Baruch 3

DOUAI-RHEIMS	NEW JERUSALEM
1 This is the book of the commandments of God, and the law, that is for ever: all they that keep it, shall come to life: but they that have forsaken it, to death.	1 Almighty Lord, God of Israel, a soul in anguish, a troubled heart now cries to you:
2 Return, O Jacob, and take hold of it, walk in the way by its brightness, in the presence of the light thereof.	2 Listen and have pity, Lord, for we have sinned before you.
3 Give not thy honour to another, nor thy dignity to a strange nation.	3 You sit enthroned for ever, while we are perishing for ever.
4 We are happy, O Israel: because the things that are pleasing to God, are made known to us.	4 Almighty Lord, God of Israel, hear the prayer of the dead of Israel, of the children of those who havesinned against you and have not listened to the voice of the Lord their God; hence the disasters which dog us.
5 Be of good comfort, O people of God, the memorial of Israel:	5 Do not cal to mind the misdeeds of our ancestors, but remember instead your power and your name.
6 You have been sold to the Gentiles, not for your destruction: but because you provoked God to wrath, you are delivered to your adversaries.	6 You are indeed the Lord our God and we wil praise you, Lord,
7 For you have provoked him who made you, the eternal God, offering sacrifice to devils, and not to God.	7 since you have put respect for you in our hearts to encourage us to cal on your name. We long topraise you in our exile, for we have rid our hearts of the wickedness of our ancestors who sinned against you.
8 For you have forgotten God, who brought you up, and you have grieved Jerusalem that nursed you.	8 Look, today we are still in exile where you have scattered us as something contemptible, accursed,condemned, for al the misdeeds of our ancestors who had abandoned the Lord our God.
9 For she saw the wrath of God coming upon you, and she said: Give ear, all you that dwell near Sion, for God hath brought upon me great mourning:	9 Listen, Israel, to commands that bring life; hear, and learn what knowledge means.
10 For I have seen the captivity of my people, of my sons, and my daughters, which the Eternal hath brought upon them.	10 Why, Israel, why are you in the country of your enemies, growing older and older in an alien land,
11 For I nourished them with joy: but I sent them away with weeping and mourning.	11 defiling yourselves with the dead, reckoned with those who go to Sheol?
12 Let no man rejoice over me, a widow, and desolate: I am forsaken of many for the sins of my children, because they departed from the law of God.	12 It is because you have forsaken the fountain of wisdom!
13 And they have not known his justices, nor walked by the ways of God's commandments, neither have they entered by the paths of his truth and justice.	13 Had you walked in the way of God, you would be living in peace for ever.
14 Let them that dwell about Sion come, and remember the captivity of my sons and daughters, which the Eternal hath brought upon them.	14 Learn where knowledge is, where strength, where understanding, and so learn where length of days is,where life, where the light of the eyes and where peace.
15 For he hath brought a nation upon them from afar, a wicked nation, and of a strange tongue:	15 But who has found out where she lives, who has entered her treasure house?
16 Who have neither reverenced the ancient, nor pitied children, and have carried away the beloved of the widow, and have left me all alone without children.	16 Where now are the leaders of the nations and those who ruled even the beasts of earth,
17 But as for me, what help can I give you?	17 those who sported with the birds of heaven, those who accumulated silver and gold on which alpeople rely, and whose possessions had no end,
18 But he that hath brought the evils upon you, he will deliver you out of the hands of your enemies.	18 those who worked so carefully in silver -but of whose works no trace is to be found?
19 Go your way, my children, go your way: for I am left alone.	19 They have vanished, gone down to Sheol. Others have risen to their places,
20 I have put off the robe of peace, and have put upon me the sackcloth of supplication, and I will cry to the most High in my days.	20 more recent generations have seen the day and peopled the earth in their turn, but the way ofknowledge they have not found;
21 Be of good comfort, my children, cry to the Lord, and he will deliver you out of the hand of the princes your enemies.	21 they have not recognised the paths she treads. Nor have their children had any grasp of her, remainingfar from her way.
22 For my hope is in the Eternal that he will save you: and joy is come upon me from the Holy One, because of the mercy which shall come to you from our everlasting Saviour.	22 Nothing has been heard of her in Canaan, nothing has been seen of her in Teman;
23 For I sent you forth with mourning and weeping: but the Lord will bring you back to me with joy and gladness for ever.	23 the children of Hagar in search of worldly wisdom, the merchants of Midian and Teman, the tale-spinners and the philosophers have none of them found the way to wisdom or remembered the paths shetreads.
24 For as the neighbours of Sion have now seen your captivity from God: so shall they also shortly see your salvation from God, which shall come upon you with great honour, and everlasting glory.	24 How great, Israel, is the house of God, how wide his domain,
25 My children, suffer patiently the wrath that is come upon you: for thy enemy hath persecuted thee, but thou shalt quickly see his destruction: and thou shalt get up upon his neck.	25 immeasurably wide, infinitely lofty!
26 My delicate ones have walked rough ways, for they were taken away as a flock made a prey by the enemies.	26 In it were born the giants, famous from the beginning, immensely tal , expert in war;
27 Be of good comfort, my children, and cry to the Lord: for you shall be remembered by him that hath led you away.	27 God's choice did not fall on these, he did not show them the way of knowledge;
28 For as it was your mind to go astray from God; so when you return again you shall seek him ten times as much.	28 they perished for lack of wisdom, perished by their own folly.
29 For he that hath brought evils upon you, shall bring you everlasting joy again with your salvation.	29 Who has ever climbed the sky and seized her to bring her down from the clouds?
30 Be of good heart, O Jerusalem: for he exhorteth thee, that named thee.	30 Who has ever crossed the ocean and found her to bring her back in exchange for the finest gold?
31 The wicked that have afflicted thee, shall perish: and they that have rejoiced at thy ruin, shall be punished.	31 No one can learn the way to her, no one can understand the path she treads.
32 The cities which thy children have served, shall be punished: and she that received thy sons.	32 But the One who knows al discovers her, he has grasped her with his own intel ect, he has set theearth firm for evermore and filled it with four-footed beasts,
33 For as she rejoiced at thy ruin, and was glad of thy fall: so shall she be grieved for her own desolation.	33 he sends the light -- and it goes, he recal s it -- and trembling it obeys;
34 And the joy of her multitude shall be cut off: and her gladness shall be turned to mourning.	34 the stars shine joyful y at their posts;
35 For fire shall come upon her from the Eternal, long to endure, and she shall be inhabited by devils for a great time.	35 when he cal s them, they answer, 'Here we are'; they shine to delight their Creator.
36 Look about thee, O Jerusalem, towards the east, and behold the joy that cometh to thee from God.	36 It is he who is our God, no other can compare with him.
37 For behold thy children come, whom thou sentest away scattered, they come gathered together from the east even to the west, at the word of the Holy One rejoicing for the honour of God.	37 He has uncovered the whole way of knowledge and shown it to his servant Jacob, to Israel his wel -beloved;
	38 only then did she appear on earth and live among human beings.