¹ Israel is a luxuriant vine, that putteth forth his fruit: according to the abundance of his fruit he hath multiplied his altars; according to the goodness of their land they have made goodly pillars.

¹¹ Because Ephraim hath multiplied altars for sinning, altars have been unto him for sinning.

¹¹ Is Gilead iniquity? they are altogether false; in Gilgal they sacrifice bullocks; yea, their altars are as heaps in the furrows of the field.

¹ Let me sing for my wellbeloved a song of my beloved touching his vineyard. My wellbeloved had a vineyard in a very fruitful hill:

² and he digged it, and gathered out the stones thereof, and planted it with the choicest vine, and built a tower in the midst of it, and also hewed out a winepress therein: and he looked that it should bring forth grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes.

³ And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah, judge, I pray you, betwixt me and my vineyard.

⁴ What could have been done more to my vineyard, that I have not done in it? wherefore, when I looked that it should bring forth grapes, brought it forth wild grapes?

⁵ And now I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard: I will take away the hedge thereof, and it shall be eaten up; I will break down the wall thereof, and it shall be trodden down:

⁶ and I will lay it waste; it shall not be pruned nor hoed; but there shall come up briers and thorns: I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it.

⁷ For the vineyard of Jehovah of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah his pleasant plant: and he looked for justice, but, behold, oppression; for righteousness, but, behold, a cry.

¹ And the word of Jehovah came unto me, saying,

² Son of man, what is the vine-tree more than any tree, the vine-branch which is among the trees of the forest?

³ Shall wood be taken thereof to make any work? or will men take a pin of it to hang any vessel thereon?

⁴ Behold, it is cast into the fire for fuel; the fire hath devoured both the ends of it, and the midst of it is burned: is it profitable for any work?

⁵ Behold, when it was whole, it was meet for no work: how much less, when the fire hath devoured it, and it is burned, shall it yet be meet for any work!

²⁸ But where are thy gods that thou hast made thee? let them arise, if they can save thee in the time of thy trouble: for according to the number of thy cities are thy gods, O Judah.

²³ For they also built them high places, and pillars, and Asherim, on every high hill, and under every green tree;

¹ Ye shall make you no idols, neither shall ye rear you up a graven image, or a pillar, neither shall ye place any figured stone in your land, to bow down unto it: for I am Jehovah your God.

²¹ For they all seek their own, not the things of Jesus Christ.

¹⁶ Wherefore we henceforth know no man after the flesh: even though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now we know `him so' no more.

⁷ For none of us liveth to himself, and none dieth to himself.

⁸ For whether we live, we live unto the Lord; or whether we die, we die unto the Lord: whether we live therefore, or die, we are the Lord's.

¹ I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman.

² Every branch in me that beareth not fruit, he taketh it away: and every `branch' that beareth fruit, he cleanseth it, that it may bear more fruit.

³ Already ye are clean because of the word which I have spoken unto you.

⁴ Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; so neither can ye, except ye abide in me.

⁵ I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same beareth much fruit: for apart from me ye can do nothing.

⁶ If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and they gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned.

⁵ Speak unto all the people of the land, and to the priests, saying, When ye fasted and mourned in the fifth and in the seventh `month', even these seventy years, did ye at all fast unto me, even to me?

⁶ And when ye eat, and when ye drink, do not ye eat for yourselves, and drink for yourselves?

² For Jehovah restoreth the excellency of Jacob, as the excellency of Israel; for the emptiers have emptied them out, and destroyed their vine-branches.

⁶ According to their pasture, so were they filled; they were filled, and their heart was exalted: therefore have they forgotten me.

² And now they sin more and more, and have made them molten images of their silver, even idols according to their own understanding, all of them the work of the craftsmen: they say of them, Let the men that sacrifice kiss the calves.

⁸ And Ephraim said, Surely I am become rich, I have found me wealth: in all my labors they shall find in me no iniquity that were sin.

⁴ They have set up kings, but not by me; they have made princes, and I knew it not: of their silver and their gold have they made them idols, that they may be cut off.

⁸ For she did not know that I gave her the grain, and the new wine, and the oil, and multiplied unto her silver and gold, which they used for Baal.