If I go forth into the field, then behold the slain with the sword! and if I enter into the city, then behold them that are sick with famine! yea, both the prophet and the priest go about into a land that they know not.
The prophet and the priest go about - i:e., shall have to migrate into a land of exile. Horsley translates, 'go trafficking about the land (see margin, Jeremiah 5:31; 2 Corinthians 4:2; 2 Peter 2:3), and take no knowledge' - i:e., pay no regard to the miseries before their eye (Isaiah 1:3; Isaiah 58:3). If the literal sense of the Hebrew verb [caachar] be retained, I would, with the English version, understand the words as referring to the exile to Babylon; thus, 'the prophet and the priest shall have to go to a strange land to practice their religious traffic' (Isaiah 56:11; Ezekiel 34:2-3; Micah 3:11).