1 And now, O priests, this commandment is to you. 2 If ye will not hearken, and if ye will not lay [it] to heart, to give glory to my name, saith the Lord Almighty, then I will send forth the curse upon you, and I will bring a curse upon your blessing: yea, I will curse it, and I will scatter your blessing, and it shall not exist among you, because ye lay not this to heart. 3 Behold, I turn my back upon you, and I will scatter dung upon your faces, the dung of your feasts, and I will carry you away at the same time. 4 And ye shall know that I have sent this commandment to you, that my covenant might be with the sons of Levi, saith the Lord Almighty. 5 My covenant of life and peace was with him, and I gave [it] him that he might reverently fear me, and that he might be awestruck at my name. 6 The law of truth was in his mouth, and iniquity was not found in his lips: he walked before me directing [his way] in peace, and he turned many from unrighteousness. 7 For the priest’s lips should keep knowledge, and they should seek the law at his mouth: for he is the messenger of the Lord Almighty. 8 But ye have turned aside from the way, and caused many to fail in [following] the law: ye have corrupted the covenant of Levi, saith the Lord Almighty. 9 And I have made you despised and cast out among all the people, because ye have not kept my ways, but have been partial in the law. 10 Have ye not all one father? Did not one God create you? why have ye forsaken every man his brother, to profane the covenant of your fathers? 11 Judah has been forsaken, and an abomination has been committed in Israel and in Jerusalem; for Judah has profaned the holy things of the Lord, which he delighted in, and has gone after other gods. 12 The Lord will utterly destroy the man that does these things, until he be even cast down from out of the tabernacles of Jacob, and from among them that offer sacrifice to the Lord Almighty. 13 And these things which I hated, ye did: ye covered with tears the altar of the Lord, and with weeping and groaning because of troubles: [is it] meet [for me] to have respect to your sacrifice, or to receive [anything] from your hands [as] welcome? 14 Yet ye said, Wherefore? Because the Lord has borne witness between thee and the wife of thy youth, whom thou hast forsaken, and [yet] she was thy partner, and the wife of thy covenant. 15 And did he not do well? and [there was] the residue of his spirit. But ye said, What does God seek but a seed? But take ye heed to your spirit, and forsake not the wife of thy youth. 16 But if thou shouldest hate [thy wife] and put her away, saith the Lord God of Israel, then ungodliness shall cover thy thoughts, saith the Lord Almighty: therefore take ye heed to your spirit, and forsake [them] not, 17 ye that have provoked God with your words. But ye said, Wherein have we provoked him? In that ye say, Every one that does evil is a pleasing [object] in the sight of the Lord, and he takes pleasure in such; and where is the God of justice?
Malachi · Updated Brenton English Septuagint
Malachi 2 Updated Brenton English Septuagint
Audio: World English Bible (WEB), read by Winfred W. Henson · About the recordings
Notes on this text (1)
- Same Septuagint text as Brenton, with modernised spelling.
Cross references (17)
Related passages for each verse, from the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge as collected and ranked by readers at OpenBible.info.
- 1 Hosea 5:1; Jeremiah 13:13; Malachi 1:6; Lamentations 4:13
- 2 Luke 17:18; Revelation 14:7; Psalm 81:11–12; Psalm 69:22; 1 Peter 4:11
- 3 Nahum 3:6; Malachi 2:9; Joel 1:17; 1 Kings 14:10; Exodus 29:14
- 4 Numbers 3:12; Ezekiel 38:23; Ezekiel 44:9–16; Luke 10:11; Matthew 3:12
- 5 Numbers 25:12–13; Ezekiel 37:26; Ezekiel 34:25; Numbers 16:9–10; Exodus 32:26–29
- 6 Daniel 12:3; 2 Timothy 2:15–16; Revelation 14:5; Jeremiah 23:22; James 5:19–20
- 7 2 Timothy 2:24–25; Leviticus 10:11; Deuteronomy 21:5; 2 Corinthians 5:20; 1 Thessalonians 4:8
- 8 Nehemiah 13:29; Jeremiah 18:15; Jeremiah 17:5; Ezekiel 44:10; Isaiah 30:11
- 9 Deuteronomy 1:17; 1 Samuel 2:30; Luke 11:42; Galatians 2:6; Matthew 19:17–18
- 10 Psalm 100:3; Malachi 2:11; 1 Corinthians 8:6; Ephesians 4:6; Isaiah 63:16
- 11 2 Corinthians 6:14–18; Ezra 9:1–2; 1 Kings 11:1–8; Deuteronomy 7:3–6; Nehemiah 13:23–29
- 12 Malachi 2:10; Ezra 10:18–19; 1 Samuel 15:22–23; Leviticus 20:3; Numbers 15:30–31
- 13 Isaiah 1:11–15; Jeremiah 14:12; Psalm 78:34–37; 2 Samuel 13:19–20; Deuteronomy 15:9
- 14 Malachi 2:15; Ecclesiastes 9:9; Isaiah 54:6; Genesis 31:50; Malachi 3:5
- 15 Matthew 19:4–6; Mark 10:6–8; Malachi 2:14; Genesis 2:20–24; Genesis 1:27
- 16 Matthew 19:3–9; Matthew 5:31–32; Mark 10:2–12; Luke 16:18; Proverbs 28:13
- 17 Isaiah 43:24; 2 Peter 3:3–4; Zephaniah 1:12; Isaiah 30:18; Ecclesiastes 8:11
Cross references: OpenBible.info (CC BY), drawn mainly from the public-domain Treasury of Scripture Knowledge. · Sources & licences
What the Fathers said
Passages from the Church Fathers that expound or quote this chapter, verbatim from the public-domain Schaff edition (19th-century English translations).
How these were chosen
“Commentary” is the opening of a homily or exposition on this chapter (John Chrysostom’s homilies, Augustine’s tractates, sermons and expositions of the Psalms). “Quotes” are sentences where the edition’s own footnotes identify a quotation of a verse here, kept only when the wording matches the verse. Only works whose authorship is not in doubt are used. Psalms follow the Hebrew/English numbering (Augustine numbers them as the Septuagint does: his Psalm 50 is Psalm 51 here).
For the Priest's lips shall keep knowledge, and they shall seek the law at His mouth: for He is the Angel of the Lord Almighty." Nor is it to be wondered at that Christ Jesus is called the Angel of the Almighty God.
Read in context · Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 1, vol. 2 (1887)
Touching whom also the prophet saith, "Ye covered my altar with tears." Christ is not willing to be fed by covetousness, He accepts not this food.
Read in context · Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 1, vol. 10 (1888)
For he had previously cited some similar expressions of those who said, "Every one that doeth evil is good in the sight of the Lord, and such are pleasing to Him." It was, I say, by understanding the law of Moses carnally that they had come to murmur thus against God.
Read in context · Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 1, vol. 2 (1887)