4 Hear this, you who trample on the needy and do away with the poor of the land,
5 asking, “When will the New Moon be overso we may sell grain, and the Sabbath,so we may market wheat? We can reduce the measurewhile increasing the price and cheat with dishonest scales.
6 We can buy the poor with silverand the needy for a pair of sandals and even sell the chaff! ”
7 The Lord has sworn by the Pride of Jacob: I will never forget all their deeds.
8 Because of this, won’t the land quake and all who dwell in it mourn? All of it will rise like the Nile; it will surge and then subsidelike the Nile in Egypt.
9 And in that day —this is the declaration of the Lord God —I will make the sun go down at noon; I will darken the land in the daytime.
10 I will turn your feasts into mourning and all your songs into lamentation; I will cause everyone to wear sackcloth and every head to be shaved. I will make that grieflike mourning for an only son and its outcome like a bitter day.