11:1 Open your doors, O Lebanon, That a fire may feed on your cedars. |
11:2 Wail, O cypress, for the cedar has fallen, Because the glorious {trees} have been destroyed; Wail, O oaks of Bashan, For the impenetrable forest has come down. |
11:3 There is a sound of the shepherds' wail, For their glory is ruined; There is a sound of the young lions' roar, For the pride of the Jordan is ruined. |
11:4 Thus says the LORD my God, "Pasture the flock {doomed} to slaughter. |
11:5 "Those who buy them slay them and go unpunished, and {each of} those who sell them says, `Blessed be the LORD, for I have become rich!' And their own shepherds have no pity on them. |
11:6 "For I will no longer have pity on the inhabitants of the land, declares the LORD; "but behold, I will cause the men to fall, each into another's power and into the power of his king; and they will strike the land, and I will not deliver {them} from their power."" |
11:7 So I pastured the flock {doomed} to slaughter, hence the afflicted of the flock. And I took for myself two staffs: the one I called Favor and the other I called Union; so I pastured the flock. |
11:8 Then I annihilated the three shepherds in one month, for my soul was impatient with them, and their soul also was weary of me. |
11:9 Then I said, "I will not pasture you. What is to die, let it die, and what is to be annihilated, let it be annihilated; and let those who are left eat one another's flesh." |
11:10 I took my staff Favor and cut it in pieces, to break my covenant which I had made with all the peoples. |
11:11 So it was broken on that day, and thus the afflicted of the flock who were watching me realized that it was the word of the LORD. |
11:12 I said to them, "If it is good in your sight, give {me} my wages; but if not, never mind! So they weighed out thirty {shekels} of silver as my wages." |
11:13 Then the LORD said to me, "Throw it to the potter, {that} magnificent price at which I was valued by them. So I took the thirty {shekels} of silver and threw them to the potter in the house of the LORD." |
11:14 Then I cut in pieces my second staff Union, to break the brotherhood between Judah and Israel. |
11:15 The LORD said to me, "Take again for yourself the equipment of a foolish shepherd. |
11:16 "For behold, I am going to raise up a shepherd in the land who will not care for the perishing, seek the scattered, heal the broken, or sustain the one standing, but will devour the flesh of the fat {sheep} and tear off their hoofs. |
11:17 "Woe to the worthless shepherd Who leaves the flock! A sword will be on his arm And on his right eye! His arm will be totally withered And his right eye will be blind." |