Malachi 2

Now, priests, this commandment is for you. If you do not listen, and if you do not take it to heart to honor my name,” says the LORD of hosts, “I will send the curse upon you and curse your blessings. Indeed, I have already cursed them, because you do not take it to heart. I am about to rebuke your seed and spread dung on your faces—the dung of your festivals—and you will be carried away with it. Then you will know that I sent you this commandment so that my covenant with Levi might continue,” says the LORD of hosts. “My covenant with him was life and peace. I gave them to him so that he would fear me. He feared me and stood in awe of my name. True instruction was in his mouth, and no unrighteousness was found on his lips. He walked with me in peace and uprightness and turned many from iniquity. For a priest’s lips should guard knowledge, and people should seek instruction from his mouth, because he is the messenger of the LORD of hosts. But you have turned from the way. You have caused many to stumble through your instruction. You have corrupted the covenant of Levi,” says the LORD of hosts. “So I have made you despised and lowly before all the people, because you do not keep my ways but show partiality in your instruction.” Do we not all have one father? Has not one God created us? Why do we act faithlessly toward one another, profaning the covenant of our ancestors? Judah has acted faithlessly, and an abomination has been committed in Israel and Jerusalem. For Judah has profaned the holiness of the LORD, which he loves, and has married the daughter of a foreign god. As for the man who does this, may the LORD cut off from the tents of Jacob the one who wakes and the one who answers, even the one who brings an offering to the LORD of hosts. This is the second thing you do: You cover the LORD’s altar with tears, with weeping and groaning, because he no longer regards the offering or accepts it with favor from your hands. Yet you ask, “Why?” Because the LORD has been a witness between you and the wife of your youth. You have acted faithlessly toward her, though she is your companion and your wife by covenant. Did he not make one, though a remnant of spirit was his? And what was the one seeking? Offspring for God. So guard yourselves in your spirit, and let none of you act faithlessly toward the wife of your youth. “For he hates divorce,” says the LORD, the God of Israel, “and the one who covers his garment with violence,” says the LORD of hosts. “So guard yourselves in your spirit and do not act faithlessly.” You have wearied the LORD with your words. Yet you ask, “How have we wearied him?” By saying, “Everyone who does evil is good in the LORD’s eyes, and he delights in them,” or, “Where is the God of justice?”

Rights and attribution