me: all these are brass, and tin, and iron, and lead, in the midst of the furnace: they are become the dross of silver.
19 Therefore thus saith the Lord God: Because you are all turned into dross, therefore behold I will gather you together in the midst of Jerusalem.
20 As they gather silver, and brass, and tin, and iron, and lead in the midst of the furnace: that I may kindle a fire in it to melt it: so will I gather you together in my fury and in my wrath, and will take my rest, and I will melt you down.
21 And I will gather you together, and will burn you in the fire of my wrath, and you shall be melted in the midst thereof.
22 As silver is melted in the midst of the furnace, so shall you be in the midst thereof: and you shall know that I am the Lord, when I have poured out my indignation upon you.
23 And the word of the Lord came to me, saying:
24 Son of man, say to her: Thou art a land that is unclean, and not rained upon in the day of wrath.
25 There is a conspiracy of prophets in the midst thereof: like a lion that roareth and catcheth the prey, they have devoured souls, they have taken riches and hire, they have made many widows in the midst thereof.
26 Her priests have despised my law, and have defiled my sanctuaries: they have put no difference between holy and profane: nor have distinguished between the polluted and the clean: and they have turned away their eyes from my sabbaths, and I was profaned in the midst of them.
27 Her princes in the midst of her, are like wolves ravening the prey to shed blood, and to destroy souls, and to run after gains through covetousness.
28 And her prophets have daubed them without tempering the mortar, seeing vain things, and divining lies unto them, saying: Thus saith the Lord God: when the Lord hath not spoken.
29 The people of the land have used oppression, and committed robbery: they afflicted the needy and poor, and they oppressed the stranger by calumny without judgment.
30 And I sought among them for a man that might set up a hedge, and stand in the gap before me in favour of the land, that I might not destroy it: and I found none.
31 And I poured out my indignation upon them, in the fire of my wrath I consumed them: I have rendered their way upon their own head, saith the Lord God.
10 For the law having a shadow of the good things to come, not the very image of the things; by the selfsame sacrifices which they offer continually every year, can never make the comers thereunto perfect:
2 For then they would have ceased to be offered: because the worshippers once cleansed should have no conscience of sin any longer:
3 But in them there is made a commemoration of sins every year.
4 For it is impossible that with the blood of oxen and goats sin should be taken away.
5 Wherefore when he cometh into the world, he saith: Sacrifice and oblation thou wouldest not: but a body thou hast fitted to me:
6 Holocausts for sin did not please thee.
7 Then said I: Behold I come: in the head of the book it is written of me: that I should do thy will, O God.
8 In saying before, Sacrifices, and oblations, and holocausts for sin thou wouldest not, neither are they pleasing to thee, which are offered according to the law.
9 Then said I: Behold, I come to do thy will, O God: he taketh away the first, that he may establish that which followeth.
10 In the which will, we are sanctified by the oblation of the body of Jesus Christ once.
11 And every priest indeed standeth daily ministering, and often offering the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins.
12 But this man offering one sacrifice for sins, for ever sitteth on the right hand of God,
13 From henceforth expecting, until his enemies be made his footstool.
14 For by one oblation he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified.
15 And the Holy Ghost also doth testify this to us. For after that he said:
16 And this is the testament which I will make unto them after those days, saith the Lord. I will give my laws in their hearts, and on their minds will I write them:
17 And their sins and iniquities I will remember no more.
108 Unto the end, a psalm for David.
2 O God, be not thou silent in my praise: for the mouth of the wicked and the mouth of the deceitful man is opened against me.
3 They have spoken against me with deceitful tongues; and they have compassed me about with words of hatred; and have fought against me without cause.
4 Instead of making me a return of love, they detracted me: but I gave myself to prayer.
5 And they repaid me evil for good: and hatred for my love.
6 Set thou the sinner over him: and may the devil stand at his right hand.
7 When he is judged, may he go out condemned; and may his prayer be turned to sin.
8 May his days be few: and his bishopric let another take.
9 May his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow.
10 Let his children be carried about vagabonds, and beg; and let them be cast out of their dwellings.
11 May the usurer search all his substance: and let strangers plunder his labours.
12 May there be none to help him: nor none to pity his fatherless offspring.
13 May his posterity be cut off; in one generation may his name be blotted out.
14 May the iniquity of his fathers be remembered in the sight of the Lord: and let not the sin of his mother be blotted out.
15 May they be before the Lord continually, and let the memory of them perish from the earth:
16 because he remembered not to shew mercy,
17 But persecuted the poor man and the beggar; and the broken in heart, to put him to death.
18 And he loved cursing, and it shall come unto him: and he would not have blessing, and it shall be far from him. And he put on cursing, like a garment: and it went in like water into his entrails, and like oil in his bones.
19 May it be unto him like a garment which covereth him; and like a girdle with which he is girded continually.
20 This is the work of them who detract me before the Lord; and who speak evils against my soul.
21 But thou, O Lord, do with me for thy name's sake: because thy mercy is sweet. Do thou deliver me,
22 for I am poor and needy, and my heart is troubled within me.
23 I am taken away like the shadow when it declineth: and I am shaken off as locusts.
24 My knees are weakened through fasting: and my flesh is changed for oil.
25 And I am become a reproach to them: they saw me and they shaked their heads,
26 Help me, O Lord my God; save me according to thy mercy.
27 And let them know that this is thy hand: and that thou, O Lord, hast done it.
28 They will curse and thou will bless: let them that rise up against me be confounded: but thy servant shall rejoice.
29 Let them that detract me be clothed with shame: and let them be covered with the their confusion as with a double cloak.
30 I will give great thanks to the Lord with my mouth: and in the midst of many I will praise him.
31 Because he hath stood at the right hand of the poor, to save my soul from persecutors.
12 The prudent man seeing evil hideth himself: little ones passing on have suffered losses.
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