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Venerdi, 29 marzo 2024 - Santi Simplicio e Costantino ( Letture di oggi)

Jeremiah 12


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1Your uprightness is too great, Yahweh, for me to dispute with you. But I should like to discuss somepoints of justice with you: Why is it that the way of the wicked prospers? Why do al treacherous people thrive?2You plant them, they take root, they flourish, yes, and bear fruit. You are on their lips, yet far from theirheart.3You know me, Yahweh, you see me, you probe my heart, which is close to yours. Drag them off likesheep for the slaughterhouse, reserve them for the day of butchery.4(How long will the land be in mourning, and the grass wither all over the countryside? The animals andbirds are dying as a result of the wickedness of the inhabitants.) For they say, 'God does not see our fate.'5'If you find it exhausting to race against me on foot, how wil you compete against horses? In a countryat peace you feel secure, but how wil you fare in the thickets of the Jordan?6'For even your brothers and your own family will betray you. They will pursue you in ful cry. Put no faithin them when they speak you fair!'7I have abandoned my house, left my heritage, I have delivered what I dearly loved into the clutches ofits enemies.8To me, my heritage has behaved like a lion in the forest, it roared at me ferociously: so I now hate it.9I see my heritage as a brightly-coloured bird of prey attacked by birds of prey on every side! Go,assemble al the wild animals, make them come and dine!10Many shepherds have laid my vineyard waste, have trampled over my plot of land, the plot of landwhich was my joy, reducing my favourite estate to a deserted wilderness.11They have made it a waste; wasted, it mourns before me. The whole country has been devastatedand no one takes it to heart.12The devastators have arrived on all the bare heights of the desert (for Yahweh wields a devouringsword); from one end of the country to the other, there is no peace for any living thing.13Wheat they have sown, thorns they reap: they have worn themselves out, to no profit. They aredisappointed in their harvests, because of Yahweh's burning anger.14Yahweh says this, 'As regards al my evil neighbours who have laid hands on the heritage I grantedmy people Israel, look, I shal uproot them from their soil, (though I shall uproot the House of Judah from amongthem).15But having uprooted them, I shall take pity on them again and bring them back each to its ownheritage, each to its own country,16and if they carefully learn my people's ways and swear by my name, "As Yahweh lives", as they havetaught my people to swear by Baal, then they wil be re-established among my people.17But if any nation refuses to listen, I shall uproot it for ever and destroy it, Yahweh declares.'