True Righteousness Extolled: External Legalism Condemned by the Prophets

Isaiah 1

¹The vision of Isaiah the son of Amoz, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah.

The Wickedness of Judah

²Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth;
   for the LORD has spoken:
"Children have I reared and brought up,
   but they have rebelled against me.
³The ox knows its owner,
   and the donkey its master's crib,
but Israel does not know,
   my people do not understand."
⁴Ah, sinful nation,
   a people laden with iniquity,
offspring of evildoers,
   children who deal corruptly!
They have forsaken the LORD,
   they have despised the Holy One of Israel,
   they are utterly estranged.
⁵Why will you still be struck down?
   Why will you continue to rebel?
The whole head is sick,
   and the whole heart faint.
⁶From the sole of the foot even to the head,
   there is no soundness in it,
but bruises and sores
   and raw wounds;
they are not pressed out or bound up
   or softened with oil.
⁷Your country lies desolate;
   your cities are burned with fire;
in your very presence
   foreigners devour your land;
   it is desolate, as overthrown by foreigners.
⁸And the daughter of Zion is left
   like a booth in a vineyard,
like a lodge in a cucumber field,
   like a besieged city.
⁹If the LORD of hosts
   had not left us a few survivors,
we should have been like Sodom,
   and become like Gomorrah.
¹⁰Hear the word of the LORD,
   you rulers of Sodom!
Give ear to the teaching of our God,
   you people of Gomorrah!
¹¹"What to me is the multitude of your sacrifices?
   says the LORD;
I have had enough of burnt offerings of rams
   and the fat of well-fed beasts;
I do not delight in the blood of bulls,
   or of lambs, or of goats.
¹²"When you come to appear before me,
   who has required of you
   this trampling of my courts?
¹³Bring no more vain offerings;
   incense is an abomination to me.
New moon and Sabbath and the calling of convocations--
   I cannot endure iniquity and solemn assembly.
¹⁴Your new moons and your appointed feasts
   my soul hates;
they have become a burden to me;
   I am weary of bearing them.
¹⁵When you spread out your hands,
   I will hide my eyes from you;
even though you make many prayers,
   I will not listen;
   your hands are full of blood.
¹⁶Wash yourselves; make yourselves clean;
   remove the evil of your deeds from before my eyes;
cease to do evil,
    ¹⁷learn to do good;
seek justice,
   correct oppression;
bring justice to the fatherless,
   plead the widow's cause.
¹⁸"Come now, let us reason together, says the LORD:
though your sins are like scarlet,
   they shall be as white as snow;
though they are red like crimson,
   they shall become like wool.
¹⁹If you are willing and obedient,
   you shall eat the good of the land;
²⁰but if you refuse and rebel,
   you shall be eaten by the sword;
   for the mouth of the LORD has spoken."

Isaiah 10

¹Woe to those who decree iniquitous decrees,
   and the writers who keep writing oppression,
²to turn aside the needy from justice
   and to rob the poor of my people of their right,
that widows may be their spoil,
   and that they may make the fatherless their prey!

Jeremiah 7

Evil in the Land

¹The word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD: ² "Stand in the gate of the LORD's house, and proclaim there this word, and say, Hear the word of the LORD, all you men of Judah who enter these gates to worship the LORD. ³Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: Amend your ways and your deeds, and I will let you dwell in this place. ⁴Do not trust in these deceptive words: 'This is the temple of the LORD, the temple of the LORD, the temple of the LORD.'
⁵"For if you truly amend your ways and your deeds, if you truly execute justice one with another, ⁶ if you do not oppress the sojourner, the fatherless, or the widow, or shed innocent blood in this place, and if you do not go after other gods to your own harm, ⁷ then I will let you dwell in this place, in the land that I gave of old to your fathers forever.
⁸"Behold, you trust in deceptive words to no avail. ⁹Will you steal, murder, commit adultery, swear falsely, make offerings to Baal, and go after other gods that you have not known, ¹⁰ and then come and stand before me in this house, which is called by my name, and say, 'We are delivered!'--only to go on doing all these abominations? ¹¹ Has this house, which is called by my name, become a den of robbers in your eyes? Behold, I myself have seen it, declares the LORD. ¹² Go now to my place that was in Shiloh, where I made my name dwell at first, and see what I did to it because of the evil of my people Israel. ¹³ And now, because you have done all these things, declares the LORD, and when I spoke to you persistently you did not listen, and when I called you, you did not answer, ¹⁴therefore I will do to the house that is called by my name, and in which you trust, and to the place that I gave to you and to your fathers, as I did to Shiloh. ¹⁵And I will cast you out of my sight, as I cast out all your kinsmen, all the offspring of Ephraim.

¹⁶"As for you, do not pray for this people, or lift up a cry or prayer for them, and do not intercede with me, for I will not hear you. ¹⁷ Do you not see what they are doing in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem? ¹⁸ The children gather wood, the fathers kindle fire, and the women knead dough, to make cakes for the queen of heaven. And they pour out drink offerings to other gods, to provoke me to anger. ¹⁹Is it I whom they provoke? declares the LORD. Is it not themselves, to their own shame? ²⁰ Therefore thus says the Lord GOD: behold, my anger and my wrath will be poured out on this place, upon man and beast, upon the trees of the field and the fruit of the ground; it will burn and not be quenched."

²¹Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: "Add your burnt offerings to your sacrifices, and eat the flesh. ²² For in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, I did not speak to your fathers or command them concerning burnt offerings and sacrifices. ²³ But this command I gave them: 'Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be my people. And walk in all the way that I command you, that it may be well with you.' ²⁴But they did not obey or incline their ear, but walked in their own counsels and the stubbornness of their evil hearts, and went backward and not forward. ²⁵From the day that your fathers came out of the land of Egypt to this day, I have persistently sent all my servants the prophets to them, day after day. ²⁶Yet they did not listen to me or incline their ear, but stiffened their neck. They did worse than their fathers.

Jeremiah 22

¹Thus says the LORD: "Go down to the house of the king of Judah and speak there this word, ²and say, 'Hear the word of the LORD, O King of Judah, who sits on the throne of David, you, and your servants, and your people who enter these gates. ³ Thus says the LORD: Do justice and righteousness, and deliver from the hand of the oppressor him who has been robbed. And do no wrong or violence to the resident alien, the fatherless, and the widow, nor shed innocent blood in this place. ⁴For if you will indeed obey this word, then there shall enter the gates of this house kings who sit on the throne of David, riding in chariots and on horses, they and their servants and their people. ⁵But if you will not obey these words, I swear by myself, declares the LORD, that this house shall become a desolation.

Ezekiel 22

Israel's Shedding of Blood

¹And the word of the LORD came to me, saying, ² "And you, son of man, will you judge, will you judge the bloody city? Then declare to her all her abominations. ³ You shall say, Thus says the Lord GOD: A city that sheds blood in her midst, so that her time may come, and that makes idols to defile herself! ⁴ You have become guilty by the blood that you have shed, and defiled by the idols that you have made, and you have brought your days near, the appointed time of your years has come. Therefore I have made you a reproach to the nations, and a mockery to all the countries. ⁵Those who are near and those who are far from you will mock you; your name is defiled; you are full of tumult.

⁶"Behold, the princes of Israel in you, every one according to his power, have been bent on shedding blood. ⁷ Father and mother are treated with contempt in you; the sojourner suffers extortion in your midst; the fatherless and the widow are wronged in you. ⁸You have despised my holy things and profaned my Sabbaths. ⁹There are men in you who slander to shed blood, and people in you who eat on the mountains; they commit lewdness in your midst. ¹⁰In you men uncover their fathers' nakedness; in you they violate women who are unclean in their menstrual impurity. ¹¹One commits abomination with his neighbor's wife; another lewdly defiles his daughter-in-law; another in you violates his sister, his father's daughter. ¹² In you they take bribes to shed blood; you take interest and profit and make gain of your neighbors by extortion; but me you have forgotten, declares the Lord GOD.

¹³"Behold, I strike my hand at the dishonest gain that you have made, and at the blood that has been in your midst. ¹⁴ Can your courage endure, or can your hands be strong, in the days that I shall deal with you? I the LORD have spoken, and I will do it. ¹⁵ I will scatter you among the nations and disperse you through the countries, and I will consume your uncleanness out of you. ¹⁶And you shall be profaned by your own doing in the sight of the nations, and you shall know that I am the LORD."

Amos 5

¹⁸Woe to you who desire the day of the LORD!
   Why would you have the day of the LORD?
It is darkness, and not light,
    ¹⁹as if a man fled from a lion,
   and a bear met him,
or went into the house and leaned his hand against the wall,
   and a serpent bit him.
²⁰Is not the day of the LORD darkness, and not light,
   and gloom with no brightness in it?
²¹"I hate, I despise your feasts,
   and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies.
²²Even though you offer me your burnt offerings and grain offerings,
   I will not accept them;
and the peace offerings of your fattened animals,
   I will not look upon them.
²³Take away from me the noise of your songs;
   to the melody of your harps I will not listen.
²⁴But let justice roll down like waters,
   and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.
²⁵"Did you bring to me sacrifices and offerings during the forty years in the wilderness, O house of Israel? ²⁶You shall take up Sikkuth your king, and Kiyyun your star-god--your images that you made for yourselves, ²⁷and I will send you into exile beyond Damascus," says the LORD, whose name is the God of hosts.