Is this the way you should treat the LORD, you foolish, senseless people? He is your father, your Creator, he made you into a nation.

God said to us humans, "To be wise, you must have reverence for the Lord. To understand, you must turn from evil."

So I let them go their stubborn ways and do whatever they wanted.

To have knowledge, you must first have reverence for the LORD. Stupid people have no respect for wisdom and refuse to learn.

The branches of the trees are withered and broken, and women gather them for firewood. Because the people have understood nothing, God their Creator will not pity them or show them any mercy.

So I will startle them with one unexpected blow after another. Those who are wise will turn out to be fools, and all their cleverness will be useless."

The LORD says, "My people are stupid; they don't know me. They are like foolish children; they have no understanding. They are experts at doing what is evil, but failures at doing what is good."

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

My people are doomed because they do not acknowledge me. You priests have refused to acknowledge me and have rejected my teaching, and so I reject you and will not acknowledge your sons as my priests.

So the prophecy of Isaiah applies to them: 'This people will listen and listen, but not understand; they will look and look, but not see,

because their minds are dull, and they have stopped up their ears and have 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.'

There is a secret truth, my friends, which I want you to know, for it will keep you from thinking how wise you are. It is that the stubbornness of the people of Israel is not permanent, but will last only until the complete number of Gentiles comes to God.

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";