¹ The sinful nation is as good as dead, ²  the people weighed down by evil deeds. They are offspring who do wrong, children ³  who do wicked things. They have abandoned the Lord, and rejected the Holy One of Israel. ⁴  They are alienated from him. ⁵ 

For the Lord will rise up, as he did at Mount Perazim, ¹  he will rouse himself, as he did in the Valley of Gibeon, ²  to accomplish his work, his peculiar work, to perform his task, his strange task. ³ 

The Lord says, “Do what is just and right. Deliver those who have been robbed from those ¹  who oppress them. Do not exploit or mistreat foreigners who live in your land, children who have no fathers, or widows. ²  Do not kill innocent people ³  in this land.

“Therefore, Oholibah, this is what the sovereign Lord says: Look here, ¹  I am about to stir up against you the lovers with whom you were disgusted; I will bring them against you from every side:

I was a father ¹  to the needy, and I investigated the case of the person I did not know;

When they were few in number, just a very few, and resident aliens within it,

I am like a foreigner in this land. ¹  Do not hide your commands from me!

The splendid crown of Ephraim’s drunkards will be trampled underfoot.

You must allot it as an inheritance among yourselves and for the foreigners who reside among you, who have fathered sons among you. You must treat them as native-born among the people of Israel; they will be allotted an inheritance with you among the tribes of Israel. ¹ 

“I ¹  will come to you in judgment. I will be quick to testify against those who practice divination, those who commit adultery, those who break promises, ²  and those who exploit workers, widows, and orphans, ³  who refuse to help ⁴  the immigrant ⁵  and in this way show they do not fear me,” says the Lord who rules over all.

I will give the whole land of Canaan – the land where you are now residing ¹  – to you and your descendants after you as a permanent ²  possession. I will be their God.”

“I am a temporary settler ¹  among you. Grant ²  me ownership ³  of a burial site among you so that I may ⁴  bury my dead.” ⁵ 

May he give you and your descendants the blessing he gave to Abraham ¹  so that you may possess the land ²  God gave to Abraham, the land where you have been living as a temporary resident.” ³ 

When she bore ¹  a son, Moses ²  named him Gershom, for he said, “I have become a resident foreigner in a foreign land.” ³ 

Also you may buy slaves ¹  from the children of the foreigners who reside with you, and from their families that are ²  with you, whom they have fathered in your land, they may become your property.

He must be with the one who bought him ¹  like a yearly hired worker. ²  The one who bought him ³  must not rule over him harshly in your sight.

Joshua read aloud every commandment Moses had given ¹  before the whole assembly of Israel, including the women, children, and resident foreigners who lived among them. ² 

Your land is devastated, your cities burned with fire. Right before your eyes your crops are being destroyed by foreign invaders. ¹  They leave behind devastation and destruction. ² 

The Lord will certainly have compassion on Jacob; ¹  he will again choose Israel as his special people ²  and restore ³  them to their land. Resident foreigners will join them and unite with the family ⁴  of Jacob.

Indeed, ¹  you have made the city ²  into a heap of rubble, the fortified town into a heap of ruins; the fortress of foreigners ³  is no longer a city, it will never be rebuilt.