The Bible, quoted
in its own voices.

The LORD their God will save them in that day as the flock of his people; for they are like the jewels of a crown, lifted on high over his land. For how great is his goodness, and how great is his beauty! Grain will make the young men flourish, and new wine the virgins.

Awake, awake! Stand up, Jerusalem, you who have drunk from the LORD’s hand the cup of his wrath. You have drunken the bowl of the cup of staggering, and drained it. There is no one to guide her among all the sons to whom she has given birth; and there is no one who takes her by the hand among all the sons whom she has brought up. These two things have happened to you— who will grieve with you?— desolation and destruction, and famine and the sword. How can I comfort you? Your sons have fainted. They lie at the head of all the streets, like an antelope in a net. They are full of the LORD’s wrath, the rebuke of your God.

Little children, these are the end times, and as you heard that the Antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have arisen. By this we know that it is the final hour. They went out from us, but they didn’t belong to us; for if they had belonged to us, they would have continued with us. But they left, that they might be revealed that none of them belong to us. You have an anointing from the Holy One, and you all have knowledge. I have not written to you because you don’t know the truth, but because you know it, and because no lie is of the truth. Who is the liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the Antichrist, he who denies the Father and the Son. Whoever denies the Son doesn’t have the Father. He who confesses the Son has the Father also.

Her nobles were purer than snow. They were whiter than milk. They were more ruddy in body than rubies. Their polishing was like sapphire. Their appearance is blacker than a coal. They are not known in the streets. Their skin clings to their bones. It is withered. It has become like wood. Those who are killed with the sword are better than those who are killed with hunger; for these pine away, stricken through, for lack of the fruits of the field. The hands of the pitiful women have boiled their own children. They were their food in the destruction of the daughter of my people. The LORD has accomplished his wrath. He has poured out his fierce anger. He has kindled a fire in Zion, which has devoured its foundations. The kings of the earth didn’t believe, neither did all the inhabitants of the world, that the adversary and the enemy would enter into the gates of Jerusalem.

I said in my heart, “Come now, I will test you with mirth; therefore enjoy pleasure;” and behold, this also was vanity. I said of laughter, “It is foolishness;” and of mirth, “What does it accomplish?”

“Lord, righteousness belongs to you, but to us confusion of face, as it is today; to the men of Judah, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and to all Israel, who are near and who are far off, through all the countries where you have driven them, because of their trespass that they have trespassed against you. Lord, to us belongs confusion of face, to our kings, to our princes, and to our fathers, because we have sinned against you. To the Lord our God belong mercies and forgiveness, for we have rebelled against him. We haven’t obeyed the LORD our God’s voice, to walk in his laws, which he set before us by his servants the prophets. Yes, all Israel have transgressed your law, turning aside, and not obeying your voice. “Therefore the curse and the oath written in the law of Moses the servant of God has been poured out on us, for we have sinned against him.

If a man fathers a hundred children, and lives many years, so that the days of his years are many, but his soul is not filled with good, and moreover he has no burial, I say that a stillborn child is better than he; for it comes in vanity, and departs in darkness, and its name is covered with darkness. Moreover it has not seen the sun nor known it. This has rest rather than the other. Yes, though he live a thousand years twice told, and yet fails to enjoy good, don’t all go to one place? All the labor of man is for his mouth, and yet the appetite is not filled.

Who among you fears the LORD and obeys the voice of his servant? He who walks in darkness and has no light, let him trust in the LORD’s name, and rely on his God. Behold, all you who kindle a fire, who adorn yourselves with torches around yourselves, walk in the flame of your fire, and among the torches that you have kindled. You will have this from my hand: you will lie down in sorrow.

“Then one who will cause a tax collector to pass through the kingdom to maintain its glory will stand up in his place; but within a few days he shall be destroyed, not in anger, and not in battle. “In his place a contemptible person will stand up, to whom they had not given the honor of the kingdom; but he will come in a time of security, and will obtain the kingdom by flatteries. The overwhelming forces will be overwhelmed from before him, and will be broken. Yes, also the prince of the covenant. After the treaty made with him he will work deceitfully; for he will come up and will become strong with few people. In a time of security he will come even on the fattest places of the province. He will do that which his fathers have not done, nor his fathers’ fathers. He will scatter among them prey, plunder, and wealth. Yes, he will devise his plans against the strongholds, but only for a time.

Open your doors, Lebanon, that the fire may devour your cedars. Wail, cypress tree, for the cedar has fallen, because the stately ones are destroyed. Wail, you oaks of Bashan, for the strong forest has come down. A voice of the wailing of the shepherds! For their glory is destroyed—a voice of the roaring of young lions! For the pride of the Jordan is ruined. The LORD my God says: “Feed the flock of slaughter. Their buyers slaughter them and go unpunished. Those who sell them say, ‘Blessed be the LORD, for I am rich;’ and their own shepherds don’t pity them. For I will no more pity the inhabitants of the land,” says the LORD; “but, behold, I will deliver every one of the men into his neighbor’s hand and into the hand of his king. They will strike the land, and out of their hand I will not deliver them.”