Go ahead and be stupid! Go ahead and be blind! Get drunk without any wine! Stagger without drinking a drop!

The LORD will fight as he did at Mount Perazim and in the valley of Gibeon, in order to do what he intends to do---strange as his actions may seem. He will complete his work, his mysterious work.

Then the LORD said to his people, "Keep watching the nations around you, and you will be astonished at what you see. I am going to do something that you will not believe when you hear about it.

We know that God spoke to Moses; as for that fellow, however, we do not even know where he comes from!"

We know that God does not listen to sinners; he does listen to people who respect him and do what he wants them to do.

Unless this man came from God, he would not be able to do a thing."

The LORD has made you drowsy, ready to fall into a deep sleep. The prophets should be the eyes of the people, but God has blindfolded them.

So he told me to go and give the people this message: "No matter how much you listen, you will not understand. No matter how much you look, you will not know what is happening."

Then he said to me, "Make the minds of these people dull, their ears deaf, and their eyes blind, so that they cannot see or hear or understand. If they did, they might turn to me and be healed."

I am going to frustrate the plans of the Egyptians and destroy their morale. They will ask their idols to help them, and they will go and consult mediums and ask the spirits of the dead for advice.

The leaders of the city of Zoan are fools! Egypt's wisest people give stupid advice! How do they dare to tell the king that they are successors to the ancient scholars and kings?

The leaders of Zoan and Memphis are fools. They were supposed to lead the nation, but they have misled it.

(SEE 5:12)

Even storks know when it is time to return; doves, swallows, and thrushes know when it is time to migrate. But, my people, you do not know the laws by which I rule you.

Your wise men are put to shame; they are confused and trapped. They have rejected my words; what wisdom do they have now?

This is what the LORD Almighty said about Edom: "Have the people of Edom lost their good judgment? Can their advisers no longer tell them what to do? Has all their wisdom disappeared?

"On the day I punish Edom, I will destroy their clever men and wipe out all their wisdom.

I tell you that many prophets and kings wanted to see what you see, but they could not, and to hear what you hear, but they did not."

Jesus said, "I came to this world to judge, so that the blind should see and those who see should become blind."

Jesus answered, "If you were blind, then you would not be guilty; but since you claim that you can see, this means that you are still guilty."

For he said, 'Go and say to this people: You will listen and listen, but not understand; you will look and look, but not see,

because this people's minds are dull, and they have stopped up their ears and closed their eyes. Otherwise, their eyes would see, their ears would hear, their minds would understand, and they would turn to me, says God, and I would heal them.' "

They know God, but they do not give him the honor that belongs to him, nor do they thank him. Instead, their thoughts have become complete nonsense, and their empty minds are filled with darkness.

They say they are wise, but they are fools;

Because those people refuse to keep in mind the true knowledge about God, he has given them over to corrupted minds, so that they do the things that they should not do.

The scripture says, "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and set aside the understanding of the scholars."

For God in his wisdom made it impossible for people to know him by means of their own wisdom. Instead, by means of the so-called "foolish" message we preach, God decided to save those who believe.

As for us, we proclaim the crucified Christ, a message that is offensive to the Jews and nonsense to the Gentiles;

For what this world considers to be wisdom is nonsense in God's sight. As the scripture says, "God traps the wise in their cleverness";