1.1
The burden of the word of the Lord to Israel by the hand of his
messenger. Lay [it], I pray you, to heart.
1.2 I have loved you, saith the Lord. And ye
said, Wherein hast thou loved us? Was not Esau Jacob's brother? saith
the Lord: yet I loved Jacob,
1.3 and hated Esau and laid waste his borders, and made his heritage as dwellings of the wilderness?
1.4 Because one will say, Idumea has been
overthrown, but let us return and rebuild the desolate places; thus
saith the Lord Almighty, They shall build, but I will throw down; and
they shall be called The borders o wickedness, and, The people against
whom the Lord has set himself for ever.
1.5 And your eyes shall see, and ye shall say, The Lord has been magnified upon the borders of Israel.
1.6 A son honours [his] father, and a servant
his master: if then I am a father, where is mine honour? and if I am a
master, where is my fear? saith the Lord Almighty. Ye the priests are
they that despise my name: yet ye said, Wherein have we despised thy
name?
1.7 In that ye bring to mine altar polluted
bread; and ye said, Wherein have ye polluted it? In that ye say, The
table of the Lord is polluted, and that which was set thereon ye have
despised.
1.8 For if ye bring a blind [victim] for
sacrifices, [is it] not evil? and if ye bring the lame or the sick, [is
it] not evil? offer it now to thy ruler, [and see] if he will receive
thee, if he will accept thy person, saith the Lord Almighty.
1.9 And now intreat the face of your God, and
make supplication to him. These things have been done by your hands;
shall I accept you? saith the Lord Almighty.
1.10 Because even among you the doors shall be shut,
and [one] will not kindle [the fire of] mine altar for nothing, I have
no pleasure in you, saith the Lord Almighty, and I will not accept a
sacrifice at your hands.
1.11 For from the rising of the sun even to the going
down [thereof] my name has been glorified among the Gentiles; and in
every place incense is offered to my name, and a pure offering: for my
name is great among the Gentiles, saith the Lord Almighty.
1.12 But ye profane it, in that ye say, The table of
the Lord is polluted, and his meats set thereon are despised.
1.13 And ye said, These [services] are troublesome:
therefore I have utterly rejected them with scorn, saith the Lord
Almighty: and ye brought in torn victims, and lame, and sick: if then
ye should bring an offering, shall I accept them at your hands? saith
the Lord Almighty.
1.14 And cursed [is the man] who had the power, and
possessed a male in his flock, and whose vow is upon him, and who
sacrifices a corrupt thing to the Lord: for I am a great King, saith
the Lord Almighty, and my name is glorious among the nations.
2.1 And now, O priests, this commandment is to you.
2.2 If ye will not hearken, and if ye will not
lay [it] to heart, to give glory to my name, saith the Lord Almighty,
then I will send forth the curse upon you, and I will bring a curse
upon your blessing: yea, I will curse it, and I will scatter your
blessing, and it shall not exist among you, because ye lay not this to
heart.
2.3 Behold, I turn my back upon you, and I will
scatter dung upon your faces, the dung of your feasts, and I will carry
you away at the same time.
2.4 And ye shall know that I have sent this
commandment to you, that my covenant might be with the sons of Levi,
saith the Lord Almighty.
2.5 My covenant of life and peace was with him,
and I gave [it] him that he might reverently fear me, and that he might
be awe-struck at my name.
2.6 The law of truth was in his mouth, and
iniquity was not found in his lips: he walked before me directing [his
way] in peace, and he turned many from unrighteousness.
2.7 For the priest's lips should keep
knowledge, and they should seek the law at his mouth: for he is the
messenger of the Lord Almighty.
2.8 But ye have turned aside from the way, and
caused many to fail in [following] the law: ye have corrupted the
covenant of Levi, saith the Lord Almighty.
2.9 And I have made you despised and cast out
among all the people, because ye have not kept my ways, but have been
partial in the law.
2.10 Have ye not all one father? Did not one God
create you? why have ye forsaken every man his brother, to profane the
covenant of your fathers?
2.11 Juda has been forsaken, and an abomination has
been committed in Israel and in Jerusalem; for Juda has profaned the
holy things of the Lord, which he delighted in, and has gone after
other gods.
2.12 The Lord will utterly destroy the man that does
these things, until he be even cast down from out of the tabernacles of
Jacob, and from among them that offer sacrifice to the Lord Almighty.
2.13 And these things which I hated, ye did: ye
covered with tears the altar of the Lord, and with weeping and groaning
because of troubles: [is it] meet [for me] to have respect to your
sacrifice, or to receive [anything] from your hands [as] welcome?
2.14 Yet ye said, Wherefore? Because the Lord has
borne witness between thee and the wife of thy youth, whom thou has
forsaken, and [yet] she was thy partner, and the wife of thy covenant.
2.15 And did he not do well? and [there was] the
residue of his spirit. But ye said, What does God seek but a seed? But
take ye heed to your spirit, and forsake not the wife of thy youth.
2.16 But if thou shouldest hate [thy wife] and put
her away, saith the Lord God of Israel, then ungodliness shall cover
thy thoughts, saith the Lord Almighty: therefore take ye heed to your
spirit, and forsake [them] not,
2.17 ye that have provoked God with your words. But
ye said, Wherein have we provoked him? In that ye say, Every one that
does evil is a pleasing [object] in the sight of the Lord, and he takes
pleasure in such; and where is the God of justice?
3.1
Behold, I send forth my messenger, and he shall survey the way before
me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come into his temple,
even the angel of the covenant, whom ye take pleasure in: behold, he is
coming, saith the Lord Almighty.
3.2 And who will abide the day of his coming?
or who will withstand at his appearing? for he is coming in as the fire
of a furnace and as the herb of fullers.
3.3 He shall sit to melt and purify as it were
silver, and as it were gold: and he shall purify the sons of Levi, and
refine them as gold and silver, and they shall offer to the Lord an
offering in righteousness.
3.4 And the sacrifice of Juda and Jerusalem
shall be pleasing to the Lord, according to the former days, and
according to the former years.
3.5 And I will draw near to you in judgment;
and I will be a sift witness against the witches, and against the
adulteresses, and against them that swear falsely by my Name, and
against them that keep back the hireling's wages, and them that oppress
the widow, and afflict orphans, and that wrest the judgment of the
stranger, and fear not me, saith the Lord Almighty.
3.6 For I am the Lord your God, and I am not changed:
3.7 but ye, the sons of Jacob, have not
refrained from the iniquities of your fathers: ye have perverted my
statutes, and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to
you, saith the Lord Almighty. But ye said, Wherein shall we return?
3.8 Will a man insult God? for ye insult me.
But ye say, Wherein have we insulted thee? In that the tithes and
first-fruits are with you [still].
3.9 And ye do surely look off from me, and ye insult me.
3.10 The year is completed, and ye have brought all
the produce into the storehouses; but there shall be the plunder
thereof in its house: return now on this behalf, saith the Lord
Almighty, [see] if I will not open to you the torrents of heaven, and
pour out my blessing upon you, until ye are satisfied.
3.11 And I will appoint food for you, and I will not
destroy the fruit of your land; and your vine in the field shall not
fail, saith the Lord Almighty.
3.12 And all nations shall call you blessed: for ye shall be a desirable land, saith the Lord Almighty.
3.13 Ye have spoken grievous words against me, saith
the Lord. Yet ye said, Wherein have we spoken against thee?
3.14 Ye said, He that serves God labours in vain: and
what have we gained in that we have kept his ordinances, and in that we
have walked as suppliants before the face of the Lord Almighty?
3.15 And now we pronounce strangers blessed; and all
they who act unlawfully are built up; and they have resisted God, and
[yet] have been delivered.
3.16 Thus spoke they that feared the Lord, every one
to his neighbour: and the Lord gave heed, and hearkened, and he wrote a
book of remembrance before him for them that feared the Lord and
reverenced his name.
3.17 And they shall be mine, saith the Lord Almighty,
in the day which I appoint for a peculiar possession; and I will make
choice of them, as a man makes choice of his son that serves him.
3.18 Then shall ye return, and discern between the
righteous and the wicked, and between him that serves God, and him that
serves [him] not.
4.1
For, behold, a day comes burning as an oven, and it shall consume them;
and all the aliens, and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble: and the
day that is coming shall set them on fire, saith the Lord Almighty, and
there shall not be left of them root or branch.
4.2 But to you that fear my name shall the Sun
of righteousness arise, and healing [shall be] in his wings: and ye
shall go forth, and bound as young calves let loose from bonds.
4.3 And ye shall trample the wicked; for they
shall be ashes underneath your feet in the day which I appoint, saith
the Lord Almighty.
4.4 Remember the law of my servant Moses,
accordingly as I charged him [with it] in Choreb for all Israel, [even]
the commandments and ordinances.
4.5 And, behold, I will send to you Elias the
Thesbite, before the great and glorious day of the Lord comes;
4.6 who shall turn again the heart of the
father to the son, and the heart of a man to his neighbour, lest I come
and smite the earth grievously.