Chapter 4

This is the book of the commandments of God, and the law that endureth for ever: all they that keep it shall come to life; but such as leave it shall die.

²Turn thee, O Jacob, and take hold of it: walk in the presence of the light thereof, that thou mayest be illuminated.

³Give not thine honour to another, nor the things that are profitable unto thee to a strange nation.

⁴O Israel, happy are we: for things that are pleasing to God are made known unto us.

⁵Be of good cheer, my people, the memorial of Israel.

⁶Ye were sold to the nations, not for your destruction: but because ye moved God to wrath, ye were delivered unto the enemies.

⁷For ye provoked him that made you by sacrificing unto devils, and not to God.

⁸Ye have forgotten the everlasting God, that brought you up; and ye have grieved Jerusalem, that nursed you.

⁹For when she saw the wrath of God coming upon you, she said, Hearken, O ye that dwell about Sion: God hath brought upon me great mourning;

¹⁰For I saw the captivity of my sons and daughters, which the Everlasting brought upon them.

¹¹With joy did I nourish them; but sent them away with weeping and mourning.

¹²Let no man rejoice over me, a widow, and forsaken of many, who for the sins of my children am left desolate; because they departed from the law of God.

¹³They knew not his statutes, nor walked in the ways of his commandments, nor trod in the paths of discipline in his righteousness.

¹⁴Let them that dwell about Sion come, and remember ye the captivity of my sons and daughters, which the Everlasting hath brought upon them.

¹⁵For he hath brought a nation upon them from far, a shameless nation, and of a strange language, who neither reverenced old man, nor pitied child.

¹⁶These have carried away the dear beloved children of the widow, and left her that was alone desolate without daughters.

¹⁷But what can I help you?

¹⁸For he that brought these plagues upon you will deliver you from the hands of your enemies.

¹⁹Go your way, O my children, go your way: for I am left desolate.

²⁰I have put off the clothing of peace, and put upon me the sackcloth of my prayer: I will cry unto the Everlasting in my days.

²¹Be of good cheer, O my children, cry unto the Lord, and he will deliver you from the power and hand of the enemies.

²²For my hope is in the Everlasting, that he will save you; and joy is come unto me from the Holy One, because of the mercy which shall soon come unto you from the Everlasting our Saviour.

²³For I sent you out with mourning and weeping: but God will give you to me again with joy and gladness for ever.

²⁴Like as now the neighbours of Sion have seen your captivity: so shall they see shortly your salvation from our God which shall come upon you with great glory, and brightness of the Everlasting.

²⁵My children, suffer patiently the wrath that is come upon you from God: for thine enemy hath persecuted thee; but shortly thou shalt see his destruction, and shalt tread upon his neck.

²⁶My delicate ones have gone rough ways, and were taken away as a flock caught of the enemies.

²⁷Be of good comfort, O my children, and cry unto God: for ye shall be remembered of him that brought these things upon you.

²⁸For as it was your mind to go astray from God: so, being returned, seek him ten times more.

²⁹For he that hath brought these plagues upon you shall bring you everlasting joy with your salvation.

³⁰Take a good heart, O Jerusalem: for he that gave thee that name will comfort thee.

³¹Miserable are they that afflicted thee, and rejoiced at thy fall.

³²Miserable are the cities which thy children served: miserable is she that received thy sons.

³³For as she rejoiced at thy ruin, and was glad of thy fall: so shall she be grieved for her own desolation.

³⁴For I will take away the rejoicing of her great multitude, and her pride shall be turned into mourning.

³⁵For fire shall come upon her from the Everlasting, long to endure; and she shall be inhabited of devils for a great time.

³⁶O Jerusalem, look about thee toward the east, and behold the joy that cometh unto thee from God.

³⁷Lo, thy sons come, whom thou sentest away, they come gathered together from the east to the west by the word of the Holy One, rejoicing in the glory of God.