Jeremiah 2:20-28

²⁰ For long ago you broke your yoke and burst your bonds, and you said, "I will not serve!" On every high hill and under every green tree you sprawled and played the whore. ²¹ Yet I planted you as a choice vine, from the purest stock. How then did you turn degenerate and become a wild vine? ²² Though you wash yourself with lye and use much soap, the stain of your guilt is still before me, says the Lord God. ²³ How can you say, "I am not defiled, I have not gone after the Baals"? Look at your way in the valley; know what you have done- a restive young camel interlacing her tracks, ²⁴ a wild ass at home in the wilderness, in her heat sniffing the wind! Who can restrain her lust? None who seek her need weary themselves; in her month they will find her. ²⁵ Keep your feet from going unshod and your throat from thirst. But you said, "It is hopeless, for I have loved strangers, and after them I will go." ²⁶ As a thief is shamed when caught, so the house of Israel shall be shamed- they, their kings, their officials, their priests, and their prophets, ²⁷ who say to a tree, "You are my father," and to a stone, "You gave me birth." For they have turned their backs to me, and not their faces. But in the time of their trouble they say, "Come and save us!" ²⁸ But where are your gods that you made for yourself? Let them come, if they can save you, in your time of trouble; for you have as many gods as you have towns, O Judah.