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10 Because they led my people astray, saying, “Peace!” when there is no peace, and when a wall is built, they cover it with whitewash,[a] 11 say then to the whitewashers: I will bring down a flooding rain; hailstones shall fall, and a stormwind shall break forth.(A) 12 When the wall has fallen, will you not be asked: “Where is the whitewash you spread on it?”

13 Therefore thus says the Lord God: In my fury I will let loose stormwinds; because of my anger there will be flooding rain, and hailstones will fall with destructive wrath.(B) 14 I will tear down the wall you whitewashed and level it to the ground, laying bare its foundations. When it falls, you shall be crushed beneath it. Thus you shall know that I am the Lord. 15 When I have poured out my fury on the wall and its whitewashers, it will fall. Then I will say to you: No wall! No whitewashers—

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Footnotes

  1. 13:10 The false prophets contributed to popular illusions of security by predictions of peace, like those who whitewash a wall to conceal its defects.

27 [a]“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites. You are like whitewashed tombs, which appear beautiful on the outside, but inside are full of dead men’s bones and every kind of filth.

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Footnotes

  1. 23:27–28 The sixth woe, like the preceding one, deals with concern for externals and neglect of what is inside. Since contact with dead bodies, even when one was unaware of it, caused ritual impurity (Nm 19:11–22), tombs were whitewashed so that no one would contract such impurity inadvertently.