978 verses about Greed

Violence has risen up into a rod of wickedness. None of them will remain, nor of their multitude, nor of their wealth. There will be nothing of value among them.

The time has come! The day draws near. Don’t let the buyer rejoice, nor the seller mourn; for wrath is on all its multitude.

They will cast their silver in the streets, and their gold will be as an unclean thing. Their silver and their gold won’t be able to deliver them in the day of Yahweh’s wrath. They won’t satisfy their souls or fill their bellies; because it has been the stumbling block of their iniquity.

You have played the prostitute also with the Assyrians, because you were insatiable; yes, you have played the prostitute with them, and yet you weren’t satisfied.

You have moreover multiplied your prostitution to the land of merchants, to Chaldea; and yet you weren’t satisfied with this.

People give gifts to all prostitutes; but you give your gifts to all your lovers, and bribe them, that they may come to you on every side for your prostitution.

“‘“Behold, this was the iniquity of your sister Sodom: pride, fullness of bread, and prosperous ease was in her and in her daughters. She also didn’t strengthen the hand of the poor and needy.

has wronged the poor and needy, has taken by robbery, has not restored the pledge, and has lifted up his eyes to the idols, has committed abomination,

has lent with interest, and has taken increase from the poor; shall he then live? He shall not live. He has done all these abominations. He shall surely die. His blood will be on him.

who has withdrawn his hand from the poor, who hasn’t received interest or increase, has executed my ordinances, has walked in my statutes; he shall not die for the iniquity of his father. He shall surely live.

As for his father, because he cruelly oppressed, robbed his brother, and did that which is not good among his people, behold, he will die in his iniquity.

In you have they taken bribes to shed blood. You have taken interest and increase, and you have greedily gained of your neighbors by oppression, and have forgotten me,” says the Lord Yahweh.

“‘“Behold, therefore I have struck my hand at your dishonest gain which you have made, and at your blood which has been within you.

There is a conspiracy of her prophets within it, like a roaring lion ravening the prey. They have devoured souls. They take treasure and precious things. They have made many widows within it.

Her princes within it are like wolves ravening the prey, to shed blood, and to destroy souls, that they may get dishonest gain.

The people of the land have used oppression and exercised robbery. Yes, they have troubled the poor and needy, and have oppressed the foreigner wrongfully.

“Son of man, because Tyre has said against Jerusalem, ‘Aha! She is broken! She who was the gateway of the peoples has been returned to me. I will be replenished, now that she is laid waste;’

They will make a plunder of your riches, and make a prey of your merchandise. They will break down your walls, and destroy your pleasant houses. They will lay your stones, your timber, and your dust in the middle of the waters.

“‘“Javan, Tubal, and Meshech were your traders. They traded the persons of men and vessels of brass for your merchandise.

These were your traders in choice wares, in wrappings of blue and embroidered work, and in chests of rich clothing, bound with cords and made of cedar, among your merchandise.

“‘“The ships of Tarshish were your caravans for your merchandise. You were replenished and made very glorious in the heart of the seas.

Your riches, your wares, your merchandise, your mariners, your pilots, your repairers of ship seams, the dealers in your merchandise, and all your men of war, who are in you, with all your company which is among you, will fall into the heart of the seas in the day of your ruin.

When your wares went out of the seas, you filled many peoples. You enriched the kings of the earth with the multitude of your riches and of your merchandise.

by your wisdom and by your understanding you have gotten yourself riches, and have gotten gold and silver into your treasures;

by your great wisdom and by your trading you have increased your riches, and your heart is lifted up because of your riches—”

By the multitude of your iniquities, in the unrighteousness of your commerce, you have profaned your sanctuaries. Therefore I have brought out a fire from the middle of you. It has devoured you. I have turned you to ashes on the earth in the sight of all those who see you.

“Son of man, those who inhabit the waste places in the land of Israel speak, saying, ‘Abraham was one, and he inherited the land; but we are many. The land is given us for inheritance.’

They come to you as the people come, and they sit before you as my people, and they hear your words, but don’t do them; for with their mouth they show much love, but their heart goes after their gain.

“Son of man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel. Prophesy, and tell them, even the shepherds, ‘Thus says the Lord Yahweh: “Woe to the shepherds of Israel who feed themselves! Shouldn’t the shepherds feed the sheep?

You eat the fat. You clothe yourself with the wool. You kill the fatlings, but you don’t feed the sheep.

“As I live,” says the Lord Yahweh, “surely because my sheep became a prey, and my sheep became food to all the animals of the field, because there was no shepherd. My shepherds didn’t search for my sheep, but the shepherds fed themselves, and didn’t feed my sheep.”

Does it seem a small thing to you to have fed on the good pasture, but you must tread down with your feet the residue of your pasture? And to have drunk of the clear waters, but must you foul the residue with your feet?

“‘“Because you have said, ‘These two nations and these two countries will be mine, and we will possess it;’ whereas Yahweh was there:

to take the plunder and to take prey; to turn your hand against the waste places that are inhabited, and against the people who are gathered out of the nations, who have gotten livestock and goods, who dwell in the middle of the earth.’

Sheba, and Dedan, and the merchants of Tarshish, with all the young lions of it, will ask you, ‘Have you come to take the plunder? Have you assembled your company to take the prey, to carry away silver and gold, to take away livestock and goods, to take great plunder?’”’

“You shall have just balances, a just ephah, and a just bath.

The shekel shall be twenty gerahs. Twenty shekels plus twenty-five shekels plus fifteen shekels shall be your mina.

Moreover the prince shall not take of the people’s inheritance, to thrust them out of their possession. He shall give inheritance to his sons out of his own possession, that my people not each be scattered from his possession.”’”

Belshazzar, while he tasted the wine, commanded that the golden and silver vessels which Nebuchadnezzar his father had taken out of the temple which was in Jerusalem be brought to him; that the king and his lords, his wives and his concubines, might drink from them.

In 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 substance. Yes, he will devise his plans against the strongholds, even for a time.

Then he will return into his land with great wealth. His heart will be against the holy covenant. He will take action, and return to his own land.

But he will have power over the treasures of gold and of silver, and over all the precious things of Egypt. The Libyans and the Ethiopians will be at his steps.

For she did not know that I gave her the grain, the new wine, and the oil, and multiplied to her silver and gold, which they used for Baal.

So I bought her for myself for fifteen pieces of silver and a homer and a half of barley.

They feed on the sin of my people, and set their heart on their iniquity.

A merchant has dishonest scales in his hand. He loves to defraud.

Ephraim said, “Surely I have become rich, I have found myself wealth. In all my wealth they won’t find in me any iniquity that is sin.”

What the swarming locust has left, the great locust has eaten. What the great locust has left, the grasshopper has eaten. What the grasshopper has left, the caterpillar has eaten.

and have cast lots for my people, and have given a boy for a prostitute, and sold a girl for wine, that they may drink.

Because you have taken my silver and my gold, and have carried my finest treasures into your temples,

Yahweh says: “For three transgressions of Israel, yes, for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because they have sold the righteous for silver, and the needy for a pair of shoes;

and they lay themselves down beside every altar on clothes taken in pledge; and in the house of their God they drink the wine of those who have been fined.

“Indeed they don’t know to do right,” says Yahweh, “Who hoard plunder and loot in their palaces.”

Listen to this word, you cows of Bashan, who are on the mountain of Samaria, who oppress the poor, who crush the needy, who tell their husbands, “Bring us drinks!”

Therefore, because you trample on the poor, and take taxes from him of wheat: You have built houses of cut stone, but you will not dwell in them. You have planted pleasant vineyards, but you shall not drink their wine.

For I know how many your offenses, and how great are your sins— you who afflict the just, who take a bribe, and who turn away the needy in the courts.

Who lie on beds of ivory, and stretch themselves on their couches, and eat the lambs out of the flock, and the calves out of the middle of the stall;

who drink wine in bowls, and anoint themselves with the best oils; but they are not grieved for the affliction of Joseph.

Therefore they will now go captive with the first who go captive; and the feasting and lounging will end.

Hear this, you who desire to swallow up the needy, and cause the poor of the land to fail,

Saying, ‘When will the new moon be gone, that we may sell grain? And the Sabbath, that we may market wheat, making the ephah small, and the shekel large, and dealing falsely with balances of deceit;

that we may buy the poor for silver, and the needy for a pair of shoes, and sell the sweepings with the wheat?’”

How Esau will be ransacked! How his hidden treasures are sought out!

Don’t enter into the gate of my people in the day of their calamity. Don’t look down on their affliction in the day of their calamity, neither seize their wealth on the day of their calamity.

All her idols will be beaten to pieces, and all her temple gifts will be burned with fire, and all her images I will destroy; for of the hire of a prostitute has she gathered them, and to the hire of a prostitute shall they return.”

They covet fields, and seize them; and houses, and take them away: and they oppress a man and his house, even a man and his heritage.

Therefore you will have no one who divides the land by lot in Yahweh’s assembly.

But lately my people have risen up as an enemy. You strip the robe and clothing from those who pass by without a care, returning from battle.

Yahweh says concerning the prophets who lead my people astray; for those who feed their teeth, they proclaim, “Peace!” and whoever doesn’t provide for their mouths, they prepare war against him:

They build up Zion with blood, and Jerusalem with iniquity.

Her leaders judge for bribes, and her priests teach for a price, and her prophets of it tell fortunes for money: yet they lean on Yahweh, and say, “Isn’t Yahweh among us? No disaster will come on us.”

Are there yet treasures of wickedness in the house of the wicked, and a short ephah that is accursed?

Shall I be pure with dishonest scales, and with a bag of deceitful weights?

Her rich men are full of violence, her inhabitants speak lies, and their tongue is deceitful in their speech.

You shall eat, but not be satisfied. Your humiliation will be within you. You will store up, but not save; and that which you save I will give up to the sword.

Their hands are on that which is evil to do it diligently. The ruler and judge ask for a bribe; and the powerful man dictates the evil desire of his soul. Thus they conspire together.

Take the plunder of silver. Take the plunder of gold, for there is no end of the store, the glory of all goodly furniture.

The lion tore in pieces enough for his cubs, and strangled for his lionesses, and filled his caves with the kill, and his dens with prey.

You have increased your merchants more than the stars of the skies. The grasshopper strips, and flees away.

Therefore he sacrifices to his net, and burns incense to his dragnet, because by them his life is luxurious, and his food is good.

Yes, moreover, wine is treacherous. A haughty man who doesn’t stay at home, who enlarges his desire as Sheol, and he is like death, and can’t be satisfied, but gathers to himself all nations, and heaps to himself all peoples.

Won’t all these take up a parable against him, and a taunting proverb against him, and say, ‘Woe to him who increases that which is not his, and who enriches himself by extortion! How long?’

Won’t your debtors rise up suddenly, and wake up those who make you tremble, and you will be their victim?

Because you have plundered many nations, all the remnant of the peoples will plunder you, because of men’s blood, and for the violence done to the land, to the city and to all who dwell in it.

Woe to him who gets an evil gain for his house, that he may set his nest on high, that he may be delivered from the hand of evil!

For the stone will cry out of the wall, and the beam out of the woodwork will answer it.

Woe to him who builds a town with blood, and establishes a city by iniquity!

“Woe to him who gives his neighbor drink, pouring your inflaming wine until they are drunk, so that you may gaze at their naked bodies!

In that day, I will punish all those who leap over the threshold, who fill their master’s house with violence and deceit.

Their wealth will become a plunder, and their houses a desolation. Yes, they will build houses, but won’t inhabit them. They will plant vineyards, but won’t drink their wine.

Neither their silver nor their gold will be able to deliver them in the day of Yahweh’s wrath, but the whole land will be devoured by the fire of his jealousy; for he will make an end, yes, a terrible end, of all those who dwell in the land.

“Is it a time for you yourselves to dwell in your paneled houses, while this house lies waste?

You have sown much, and bring in little. You eat, but you don’t have enough. You drink, but you aren’t filled with drink. You clothe yourselves, but no one is warm, and he who earns wages earns wages to put them into a bag with holes in it.”

“You looked for much, and, behold, it came to little; and when you brought it home, I blew it away. Why?” says Yahweh of Armies, “Because of my house that lies waste, while each of you is busy with his own house.

Their buyers slaughter them, and go unpunished. Those who sell them say, ‘Blessed be Yahweh, for I am rich;’ and their own shepherds don’t pity them.

I said to them, “If you think it best, give me my wages; and if not, keep them.” So they weighed for my wages thirty pieces of silver.

For, behold, I will raise up a shepherd in the land, who will not visit those who are cut off, neither will seek those who are scattered, nor heal that which is broken, nor feed that which is sound; but he will eat the meat of the fat sheep, and will tear their hoofs in pieces.

Will a man rob God? Yet you rob me! But you say, ‘How have we robbed you?’ In tithes and offerings.

You are cursed with the curse; for you rob me, even this whole nation.

Give alms from your possessions. When you give alms, don’t let your eye be envious. Don’t turn away your face from any poor man, and the face of God won’t be turned away from you.