4. But the Lord says, “Israel and Judah, what am I going to do with you? Your love for me disappears as quickly as morning mist; it is like dew, that vanishes early in the day.
5. That is why I have sent my prophets to you with my message of judgement and destruction. What I want from you is plain and clear:
6. I want your constant love, not your animal sacrifices. I would rather have my people know me than burn offerings to me.
7. “But as soon as they entered the land at Adam, they broke the covenant I had made with them.
8. Gilead is a city full of evil people and murderers.
9. The priests are like a gang of robbers who wait in ambush for someone. Even on the road to the holy place at Shechem they commit murder. And they do all this evil deliberately!
10. I have seen a horrible thing in Israel: my people have defiled themselves by worshipping idols.
11. “And as for you, people of Judah, I have set a time to punish you also for what you are doing.