Condemnation of Bad Shepherds and Promise of a Good Shepherd
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Chapter 34
1And the word of the LORD came to me, saying:2Son of Adam, prophesy over the shepherds of Israel. Prophesy and say to them: To the shepherds, thus says the Lord GOD: Woe to the shepherds of Israel who shepherded themselves! Should not the sheep be shepherded, you shepherds?3You eat the fat and you wear the wool. You sacrifice the healthy one; you do not shepherd the sheep.4You did not strengthen the inheritances, and you did not heal the sick one, and you did not bind up the broken one, and you did not bring back the driven away one, and you did not seek the lost one, but you ruled over them with strength and with cruelty.5And they were scattered without a shepherd, and they became food for every beast of the field, and they were scattered.6My sheep go astray on all the mountains and on every high hill and on all the faces of the land. My sheep are scattered, and there is no one inquiring and no one seeking.7Therefore, shepherds, hear the word of the LORD.8As I live, declares the Lord GOD, if not because my flock was for plunder and my flock became food for every beast of the field, from there being no shepherd and they did not seek my flock, but the shepherds shepherded themselves and my flock they did not shepherd.9Therefore the shepherds heard the word of the LORD.10Thus says the Lord GOD: Behold, I am against the shepherds, and I will seek my flock from their hand. I will bring them back from shepherding the flock, and the shepherds will not shepherd them anymore. I will rescue my flock from their mouth, and they will not be food for them.11For thus says the Lord GOD: Here I am. I will inquire of my sheep, and I will tend them.12as a shepherd visits his flock on the day he is in the midst of his sheep that were scattered, so I will visit my sheep and deliver them from all the places where they were scattered, on a day of cloud and thick darkness.13And I brought them out from the peoples and gathered them from the lands and brought them to their land and pastured them to the mountains of Israel in the wadis and in all the dwellings of the land.14In good pasture I will shepherd them, and on the mountains of Israel's cosmic divine heights their pasture will be. There they will lie down in good pasture, and on the mountains of Israel they will shepherd fat pasture.15I will shepherd my flock, and I will make them lie down, declares the Lord GOD.16I will seek the lost and I will return the driven-away, and to the broken I will bind up and the sick I will strengthen, and the fat and the strong I will destroy. I will shepherd in judgment.17And I, my sheep, says the Lord LORD: Behold, I am judging between sheep and sheep, rams and he-goats.18Is it too little for you that you have grazed the good pasture, and you have trampled the rest of your pastures with your feet? And you have drunk from the settled waters, and you have fouled the remaining ones with your feet?19And my flock will graze from the trampling of your feet and drink from the dung of your feet.20Therefore the Lord GOD says this to them: Look, I myself will judge between the fat sheep and the thin sheep.21Because with the side and with the shoulder you thrust, and with your horns you gore all the inheritances until you scattered them outside, the sign.22And I will save my flock, and they will no longer be plunder, and I will judge between sheep and sheep.23And I will set up over them one shepherd, and he will shepherd them—my servant David. He will shepherd them, and he will be a shepherd to them.24And I, the LORD, will be their God, and my servant David will be a chieftain in their midst. I, the LORD, have spoken.25And I will cut for them a covenant of peace, and I will cause the evil beast to cease from upon the land, and they will dwell in the wilderness in security, and they will sleep in the forests.26And I will give them and the surroundings of its hills a blessing, and I will bring down the rains in its time. They will be rains of blessing.27And the tree of the field will give its fruit, and the land will give its yield, and they will be on their ground in safety, and they will know that I am the LORD when I break the staffs of their youth and deliver them from the hand of those who enslaved them.28And they will no longer be prey to the nations, and the living creatures of the land will not devour them. And they will dwell in security, and there will be no terrifying one.29And I will raise up for them a planting for a name, and they will no longer be gathered ones of famine in the land, and they will no longer bear the reproach of the nations.30And they will know that I am the LORD their God—you and they, my people, house of Israel, declares the Lord the LORD.31And my sheep, the flock of my pasture—you are humanity; I am your God, says the Lord GOD.