“Daughters of Jerusalem, don’t weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children. For behold, the days are coming in which they will say, ‘Blessed are the barren, the wombs that never bore, and the breasts that never nursed.’ Then they will begin to tell the mountains, ‘Fall on us!’ and tell the hills, ‘Cover us.’ For if they do these things in the green tree, what will be done in the dry?”
The inhabitants of Samaria will be in terror for the calves of Beth Aven, for its people will mourn over it, along with its priests who rejoiced over it, for its glory, because it has departed from it. It also will be carried to Assyria for a present to a great king. Ephraim will receive shame, and Israel will be ashamed of his own counsel. Samaria and her king float away like a twig on the water. The high places also of Aven, the sin of Israel, will be destroyed. The thorn and the thistle will come up on their altars. They will tell the mountains, “Cover us!” and the hills, “Fall on us!”
Speaker, not author
Spoken by Jesus; the Gospel does not name its own author.