New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures Reference Bible

Jeremiah

1 The words of Jeremiah*+ the son of Hilkiah,* one of the priests that were in Anathoth+ in the land of Benjamin;+ 2 to whom the word of Jehovah occurred in the days of Josiah+ the son of Amon,+ the king of Judah, in the thirteenth year of his reigning.+ 3 And it kept on occurring in the days of Jehoiakim+ the son of Josiah, the king of Judah, until the completion of the eleventh year of Zedekiah*+ the son of Josiah, the king of Judah, until Jerusalem went into exile in the fifth month.+

4 And the word of Jehovah began to occur to me, saying: 5 “Before I was forming you in the belly+ I knew you,+ and before you proceeded to come forth from the womb I sanctified you.+ Prophet to the nations I made you.”

6 But I said: “Alas, O Sovereign Lord Jehovah! Here I actually do not know how to speak,+ for I am but a boy.”*+

7 And Jehovah went on to say to me: “Do not say, ‘I am but a boy.’ But to all those to whom I shall send you, you should go; and everything that I shall command you, you should speak.+ 8 Do not be afraid because of their faces,+ for ‘I am with you to deliver you,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah.”

9 At that Jehovah thrust his hand out and caused it to touch my mouth.+ Then Jehovah said to me: “Here I have put my words in your mouth.+ 10 See, I have commissioned you this day to be over the nations and over the kingdoms,+ in order to uproot and to pull down and to destroy and to tear down,+ to build and to plant.”+

11 And the word of Jehovah continued to occur to me, saying: “What are you seeing, Jeremiah?”
    So I said: “An offshoot* of an almond tree* is what I am seeing.”

12 And Jehovah went on to say to me: “You have seen well, for I am keeping awake* concerning my word in order to carry it out.”+

13 And the word of Jehovah proceeded to occur to me the second time, saying: “What are you seeing?”
    So I said: “A widemouthed cooking pot blown upon* is what I am seeing, and its mouth* is away from the north.”

14 At this Jehovah said to me: “Out of the north the calamity will be loosened against all the inhabitants of the land.+ 15 For ‘here I am calling for all the families of the kingdoms of the north,’ is the utterance of Jehovah;+ ‘and they will certainly come and place each one his throne at the entrance of the gates of Jerusalem,+ and against all her walls round about and against all the cities of Judah.+ 16 And I will speak with them my judgments over all their badness,+ in that they have left me+ and they keep making sacrificial smoke to other gods*+ and bowing down to the works of their own hands.’+

17 “And as for you, you should gird up your hips,+ and you must rise up and speak to them everything that I myself command you. Do not be struck with any terror because of them,+ in order that I may not strike you with terror before them. 18 But as for me, here I have made you today a fortified city and an iron pillar and copper walls+ against all the land,+ toward the kings of Judah, toward her princes, toward her priests and toward the people of the land.*+ 19 And they will be certain to fight against you, but they will not prevail against you,+ for ‘I am with you,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘to deliver you.’”+

2 And the word of Jehovah proceeded to occur to me,+ saying: 2 “Go,* and you must call out in the ears of Jerusalem, saying, ‘This is what Jehovah has said:+ “I well remember, on your* part, the loving-kindness* of your youth,+ the love during your being engaged to marry,+ your walking after me in the wilderness, in a land not sown with seed.+ 3 Israel was something holy* to Jehovah,+ the first yield to Him.”’*+ ‘Any persons devouring him would make themselves guilty.+ Calamity itself would come upon them,’ was the utterance of Jehovah.”+

4 Hear the word of Jehovah, O house of Jacob,+ and all YOU families of the house of Israel.+ 5 This is what Jehovah has said: “What have YOUR fathers found in me that was unjust,+ so that they have become far off from me,+ and they kept walking after the vain idol+ and becoming vain themselves?+ 6 And they have not said, ‘Where is Jehovah, the One bringing us up out of the land of Egypt,+ the One walking us through the wilderness, through a land of desert plain+ and pit, through a land of no water+ and of deep shadow,*+ through a land through which no man* passed and in which no earthling man* dwelt?’

7 “And I gradually brought YOU to a land of the orchard, to eat its fruitage and its good things.+ But YOU came in and defiled my land; and my own inheritance YOU made something detestable.+ 8 The priests themselves did not say, ‘Where is Jehovah?’+ And the very ones handling the law did not know me;+ and the shepherds themselves transgressed* against me,+ and even the prophets prophesied by Baal,+ and after those who could bring no benefit they walked.+

9 “‘Therefore I shall contend further with YOU people,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘and with the sons of YOUR sons I shall contend.’+

10 “‘But pass over to the coastlands* of the Kittim+ and see. Yes, send even to Kedar+ and give YOUR special consideration, and see whether anything like this has happened.+ 11 Has a nation exchanged gods,+ even for those that are no gods?*+ But my own people have exchanged my* glory for what can bring no benefit.+ 12 Stare in amazement, O YOU heavens, at this; and bristle up in very great horror,’* is the utterance of Jehovah,+ 13 ‘because there are two bad things that my people have done: They have left even me,+ the source of living water,+ in order to hew out for themselves cisterns, broken cisterns, that cannot contain the water.’

14 “‘Is Israel a servant,*+ or a slave born in the household? Why is it that he has come to be for plunder? 15 Against him maned young lions roar;+ they have given out their voice.+ And they went making his land an object of astonishment. His own cities have been set afire, so that there is no inhabitant.+ 16 Even the sons of Noph*+ and Tahpanes*+ themselves kept feeding on you at the crown of the head.+ 17 Is not this what you* proceeded to do to yourself by your leaving Jehovah your God+ during the time of [his] walking you in the way?+ 18 And now what concern should you have for the way of Egypt+ in order to drink the waters of Shihor?*+ And what concern should you have for the way of Assyria+ in order to drink the waters of the River?* 19 Your badness should correct you,+ and your own acts of unfaithfulness should reprove you.+ Know, then, and see that your leaving Jehovah your God is something bad and bitter,+ and no dread of me [has resulted] to you,’+ is the utterance of the Sovereign+ Lord, Jehovah of armies.

20 “‘For long ago I broke your yoke to pieces;+ I tore your bands apart. But you said: “I am not going to serve,” for upon every high hill and under every luxuriant tree+ you were lying sprawled out,+ prostituting yourself.+ 21 And as for me, I had planted you as a choice red vine,+ all of it a true seed. So how have you been changed toward me into the degenerate [shoots] of a foreign vine?’+

22 “‘But though you should do the washing with alkali and take to yourself large quantities of lye,+ your error would certainly be a stain before me,’+ is the utterance of the Sovereign Lord Jehovah. 23 How can you say, ‘I have not defiled myself.+ After the Baals* I have not walked’?+ See your way in the valley.+ Take note of what you have done. A swift young she-camel aimlessly running to and fro in her ways; 24 a zebra+ accustomed to the wilderness, at the craving of her soul, snuffing up the wind;*+ at her time for copulation, who can turn her back? All those who are looking for her will not go tiring themselves out. In her month they will find her. 25 Hold your foot back from [becoming] barefoot, and your throat from thirst.+ But you proceeded to say, ‘It is hopeless!+ No, but I have fallen in love with strangers,+ and after them I am going to walk.’+

26 “As with the shame of a thief when he is found out, so those of the house of Israel have felt shame,+ they, their kings, their princes and their priests and their prophets.+ 27 They are saying to a tree, ‘You are my father,’+ and to a stone, ‘You yourself brought me to birth.’ But to me they have turned the back of the neck and not the face.+ And in the time of their calamity they will say, ‘Do rise up and save us!’+

28 “But where are your gods* that you have made for yourself?+ Let them rise up if they can save you in the time of your calamity.+ For as the number of your cities your gods have become, O Judah.+

29 “‘Why do YOU people keep contending against me?+ Why have YOU transgressed, all of YOU, against me?’+ is the utterance of Jehovah. 30 To no effect I have struck YOUR sons.+ No discipline did they take.+ YOUR sword has devoured YOUR prophets, like a lion that is causing ruin.+ 31 O generation, see for yourselves the word of Jehovah.+

“Have I become a mere wilderness to Israel+ or a land of intense darkness? Why is it that these, my people, have said, ‘We have roamed. We shall come to you no more’?+ 32 Can a virgin forget her ornaments, a bride her breastbands? And yet my own people—they have forgotten me days without number.+

33 “Why do you,* O woman, improve your way in order to look for love? Therefore it has also been in bad things that you have taught your ways.+ 34 Also, in your skirts* there have been found the blood marks* of the souls*+ of the innocent poor ones.+ Not in the act of breaking in* have I found them, but [they are] upon all these.+

35 “But you say, ‘I have remained innocent. Surely his anger has turned back from me.’+

“Here I am entering into controversy with you on account of your saying, ‘I have not sinned.’+ 36 Why do you treat as very insignificant the changing of your way?+ Of Egypt, too, you will become ashamed,+ just as you became ashamed of Assyria.+ 37 For this cause also you will go forth with your hands upon your head,+ because Jehovah has rejected the objects of your confidence, and you will have no success with them.”

3  There is a saying: “If a man* should send away his wife* and she should actually go away from him and become another man’s, should he return to her anymore?”+
    Has that land* not positively been polluted?+
    “And you* yourself have committed prostitution with many companions;+ and should there be a returning to me?”+ is the utterance of Jehovah. 2 “Raise your eyes to the beaten paths and see.+ Where is it that you have not been raped?*+ Alongside the ways you have sat for them, like an Arabian in the wilderness;+ and you keep polluting the land with your acts of prostitution and with your badness.+ 3 So copious showers are withheld,+ and not even a spring rain has occurred.+ And the forehead of a wife committing prostitution is what has become yours. You have refused to feel humiliated.+ 4 Have you from now on called out to me, ‘My Father,+ you are the confidential friend of my youth!+ 5 Should one stay resentful to time indefinite, or keep watching [something] forever?’+ Look! You have spoken, and you went on to do bad things and prevail.”+

6 And Jehovah proceeded to say to me in the days of Josiah the king:+ “‘Have you seen what unfaithful Israel* has done?+ She is going upon every high mountain+ and underneath every luxuriant tree,+ that she may commit prostitution there.+ 7 And after her doing all these things I kept saying that she should return even to me, but she did not return;+ and Judah kept looking at her own treacherous sister.+ 8 When I got to see that, for the very reason that unfaithful Israel had committed adultery, I sent her away+ and proceeded to give the certificate of her full divorce to her,+ yet treacherously dealing Judah her sister did not become afraid, but she herself also began to go and commit prostitution.+ 9 And her prostitution occurred because of [her] frivolous view, and she kept polluting the land+ and committing adultery with stones and with trees;+ 10 and even for all this her treacherous sister Judah did not return to me with all her heart,+ only falsely,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah.”

11 And Jehovah went on to say to me: “Unfaithful Israel has proved her own soul to be more righteous than treacherously dealing Judah.+ 12 Go,* and you must proclaim these words to the north+ and say:

“‘“Do return, O renegade Israel,” is the utterance of Jehovah.’+ ‘“I shall not have my face drop [angrily] upon YOU people,+ for I am loyal,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah.’ ‘“I shall not stay resentful to time indefinite.+ 13 Only take note of your error, for it is against Jehovah your God* that you* have transgressed.+ And you continued scattering your ways to the strangers+ under every luxuriant tree,+ but to my voice YOU people did not listen,” is the utterance of Jehovah.’”

14 “Return, O YOU renegade sons,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah. “For I myself have become the husbandly owner of YOU people;+ and I will take YOU, one out of a city and two out of a family, and I will bring YOU to Zion.+ 15 And I will give YOU shepherds in agreement with my heart,+ and they will certainly feed* YOU with knowledge and insight.+ 16 And it must occur that YOU will become many and certainly bear fruit in the land* in those days,” is the utterance of Jehovah.+ “No more will they say, ‘The ark of the covenant of Jehovah!’+ nor will it come up into the heart, nor will they remember it+ or miss it, and no more will it be made. 17 In that time they will call Jerusalem the throne of Jehovah;+ and to her all the nations must be brought together+ to the name of Jehovah at Jerusalem,+ and they will no more walk after the stubbornness of their bad heart.”+

18 “In those days they will walk, the house of Judah alongside* the house of Israel,+ and together+ they will come out of the land of the north into the land that I gave as a hereditary possession to YOUR* forefathers.+ 19 And I myself have said, ‘O how I proceeded to place you* among the sons and to give you the desirable land,+ the hereditary possession of the ornament of the armies of the nations!’ And I further said, ‘“My Father!”+ YOU people will call out to me, and from following me YOU people will not turn back.’ 20 ‘Truly [as] a wife* has treacherously gone from her companion,+ so YOU, O house of Israel, have dealt treacherously with me,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah.”

21 On the beaten paths there has been heard a sound, the weeping, the entreaties of the sons of Israel. For they have twisted their way;+ they have forgotten Jehovah their God.*+

22 “Return, YOU renegade sons.+ I shall heal YOUR renegade condition.”*+

“Here we are! We have come to you, for you, O Jehovah, are our God.+ 23 Truly the hills as well as the turmoil on the mountains+ belong to falsehood.+ Truly in Jehovah our God is the salvation of Israel.+ 24 But the shameful thing+ itself has eaten up the toil of our forefathers from our youth, their flocks and their herds, their sons and their daughters. 25 We lie down in our shame,+ and our humiliation keeps covering us;+ for it is toward Jehovah our God that we have sinned,+ we and our fathers from our youth on and down to this day,+ and we have not obeyed the voice of Jehovah our God.”+

4 “If you would return, O Israel,” is the utterance of Jehovah, “you may return even to me.+ And if you will take away your disgusting things on my account,*+ then you will not go as a fugitive. 2 And [if] you will certainly swear,+ ‘As Jehovah is alive in truth,+ in justice and in righteousness!’+ then in him* the nations will actually bless themselves, and in him they will boast about themselves.”+

3 For this is what Jehovah has said to the men* of Judah and to Jerusalem: “Plow for yourselves arable land, and do not keep sowing among* thorns.+ 4 Get yourselves circumcised to Jehovah, and take away the foreskins of YOUR hearts,+ Deut.30:6; 10:16 YOU men* of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem; that my rage may not go forth just like a fire, and it certainly burn with no one to do the extinguishing, on account of the badness of YOUR dealings.”+

5 Tell [it] in Judah, YOU men, and publish [it] even in Jerusalem,+ and say [it] out, and blow a horn* throughout the land.+ Call out loudly* and say: “Gather yourselves together, and let us enter into the fortified cities.+ 6 Raise a signal toward Zion. Make provision for shelter. Do not stand still.” For there is a calamity that I am bringing in from the north,+ even a great crash. 7 He has gone up as a lion out of his thicket,+ and the one who is bringing the nations to ruin has pulled away;+ he has gone forth from his place in order to render your* land as an object of astonishment. Your own cities will fall in ruins so that there will be no inhabitant.+ 8 On this account gird on sackcloth, YOU people.+ Beat YOUR breasts and howl,+ because the burning anger of Jehovah has not turned back from us.+

9 “And it must occur in that day,” is the utterance of Jehovah, “that the heart of the king will perish,+ also the heart of the princes; and the priests will certainly be driven to astonishment, and the prophets themselves will be amazed.”+

10 And I proceeded to say: “Alas, O Sovereign Lord Jehovah! Truly you have absolutely deceived this people+ and Jerusalem, saying, ‘Peace itself will become YOURS,’+ and the sword has reached clear to the soul.”*

11 At that time it will be said to this people and to Jerusalem: “There is a searing wind of the beaten paths through the wilderness+ [on] the way to the daughter of my people;+ it is not for winnowing, nor for cleansing. 12 The full wind itself comes even from these to me. Now I myself also shall speak forth the judgments with them.+ 13 Look! Like rain clouds he will come up, and his chariots are like a storm wind.+ His horses are swifter than eagles.*+ Woe to us, because we have been despoiled! 14 Wash your heart clean of sheer badness, O Jerusalem, in order that you may be saved.+ How long will your erroneous thoughts lodge within you?+ 15 For a voice is telling from Dan+ and is publishing something hurtful from the mountainous region of Ephraim.+ 16 Make mention [of it], YOU people, yes, to the nations. Publish [it] against Jerusalem.”

“Watchers are coming from a land far away,+ and they will let out their voice against the very cities of Judah. 17 Like guards of the open field they have become against her on all sides,+ because she has rebelled even against me,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah. 18 “Your* way and your dealings—there will be a rendering* of these to you.*+ This is the calamity upon you, for it is bitter; because it has reached clear to your heart.”

19 O my intestines, my intestines! I am in severe pains in the walls of my heart.+ My heart is boisterous within me.+ I cannot keep silent, for the sound of the horn is what my soul has heard, the alarm signal of war.+ 20 Crash upon crash is what has been called out, for the whole land has been despoiled.+ Suddenly my tents have been despoiled,+ in a moment my tent cloths. 21 How long shall I keep seeing the signal, keep hearing the sound of the horn?+ 22 For my people is foolish.+ Of me they have not taken note.+ They are unwise sons; and they are not those having understanding.+ Wise they are for doing bad, but for doing good they actually have no knowledge.+

23 I saw the land,* and, look! [it was] empty and waste;+ and into the heavens, and their light was no more.+ 24 I saw the mountains, and, look! they were rocking, and the hills themselves were all given a shaking.+ 25 I saw, and, look! there was not an earthling man,* and the flying creatures of the heavens had all fled.+ 26 I saw, and, look! the orchard itself was a wilderness, and the very cities of it had all been torn down.+ It was because of Jehovah, because of his burning anger.

27 For this is what Jehovah has said: “A desolate waste is what the whole land will become,+ and shall I not carry out a sheer extermination?*+ 28 On this account the land will mourn,+ and the heavens above will certainly become dark.+ It is because I have spoken, I have considered, and I have not felt regret, nor shall I turn back from it.+ 29 Because of the sound of the horsemen and bow shooters the entire city is running away.+ They have entered into the thickets, and into the rocks* they have gone up.+ Every city is left, and there is no man* dwelling in them.”

30 Now that you* are despoiled, what will you do, since you used to clothe yourself with scarlet, since you used to deck yourself with ornaments of gold, since you used to enlarge your eyes with black paint?+ It is in vain that you used to make yourself pretty.+ Those lusting after [you] have rejected you; they keep seeking for your very soul.+ 31 For a voice like that of a sick woman* I have heard, the distress like that of a woman giving birth to her first child,+ the voice of the daughter of Zion who keeps gasping for breath. She keeps spreading out her palms:+ “Woe, now, to me, for my soul is tired of the killers!”+

5  Go roving about in the streets of Jerusalem and see, now, and know, and seek for yourselves in her public squares whether YOU can find a man,+ whether there exists anyone doing justice,+ anyone seeking faithfulness,+ and I shall forgive her. 2 Even if they should say: “As Jehovah is alive!” they would thereby be swearing to sheer falsehood.+

3 O Jehovah, are not those eyes of yours toward faithfulness?+ You have struck them,+ but they did not become ill.+ You exterminated them.+ They refused to take discipline.+ They made their faces harder than a crag.+ They refused to turn back.+ 4 Even I myself had said: “Surely they are of low class. They acted foolishly, for they have ignored the way of Jehovah, the judgment of their God.*+ 5 I will go my way to the great ones and speak with them;+ for they themselves must have taken note of the way of Jehovah, the judgment of their God.+ Surely they themselves must have all together broken the yoke; they must have torn apart the bands.”+

6 That is why a lion out of the forest has struck them, a wolf itself of the desert plains keeps despoiling them,+ a leopard is keeping awake at their cities.+ Everyone going forth from them gets torn to pieces. For their transgressions have become many; their acts of unfaithfulness have become numerous.+

7 How can I forgive you* for this very thing? Your own sons have left me, and they keep swearing+ by what is no God.*+ And I kept satisfying them,+ but they continued committing adultery,+ and to the house of a prostitute woman they go in troops. 8 Horses seized with sexual heat, having [strong] testicles, they have become. They neigh each one to the wife of his companion.+

9 “Should I not take an accounting because of these very things?” is the utterance of Jehovah.+ “Or upon a nation that is like this should not my soul avenge itself?”+

10 “Come up against her [vine] rows* and cause ruin,+ but do not YOU men make an actual extermination.+ Take away her luxuriating shoots, for they do not belong to Jehovah.+ 11 For the house of Israel and the house of Judah have positively dealt treacherously with me,” is the utterance of Jehovah.+ 12 “They have denied Jehovah, and they keep saying, ‘He is not.+ And upon us no calamity will come, and no sword or famine shall we see.’+ 13 And the prophets themselves become a wind, and the word is not in them.+ That is how it will be done to them.”

14 Therefore this is what Jehovah, the God of armies, has said: “For the reason that YOU men are saying this thing, here I am making my words in your mouth a fire,+ and this people will be pieces of wood, and it will certainly devour them.”+

15 “Here I am bringing in upon YOU men a nation from far away,+ O house of Israel,” is the utterance of Jehovah. “It is an enduring nation.+ It is a nation of long ago, a nation whose language* you do not know, and you cannot hear [understandingly] what they speak. 16 Their quiver is like an open burial place; all of them are mighty men.+ 17 They will also certainly eat up your harvest and your bread.+ The men will eat up your sons and your daughters. They will eat up your flocks and your herds. They will eat up your vine and your fig tree.+ They will shatter with the sword your fortified cities in which you are trusting.”

18 “And even in those days,” is the utterance of Jehovah, “I shall not carry out an extermination of YOU men.+ 19 And it must occur that YOU will say, ‘Due to what fact has Jehovah our God done to us all these things?’+ And you must say to them, ‘Just as YOU have left me and have gone serving a foreign god* in YOUR land, so YOU will serve strangers in a land that is not YOURS.’”+

20 TELL this in the house of Jacob, and publish it in Judah, saying: 21 “Hear, now, this, O unwise people that is without heart:*+ They have eyes, but they cannot see;+ they have ears, but they cannot hear.+ 22 ‘Do YOU not fear even me,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘or are YOU in no severe pains even because of me,+ who have set the sand as the boundary for the sea, an indefinitely lasting regulation that it cannot pass over? Although its waves toss themselves, still they cannot prevail; and [although] they do become boisterous, still they cannot pass over it.+ 23 But this very people has come to have a stubborn and rebellious heart; they have turned aside and keep walking in their course.+ 24 But they have not said in their heart: “Let us, now, fear Jehovah our God,+ the One who is giving the downpour and the autumn rain and the spring rain in its season,+ the One who guards even the prescribed weeks of the harvest for us.”+ 25 YOUR own errors have turned these things away, and YOUR own sins have held back what is good from YOU people.+

26 “‘For among my people there have been found wicked men.+ They keep peering, as when birdcatchers crouch down.+ They have set a ruinous [trap].* It is men* that they catch. 27 As a cage is full of flying creatures, so their houses are full of deception.+ That is why they have become great and they gain riches.+ 28 They have grown fat;+ they have become shiny. They have also overflowed with bad things.* No legal case have they pleaded,+ even the legal case of the fatherless boy,+ that they may gain success;+ and the judgment of the poor ones they have not taken up.’”

29 “Should I not hold an accounting because of these very things,” is the utterance of Jehovah, “or on a nation that is like this should not my soul avenge itself?+ 30 An astonishing situation, even a horrible thing, has been brought to be* in the land:+ 31 The prophets themselves actually prophesy in falsehood;+ and as for the priests, they go subduing according to their powers.*+ And my own people have loved [it] that way;+ and what will YOU men do in the finale of it?”+

6 Take shelter, O YOU sons of Benjamin, from the midst of Jerusalem; and in Tekoa+ blow the horn.*+ And over Beth-haccherem+ raise a fire signal; because calamity itself has looked down out of the north, even a great crash.+ 2 The daughter of Zion has resembled indeed a comely and daintily bred woman.+ 3 To her the shepherds and their droves proceeded to come. Against her they pitched [their] tents all around.+ They grazed off each one his own part.+ 4 Against her they have sanctified war:+ “Rise up, and let us go up at midday!”+
     “Woe to us, for the day has declined, for the shadows of evening keep extending themselves!”

5 “Rise up, and let us go up during the night and bring to ruin her dwelling towers.”+

6 For this is what Jehovah of armies has said: “Cut down wood*+ and throw up against Jerusalem a siege rampart.+ She is the city with which an accounting must be held.+ She is nothing but oppression in the midst of her.+ 7 As a cistern keeps its waters cool, so she has kept her badness cool. Violence and despoiling are heard in her;+ sickness and plague are before my face constantly. 8 Be corrected,+ O Jerusalem, that my soul may not turn away disgusted from you;+ that I may not set you as a desolate waste, a land not inhabited.”+

9 This is what Jehovah of armies has said: “They will without fail glean the remnant of Israel just like a vine.+ Put your hand back like one that is gathering grapes upon the vine tendrils.”

10 “To whom shall I speak and give warning, that they may hear? Look! Their ear is uncircumcised, so that they are unable to pay attention.+ Look! The very word of Jehovah has become to them a reproach,+ in which* [word] they can take no delight.+ 11 And with the rage of Jehovah I have become full. I have become weary with holding in.”+

“Pour [it] out upon the child in the street+ and upon the intimate group of young men at the same time; for they will also be caught, a man* along with his wife,* an old man along with one that is full of days.+ 12 And their houses will certainly be turned over to others for possession, the fields and the wives at the same time.+ For I shall stretch my hand out against the inhabitants of the land,” is the utterance of Jehovah.+

13 “For from the least one of them even to the greatest one of them, every one is making for himself unjust gain;+ and from the prophet even to the priest, each one is acting falsely.+ 14 And they try to heal the breakdown* of my people lightly,*+ saying, ‘There is peace! There is peace!’* when there is no peace.+ 15 Did they feel shame because it was something detestable that they had done?+ For one thing, they positively do not feel any shame; for another thing, they have not come to know even how to feel humiliated.+ Therefore they will fall among those who are falling;+ in the time that I must hold an accounting with them they will stumble,” Jehovah has said.

16 This is what Jehovah has said: “Stand still in the ways, YOU people, and see, and ask for the roadways of long ago, where, now, the good way is;+ and walk in it,+ and find ease for YOUR souls.”+ But they kept saying: “We are not going to walk.”+ 17 “And I raised up over YOU people* watchmen,+ ‘Pay attention to the sound of the horn!’”+ But they kept saying: “We are not going to pay attention.”+ 18 “Therefore hear, O YOU nations! And know, O you assembly, what will be among them. 19 Listen, O earth! Here I am bringing in calamity upon this people+ as the fruitage of their thoughts,+ for they paid no attention to my very own words; and my law—they also kept rejecting it.”+

20 “What does this matter to me that you bring in even frankincense from Sheba+ and the good cane* from the land far away? The whole burnt offerings of YOU people serve for no pleasure,+ and YOUR very sacrifices have not been gratifying to me.”+ 21 Therefore this is what Jehovah has said: “Here I am setting for this people stumbling blocks,+ and they will certainly stumble over them, fathers and sons together; the neighbor and his companion—they will perish.”+

22 This is what Jehovah has said: “Look! A people is coming from the land of the north, and there is a great nation that will be awakened from the remotest parts of the earth.+ 23 The bow and the javelin they will grab hold of.+ It* is a cruel one, and they will have no pity. Their very voice will resound just like the sea,+ and upon horses they will ride.+ It is drawn up in battle order like a man of war against you, O daughter of Zion.”+

24 We have heard the report about it.* Our hands have dropped.+ Distress itself has seized hold of us, labor pains like those of a woman giving birth.+ 25 Do not go out* into the field, and do not walk even in the way; for there is the sword belonging to the enemy, there is fright all around.+ 26 O daughter of my people, gird on sackcloth+ and wallow in the ashes.+ Make your mourning that for an only [son], the wailing of bitterness;+ because suddenly the despoiler will come upon us.+

27 “I have made you* a metal tester among my people, one making a thorough search;* and you will take note and you must examine* their way.+ 28 All of them are the most stubborn men,*+ walking about as slanderers+—copper and iron. They are all of them ruinous.+ 29 The bellows+ have been scorched.* Out from their fire there is lead.+ One has kept refining intensely simply for nothing, and those who are bad have not been separated.+ Isai.48:10 30 Rejected silver is what people will certainly call them,+ for Jehovah has rejected them.”+

7 The word that occurred to Jeremiah* from Jehovah, saying: 2 “Stand in the gate of the house of Jehovah, and you must proclaim there this word,+ and you must say, ‘Hear the word of Jehovah, all YOU of Judah, who are entering into these gates to bow down to Jehovah. 3 This is what Jehovah of armies, the God* of Israel, has said: “Make YOUR ways and YOUR dealings good, and I will keep YOU people residing in this place.+ 4 Do not put YOUR trust in fallacious words,*+ saying, ‘The temple* of Jehovah, the temple of Jehovah, the temple of Jehovah they are!’ 5 For if YOU will positively make YOUR ways and YOUR dealings good, if YOU will positively carry out justice between a man* and his companion,+ 6 if no alien resident,* no fatherless boy and no widow YOU will oppress,+ and innocent blood YOU will not shed in this place,+ and after other gods* YOU will not walk for calamity to yourselves,+ 7 I, in turn, shall certainly keep YOU residing in this place, in the land that I gave to YOUR forefathers, from time indefinite even to time indefinite.”’”+

8 “Here YOU are putting YOUR trust in fallacious words—it will certainly be of no benefit at all.+ 9 Can there be stealing,+ murdering+ and committing adultery+ and swearing falsely+ and making sacrificial smoke to Baal+ and walking after other gods whom YOU had not known,+ 10 and must YOU come and stand before me in this house upon which my name has been called,+ and must YOU say, ‘We shall certainly be delivered,’ in the face of doing all these detestable things? 11 Has this house upon which my name has been called+ become a mere cave of robbers in YOUR eyes?+ Here I myself also have seen [it],” is the utterance of Jehovah.+

12 “‘However, GO, now, to my place that was in Shiloh,+ where I caused my name to reside at first,+ and see what I did to it because of the badness of my people Israel.+ 13 And now for the reason that YOU kept doing all these works,’ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘and I kept speaking to YOU, getting up early and speaking,+ but YOU did not listen,+ and I kept calling YOU, but YOU did not answer,+ 14 I will do also to the house upon which my name has been called,+ in which YOU are trusting,+ and to the place that I gave to YOU and to YOUR forefathers, just as I did to Shiloh.+ 15 And I will throw YOU out from before my face,+ just as I threw out all YOUR brothers, the whole offspring of Ephraim.’+

16 “And as for you, do not pray in behalf of this people, neither raise in their behalf an entreating cry or a prayer nor beseech me,+ for I shall not be listening to you.+ 17 Are you not seeing what they are doing in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem?+ 18 The sons are picking up sticks of wood, and the fathers are lighting the fire, and the wives* are kneading flour dough in order to make sacrificial cakes to the ‘queen* of the heavens’;+ and there is a pouring out* of drink offerings+ to other gods for the purpose of offending me.+ 19 ‘Is it I whom they are offending?’ is the utterance of Jehovah.+ ‘Is it not they themselves, for the purpose of shame to their faces?’+ 20 Therefore this is what the Sovereign Lord Jehovah has said, ‘Look! My anger and my rage are being poured forth upon this place,+ upon mankind* and upon domestic animal, and upon the tree of the field+ and upon the fruitage of the ground; and it must burn, and it will not be extinguished.’+

21 “This is what Jehovah of armies, the God* of Israel, has said, ‘Add those whole burnt offerings of YOURS to YOUR sacrifices and eat flesh.+ 22 For I did not speak with YOUR forefathers, nor did I command them in the day of my bringing them out from the land of Egypt concerning the matters of whole burnt offering and sacrifice.+ 23 But this word I did express in command upon them, saying: “Obey my voice,+ and I will become YOUR God,+ and YOU yourselves will become my people; and YOU must walk in all the way+ that I shall command YOU, in order that it may go well with YOU.”’+ 24 But they did not listen, neither did they incline their ear,+ but they went walking in the counsels in the stubbornness of their bad heart,+ so that they became backward in direction and not forward,+ 25 from the day that YOUR forefathers came forth out of the land of Egypt until this day;+ and I kept sending to YOU all my servants the prophets, daily getting up early and sending [them].+ 26 But they did not listen to me, and they did not incline their ear,+ but they kept hardening their neck.+ They acted worse than their forefathers!+

27 “And you must speak to them all these words,+ but they will not listen to you; and you must call to them, but they will not answer you.+ 28 And you must say to them, ‘This is the nation whose people have not obeyed the voice of Jehovah its God,+ and have not taken discipline.+ Faithfulness has perished, and it has been cut off from their mouth.’+

29 “Shear off your* uncut hair* and throw [it] away,+ and upon the bare hills raise a dirge,+ for Jehovah has rejected+ and will desert the generation with which he is furious.*+ 30 ‘For the sons of Judah have done what is bad in my eyes,’ is the utterance of Jehovah. ‘They have set their disgusting things in the house upon which my name has been called, in order to defile it.+ 31 And they have built the high places of Topheth,+ which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom,*+ in order to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire,+ a thing that I had not commanded and that had not come up into my heart.’+

32 “‘Therefore, look! days are coming,’ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘when it will no more be said [to be] Topheth and the valley of the son of Hinnom, but the valley of the killing;+ and they will have to bury in Topheth without there being enough place.*+ 33 And the dead bodies of this people must become food for the flying creatures of the heavens and for the beasts of the earth, with nobody to make [them] tremble.+ 34 And I will cause to cease from the cities of Judah and from the streets of Jerusalem the voice of exultation and the voice of rejoicing, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride;+ for the land will become nothing but a devastated place.’”+

8 "At that time,” is the utterance of Jehovah, “people will also bring forth the bones of the kings of Judah and the bones of its princes and the bones of the priests and the bones of the prophets and the bones of the inhabitants of Jerusalem from their graves.+ 2 And they will actually spread them out to the sun and to the moon and to all the army of the heavens that they have loved and that they have served and that they have walked after+ and that they have sought and that they have bowed down to.+ They will not be gathered, nor will they be buried. As manure upon the face of the ground they will become.”+

3 “And death will certainly be chosen rather than life+ on the part of all the remnant of those remaining out of this bad family in all the places of the remaining ones, where I will have dispersed them,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah of armies.

4 “And you must say to them, ‘This is what Jehovah has said: “Will they fall and not get up again?+ If one would turn back, will the other not also turn back?+ 5 Why is it that this people, Jerusalem, is unfaithful with an enduring unfaithfulness? They have taken hold of trickiness;+ they have refused to turn back.+ 6 I have paid attention,+ and I kept listening.+ It was not right the way they kept speaking. There was not a man repenting over his badness,+ saying, ‘What have I done?’ Each one is going back into the popular course,+ like a horse that is dashing into the battle. 7 Even the stork in the heavens—it well knows its appointed times;+ and the turtledove+ and the swift and the bulbul—they observe well the time of each one’s coming in. But as for my people, they have not come to know the judgment of Jehovah.”’+

8 “‘How can YOU men say: “We are wise, and the law of Jehovah is with us”?+ Surely, now, the false stylus+ of the secretaries has worked in sheer falsehood. 9 The wise ones have become ashamed.+ They have become terrified and will be caught. Look! They have rejected the very word of Jehovah, and what wisdom do they have?+ 10 Therefore I shall give their wives to other men, their fields to those taking possession;+ for, from the least one even to the greatest one, each one is making unjust gain;+ from the prophet even to the priest, each one is acting falsely.+ 11 And they try to heal the breakdown* of the daughter of my people lightly,*+ saying: “There is peace! There is peace!”* when there is no peace.+ 12 Did they feel shame because they had done even what was detestable?+ For one thing, they positively could not feel ashamed; for another thing, they did not know even how to feel humiliated.+

“‘Therefore they will fall among those who are falling. In the time of their being given attention,+ they will stumble,’ Jehovah has said.+

13 “‘When doing the gathering, I shall bring them to their finish,’* is the utterance of Jehovah.+ ‘There will be no grapes on the vine,+ and there will be no figs on the fig tree, and the foliage itself will certainly wither. And things that I give to them will pass by them.’”

14 “Why are we sitting still? Gather yourselves together, and let us enter into the fortified cities+ and be silent there. For Jehovah our God* has himself put us to silence,*+ and he gives us poisoned water to drink,+ because we have sinned against Jehovah. 15 There was a hoping for peace, but no good [came];+ for a time of healing, but, look! terror!+ 16 From Dan+ has been heard the snorting of his horses. Due to the sound of the neighing of his stallions the whole land has begun to rock.+ And they come in and eat up the land* and what fills it, the city and its inhabitants.”

17 “For here I am sending in among YOU serpents, poisonous snakes,+ for which there is no charming,+ and they will certainly bite YOU,” is the utterance of Jehovah.

18 A grief that is beyond curing has come up into me.+ My heart is ill. 19 Here there is the sound of the cry for help of the daughter of my people from a land far away:+ “Is Jehovah not in Zion?+ Or is her king not in her?”+

“Why is it that they have offended me with their graven images, with their vain foreign gods?”+

20 “The harvest has passed, the summer has come to an end; but as for us, we have not been saved!”+

21 Over the breakdown+ of the daughter of my people I have become shattered.+ I have grown sad. Outright astonishment has seized hold of me.+ 22 Is there no balsam in Gilead?+ Or is there no healer there?+ Why is it, then, that the recuperation+ of the daughter of my people has not come up?+

9  O that my head were waters, and that my eyes were a source of tears!+ Then I could weep day and night for the slain ones of the daughter of my people.*+

2 O that I had in the wilderness a lodging place of travelers!+ Then I would leave my people and go away from them, for all of them are adulterers,*+ a solemn assembly of treacherous dealers;+ 3 and they bend their tongue as their bow in falsehood;+ but not for faithfulness have they proved mighty in the land.*

“For from badness to badness they went forth, and they ignored even me,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah.

4 “Guard yourselves each one against his own companion,+ and put YOUR trust in no brother at all.+ For even every brother would positively supplant,+ and every companion himself would walk around as a mere slanderer,+ 5 and they keep trifling each one with his companion;+ and they speak no truth at all. They have taught their tongue to speak falsehood.+ They have tired themselves out merely in doing wrong.+

6 “Your sitting is in the midst of deception.+ Through deception they have refused to know me,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah.

7 Therefore this is what Jehovah of armies has said: “Here I am smelting them, and I have to examine them,+ because how otherwise shall I act on account of the daughter of my people?+ 8 Their tongue is a slaughtering arrow.*+ Deception is what it has spoken. With his mouth, peace is what [a person] keeps speaking with his own companion; but within himself he sets his ambush.”+

9 “Because of these things should I not hold an accounting with them?” is the utterance of Jehovah. “Or upon a nation that is like this should not my soul avenge itself?+ 10 Over the mountains I shall raise a weeping and lamentation,+ and over the pasture grounds of the wilderness a dirge; for they will have been burned+ so that there is no man passing through and people actually will not hear the sound of livestock.+ Both the flying creature of the heavens and the beast will have fled; they will have gone.+ 11 And I will make Jerusalem piles of stones,+ the lair of jackals;+ and the cities of Judah I shall make a desolate waste, without an inhabitant.+

12 “Who is the man that is wise, that he may understand this, even the one to whom the mouth of Jehovah has spoken, that he may tell it?+ On what account should the land actually perish, be actually burned like the wilderness without anyone passing through?”+

13 And Jehovah proceeded to say: “On account of their leaving my law that I gave [to be] before them, and [because] they have not obeyed my voice and have not walked in it,*+ 14 but they kept on walking after the stubbornness of their heart+ and after the Baal images,*+ about which their fathers had taught them;+ 15 therefore this is what Jehovah of armies, the God* of Israel, has said, ‘Here I am making them, that is, this people, eat wormwood,+ and I will make them drink poisoned water;+ 16 and I will scatter them among the nations that neither they nor their fathers have known,+ and I will send after them the sword until I shall have exterminated them.’+

17 “This is what Jehovah of armies has said, ‘Behave with understanding, YOU people, and call the dirge-chanting women,+ that they may come; and send even to the skilled* women, that they may come,+ 18 and that they may hurry and raise up over us a lamentation. And may our eyes run down with tears and our own beaming eyes trickle with waters.+ 19 For the voice of lamentation is what has been heard from Zion:+ “How we have been despoiled!+ How much we have felt shame! For we have left the land; for they* have thrown away our residences.”*+ 20 But hear, O YOU women, the word of Jehovah, and may YOUR ear take the word of his mouth. Then teach YOUR daughters a lamentation,+ and each woman her companion a dirge.+ 21 For death has come up through our windows; it has come into our dwelling towers, in order to cut off the child from the street, the young men from the public squares.’+

22 “Speak, ‘This is what the utterance of Jehovah is: “The dead bodies of mankind* must also fall like manure upon the face of the field and like a row of newly cut grain after the reaper, with no one to do the gathering up.”’”+

23 This is what Jehovah has said: “Let not the wise man brag about himself because of his wisdom,+ and let not the mighty man brag about himself because of his mightiness.+ Let not the rich man brag about himself because of his riches.”+

24 “But let the one bragging about himself brag about himself because of this very thing, the having of insight+ and the having of knowledge of me, that I am Jehovah,+ the One exercising loving-kindness, justice* and righteousness in the earth;+ for in these things I do take delight,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah.

25 “Look! Days are coming,” is the utterance of Jehovah, “and I will hold an accounting with everyone circumcised [but still] in uncircumcision,*+ 26 upon Egypt+ and upon Judah+ and upon Edom+ and upon the sons of Ammon+ and upon Moab+ and upon all those with hair clipped at the temples who are dwelling in the wilderness;+ for all the nations are uncircumcised, and all the house of Israel are uncircumcised in heart.”+ 4:4; Deut.30:6; 10:16

10 Hear the word that Jehovah has spoken against YOU people, O house of Israel. 2 This is what Jehovah has said: “Do not learn the way of the nations at all,+ and do not be struck with terror even at the signs of the heavens, because the nations are struck with terror at them.+ 3 For the customs* of the peoples+ are just an exhalation, because it is a mere tree+ out of the forest that one has cut down, the work of the hands of the craftsman with the billhook.+ 4 With silver and with gold one makes it pretty.+ With nails and with hammers they fasten them down, that none may reel.+ 5 They are like a scarecrow of a cucumber field, and cannot speak.+ Without fail they are carried, for they cannot take any steps.+ Do not be afraid because of them, for they can do nothing calamitous and, what is more, the doing of any good is not with them.”+

6 In no way is there anyone like you, O Jehovah.+ You are great, and your name is great in mightiness.+ 7 Who should not fear you,+ O King of the nations,+ for to you it is fitting; because among all the wise ones of the nations and among all their kingships there is in no way anyone like you.+ 8 And at one and the same time they prove to be unreasoning and stupid.+ A tree is a mere exhortation of vanities.+ 9 Silver beaten into plates is what is brought in even from Tarshish,+ and gold from Uphaz,*+ the workmanship of a craftsman and of the hands of a metalworker; their clothing is blue thread and wool dyed reddish purple. They are all the workmanship of skilled people.+

10 But Jehovah is in truth God.*+ He is the living God+ and the King to time indefinite.+ Because of his indignation the earth will rock,+ and no nations will hold up under his denunciation.+ 11 This is what YOU men will say to them: “The gods*+ that did not make the very heavens and the earth are the ones who will perish from the earth+ and from under these heavens.”* 12 He* is the Maker of the earth by his power,+ the One firmly establishing the productive land* by his wisdom,+ and the One who by his understanding stretched out the heavens.+ 13 At [his] voice there is a giving by him of a turmoil of waters in the heavens,+ and he causes vapors* to ascend from the extremity* of the earth.+ He has made even sluices* for the rain,+ and he brings forth the wind* from his storehouses.+

14 Every man* has behaved so unreasoningly as not to know.+ Every metalworker will certainly feel shame because of the carved image;+ for his molten image is a falsehood,+ and there is no spirit* in them.+ 15 They are vanity,* a work of mockery.+ In the time of their being given attention they will perish.+

16 The Share of Jacob+ is not like these things, for he is the Former of everything,+ and Israel is the staff* of his inheritance.+ Jehovah of armies is his name.+

17 Gather up from the earth your pack load,+ O woman dwelling under stress.+ 18 For this is what Jehovah has said: “Here I am slinging out the inhabitants of the earth* on this occasion,+ and I will cause them distress in order that they may find out.”+

19 Woe to me on account of my breakdown!+ My stroke has become sickish.* And I myself have said: “Surely this is my sickness, and I shall carry it.+ 20 My own tent has been despoiled, and my own tent cords have all been torn in two.+ My own sons have gone forth from me, and they are no more.+ There is no one stretching out my tent anymore or raising up my tent cloths. 21 For the shepherds have behaved unreasoningly,+ and they have not looked even for Jehovah.+ That is why they have not acted with insight, and all their pastured animals have been scattered.”+

22 Listen! A report! Here it* has come, also a great pounding from the land of the north,+ in order to make the cities of Judah a desolate waste, the lair of jackals.+

23 I well know, O Jehovah, that to earthling man* his way does not belong. It does not belong to man* who is walking even to direct his step.+ 24 Correct me, O Jehovah, however with judgment;+ not in your anger,+ that you may not reduce me to nothing.+ 25 Pour out your rage upon the nations+ who have ignored you,*+ and upon the families who have not called even upon your name.+ For they have eaten up Jacob.+ Yes, they have eaten him up, and they keep at exterminating him;+ and his abiding place they have desolated.+

11 The word that occurred to Jeremiah* from Jehovah, saying: 2 “Hear the words of this covenant, YOU men!

“And you must speak+ them to the men* of Judah and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, 3 and you must say to them, ‘This is what Jehovah the God of Israel has said: “Cursed is the man* that does not listen to the words of this covenant,+ 4 which I commanded YOUR forefathers in the day of my bringing them out of the land of Egypt,+ out of the furnace of iron,+ saying, ‘Obey my voice, and YOU must do things according to all that I command YOU;+ and YOU will certainly become my people and I myself shall become YOUR God,*+ 5 for the purpose of carrying out the oath that I swore to YOUR forefathers,+ to give them the land flowing with milk and honey,+ as in this day.’”’”

And I proceeded to answer and say: “Amen,* O Jehovah.”

6 And Jehovah went on to say to me: “Proclaim all these words in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem,+ saying, ‘Hear, YOU people, the words of this covenant, and YOU must do them.+ 7 For I solemnly admonished YOUR forefathers in the day of my bringing them up out of the land of Egypt+ and down to this day, rising up early and admonishing, saying: “Obey my voice.”+ 8 But they did not listen or incline their ear,+ but they kept walking each one in the stubbornness of their bad heart;+ and so I brought upon them all the words of this covenant that I commanded [them] to do, but that they did not do.’”

9 Furthermore, Jehovah said to me: “Conspiracy has been found among the men of Judah and among the inhabitants of Jerusalem.+ 10 They have returned to the errors of their forefathers,+ the first ones, who refused to obey* my words, but who themselves have walked after other gods* in order to serve them.+ The house of Israel and the house of Judah have broken my covenant that I concluded with their forefathers.+ 11 Therefore this is what Jehovah has said, ‘Here I am bringing upon them a calamity+ that they will not be able to get out of;+ and they will certainly call to me for aid, but I shall not listen to them.+ 12 And the cities of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem will have to go and call for aid to the gods* to which they are making sacrificial smoke,+ but which will positively bring no salvation to them in the time of their calamity.+ 13 For your gods have become as many as your cities, O Judah;+ and as many altars as the streets of Jerusalem YOU people have placed for the shameful thing,+ altars to make sacrificial smoke to Baal.’+

14 “And as for you, do not pray in behalf of this people, and do not lift up in their behalf an entreating cry or a prayer,+ for I shall not be listening in the time of their calling out to me in regard to their calamity.*+

15 “What business does my beloved one have in my house,+ that many of them should do this thing,+ the [evil] device?+ And with holy flesh will they make [it] pass over from upon you,+ when your calamity [comes]? At that time will you exult?+ 16 ‘A luxuriant olive tree, pretty with fruit [and] in form,’ is what Jehovah has called your name.+ With sound of the great roaring, he has set a fire blazing against her, and they have broken its branches.+

17 “And Jehovah of armies himself, the Planter of you,*+ has spoken against you a calamity on account of the badness of the house of Israel+ and the house of Judah that they have committed on their own part to offend me in making sacrificial smoke to Baal.”+

18 And Jehovah himself has informed me that I may know. At that time you caused me to see their dealings.+ 19 And I was like a male lamb, an intimate one, that is brought to slaughter,+ and I did not know that it was against me that they thought out schemes:+ “Let us bring to ruin the tree with its food, and let us cut him off from the land of the living ones,+ that his very name may no more be remembered.” 20 But Jehovah of armies is judging with righteousness;+ he is examining the kidneys* and the heart.+ O may I see your vengeance on them, for it is to you that I have revealed my case at law.+

21 Therefore this is what Jehovah has said against the men of Anathoth+ who are seeking for your soul,* saying: “You must not prophesy in the name of Jehovah,+ that you may not die at our hand”; 22 therefore this is what Jehovah of armies has said: “Here I am turning my attention upon them. The young men themselves will die by the sword.+ Their sons and their daughters themselves will die by the famine.+ 23 And not even a remnant will there come to be for them, because I shall bring calamity upon the men of Anathoth,+ the year of their being given attention.”+

12 You are righteous,+ O Jehovah, when I make my complaint to you, indeed when I speak even about matters of judgment with you. Why is it that the way of wicked ones is what has succeeded,+ that all those who are committing treachery are the unworried ones? 2 You have planted them; they have also taken root. They keep going ahead; they have also produced fruit. You are near in their mouth, but far away from their kidneys.*+  Mal.3:15 3 And you yourself, O Jehovah, know me well;+ you see me, and you have examined my heart in union with yourself.+ Single them out like sheep for the slaughtering,+ and set them apart* for the day of killing. 4 How long should the land keep withering away,+ and the very vegetation of all the field dry up?+ Because of the badness of those dwelling in it the beasts and the flying creatures have been swept away.+ For they have said: “He does not see our future.”

5 Because with footmen you have run, and they would tire you out, how, then, can you run a race with horses?+ And in the land of peace are you confident?*+ So how will you act among the proud [thickets] along the Jordan?+ 6 For even your own brothers and the household of your own father, even they themselves have dealt treacherously with you.+ Even they themselves have called out loudly behind you. Do not put any faith in them, just because they speak to you good things.+

7 “I have left my house;+ I have deserted my inheritance;+ I have given the beloved one of my soul into the palm of her enemies.+ 8 My inheritance has become to me like a lion in the forest. She has let loose her voice even against me. That is why I have hated her.+ 9 My inheritance+ is as a many-colored bird of prey to me; the birds of prey are round about upon it.+ Come, gather together, all YOU wild beasts of the field; bring [them] to eat.+ 10 Many shepherds+ themselves have brought my vineyard to ruin;+ they have stamped down my share.+ They have turned my desirable+ share into a wilderness of a desolate waste. 11 One has made it a desolate waste;+ it has withered away;* it is desolated to me.+ The whole land has been made desolate, because there is no man* that has taken [it] to heart.+ 12 On all the beaten paths through the wilderness the despoilers have come. For the sword belonging to Jehovah is devouring from one end of the land even to the other end of the land.+ There is no peace for any flesh. 13 They have sown wheat, but thorns are what they have reaped.+ They have worked themselves sick; they will be of no benefit.+ And they will certainly be* ashamed of the products of YOU people because of the burning anger of Jehovah.”

14 This is what Jehovah has said against all my bad neighbors,*+ who are touching the hereditary possession that I caused my people, even Israel, to possess:+ “Here I am uprooting them from off their ground;+ and the house of Judah I shall uproot from the midst of them.+ 15 And it must occur that after my uprooting them I shall again certainly have mercy upon them+ and will bring them back, each one to his hereditary possession and each one to his land.”+

16 “And it must occur that if they will without fail learn the ways of my people in swearing by my name,+ ‘As Jehovah is alive!’ just as they taught my people to swear by Baal,+ they will also be built up in the midst of my people.+ 17 But if they will not obey, I will also uproot that nation, uprooting and destroying [it],”+ is the utterance of Jehovah.

13 This is what Jehovah has said to me: “Go,* and you must get for yourself a linen belt and put it upon your hips, but you must not bring it into any water.” 2 So I got the belt in accord with the word of Jehovah and put it upon my hips. 3 And the word of Jehovah proceeded to occur to me a second time, saying: 4 “Take the belt that you got, that is upon your hips, and rise up, go to the Euphrates,+ and hide it there in a cleft of the crag.” 5 So I went and hid it by the Euphrates, just as Jehovah had commanded me.

6 But it came about at the end of many days that Jehovah proceeded to say to me: “Rise up, go to the Euphrates and take from there the belt that I commanded you to hide there.” 7 Accordingly I went to the Euphrates and dug and took the belt from the place in which I had hid it, and, look! the belt had been ruined; it was not fit for anything.

8 Then the word of Jehovah occurred to me, saying: 9 “This is what Jehovah has said, ‘In the same way I shall bring to ruin the pride of Judah+ and the abundant pride of Jerusalem. 10 This bad people who are refusing to obey my words,+ who are walking in the stubbornness of their heart+ and who keep walking after other gods* in order to serve them and to bow down to them,+ will also become just like this belt that is fit for nothing.’ 11 ‘For just as a belt clings to the hips of a man,* so I caused the whole house of Israel and the whole house of Judah to cling even to me,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘in order to become to me a people+ and a name+ and a praise and something beautiful; but they did not obey.’+

12 “And you must say to them this word, ‘This is what Jehovah the God* of Israel has said: “Every large jar is something that gets filled with wine.”’+ And they will certainly say to you, ‘Do we not positively know that every large jar is something that gets filled with wine?’ 13 And you must say to them, ‘This is what Jehovah has said: “Here I am filling all the inhabitants of this land and the kings that are sitting for David+ upon his throne and the priests and the prophets and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem with drunkenness.+ 14 And I will dash them one against another, both the fathers and the sons, at the same time,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah. “I shall show no compassion, nor feel any sorrow, and I shall not have the mercy to keep from bringing them to ruin.”’+

15 “Hear, YOU people, and give ear. Do not be haughty,+ for Jehovah himself has spoken.+ 16 Give to Jehovah YOUR God* glory,+ before he causes darkness+ and before YOUR feet strike up against each other on the mountains at dusk.+ And YOU will certainly hope for the light,+ and he will actually make it deep shadow;+ he will turn [it] into thick gloom.+ 17 And if YOU will not hear it,+ in places of concealment my soul will weep because of pride and will positively shed tears; and my eye will run down with tears,+ because the drove+ of Jehovah will have been carried captive.

18 “Say to the king and to the lady,+ ‘Seat yourselves in a lower place,+ for down from YOUR heads* YOUR crown of beauty will certainly come.’+ 19 The cities of the south* themselves have been shut up, so that there is no one opening [them]. Judah in its entirety has been taken into exile. It has been taken into exile completely.+

20 “Raise your* eyes* and see those who are coming from the north.+ Where is the drove that one gave to you,* your beautiful flock?+ 21 What will you say when one* turns his attention upon you,+ when you yourself have taught them as confidential friends right alongside you at the start?+ Will not birth pangs themselves seize hold of you, like those of a wife* giving birth?+ 22 And when you will say in your heart,+ ‘Why is it that these things have befallen me?’+ because of the abundance of your error your skirts have been taken off as a cover;+ your heels have been treated violently.

23 “Can a Cushite*+ change his skin? or a leopard its spots?+ YOU yourselves would also be able to do good, who are persons taught to do bad.+ 24 So I shall scatter them+ like stubble that is passing along in the wind from the wilderness.+ 25 This is your* lot, your measured portion from me,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah, “because you have forgotten me+ and you keep putting your trust in falsehood.+ 26 And I myself also will lift up your skirts over your face, and your dishonor will certainly be seen,+ 27 your acts of adultery+ and your neighings,+ your loose conduct in prostitution. Upon the hills, in the field, I have seen your disgusting things.+ Woe to you, O Jerusalem! You cannot be clean+—after how much longer?”+

14  [This is] what occurred as the word of Jehovah to Jeremiah* concerning the matters of the droughts:+ 2 Judah has gone mourning,+ and its very gates have faded away.+ They have become dejected to the earth,+ and even the outcry of Jerusalem has gone up.+ 3 And their majestic ones themselves have sent their insignificant* ones for water.+ They have come to the ditches. They have found no water.+ They have returned with their vessels empty. They have been put to shame+ and have been disappointed, and they have covered their head.+ 4 On account of the soil that has been shattered because there has occurred no downpour upon the land,+ the farmers have become ashamed; they have covered their head.+ 5 For even the hind in the field has given birth, but leaving* [it], because there proved to be no tender grass. 6 And the zebras+ themselves have stood still upon the bare hills; they have snuffed up the wind like the jackals; their eyes have failed because there is no vegetation.+ 7 Even if our own errors do testify against us, O Jehovah, act for the sake of your name;+ for our acts of unfaithfulness have become many;+ it is against you that we have sinned.+

8 O you the hope of Israel,*+ the Savior of him+ in the time of distress,+ why do you become like an alien resident in the land, and like a traveler that has turned aside to spend the night?+ 9 Why do you become like a man* astounded, like a mighty man* that is unable to do any saving?+ Yet you yourself are in the midst of us,+ O Jehovah, and upon us it is that your own name has been called.+ Do not let us down.

10 This is what Jehovah has said concerning this people: “Thus they have loved to wander about;+ their feet they have not kept in check.+ So Jehovah himself has taken no pleasure in them.+ Now he will remember their error and will give attention to their sins.”+

11 And Jehovah proceeded to say to me: “Do not pray in behalf of this people for any good.+ 12 When they fast, I am not listening to their entreating cry;+ and when they offer up the whole burnt offering and the grain offering, I am taking no pleasure in them;+ for by the sword and by famine and by pestilence I am bringing them to their end.”+

13 At this I said: “Alas, O Sovereign Lord Jehovah! Here the prophets are saying to them, ‘YOU will see no sword, and there will be no famine to happen to YOU, but true peace* is what I shall give YOU in this place.’”+

14 And Jehovah went on to say to me: “Falsehood is what the prophets are prophesying in my name.+ I have not sent them, nor have I commanded them or spoken to them.+ A false vision and divination and a valueless thing+ and the trickiness of their heart they are speaking prophetically to YOU people.+ 15 Therefore this is what Jehovah has said concerning the prophets who are prophesying in my name and whom I myself did not send and who are saying that no sword or famine will occur in this land, ‘By sword and by famine those prophets will come to their finish.+ 16 And the very people to whom they are prophesying will become people cast out into the streets of Jerusalem because of the famine and the sword, with no one to do the burying of them—them, their wives and their sons and their daughters.+ And I will pour out upon them their calamity.’+

17 “And you must say to them this word, ‘Let my eyes run down with tears night and day and let them not keep still,+ for with a great crash the virgin daughter of my people has been broken,+ with an extremely sickish stroke.+ 18 If I actually go out into the field, look, now, those slain by the sword!+ And if I actually come into the city, look, also, the maladies from the famine!+ For both the prophet and the priest themselves have gone around to a land that they have not known.’”+

19 Have you absolutely rejected Judah,+ or has your soul abhorred even Zion?+ Why is it that you have struck us, so that there is no healing for us?+ There was a hoping for peace, but no good [came]; and for a time of healing, and, look! terror!+ 20 We do acknowledge, O Jehovah, our wickedness, the error of our forefathers,+ for we have sinned against you.+ 21 Do not disrespect [us] for the sake of your name;+ do not despise your glorious throne.+ Remember; do not break your covenant with us.+ 22 Do there exist among the vain idols+ of the nations any that can pour down rain, or can even the heavens themselves give copious showers?+ Are you not the One, O Jehovah our God?+ And we hope in you, for you yourself have done all these things.+

15 And Jehovah proceeded to say to me: “If Moses+ and Samuel+ were standing before me, my soul would not be toward this people.+ There would be a sending of them away from before my face, that they might go out.+ 2 And it must occur that should they say to you, ‘Where shall we go out to?’ you must also say to them, ‘This is what Jehovah has said: “Whoever is for deadly plague, to deadly plague! And whoever is for the sword, to the sword! And whoever is for the famine, to the famine!+ And whoever is for the captivity, to the captivity!”’+

3 “‘And I will commission over them four families,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘the sword to kill, and the dogs to drag away, and the flying creatures of the heavens+ and the beasts of the earth to eat and to bring to ruin. 4 And I will give them for a quaking to all the kingdoms of the earth+ on account of Manasseh the son of Hezekiah,* the king of Judah, for what he did in Jerusalem.+ 5 For who will show compassion upon you, O Jerusalem, and who will sympathize with you,+ and who will turn aside to ask about your welfare?’

6 “‘You yourself have deserted me,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah. ‘Backwards is the way you keep walking.+ And I shall stretch out my hand against you and bring you to ruin.+ I have got tired of feeling regret.+ 7 And I shall winnow them with a fork+ in the gates of the land. I shall certainly bereave [them] of children.+ I will destroy my people, [since] they have not turned back from their own ways.+ 8 To me their* widows have become more numerous than the sand grains of the seas. I will bring for them, upon mother, young man, the despoiler at midday.+ I will cause to fall upon them* suddenly excitement and disturbances.+ 9 The woman giving birth to seven has faded away; her soul has struggled for breath.+ Her sun has set while it is yet day;+ it has become ashamed and felt abashed.’ ‘And to the sword I shall give the mere remnant of them before their enemies,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah.”

10 Woe to me,+ O my mother, because you have given birth to me, a man subject to quarrel and a man subject to strife with all the earth.+ I have given no loan, and they have given me no loan. All of them* are calling down evil upon me.+

11 Jehovah has said: “Surely I will minister to you for good.+ Surely I will intercede for you in the time of calamity+ and in the time of distress, against the enemy.+ 12 Can one break iron in pieces, iron out of the north, and copper? 13 Your resources and your treasures I shall give for mere plunder,+ not for a price, but for all your sins, even in all your territories.+ 14 And I will cause [them] to pass over with your enemies into a land that you have not known.+ For a fire itself has been ignited in my anger.+ Against YOU people it is kindled.”

15 You yourself have known.+ O Jehovah, remember me+ and turn your attention to me and avenge me upon my persecutors.+ In your slowness to anger do not take me away.+ Take note of my bearing reproach on account of your own self.+ 16 Your words were found, and I proceeded to eat them;+ and your word becomes to me the exultation+ and the rejoicing of my heart;+ for your name has been called upon me,+ O Jehovah God of armies.+ 17 I have not sat down in the intimate group of those playing jokes+ and begun exulting.+ Because of your hand I have sat down all by myself,+ for it is with denunciation that you have filled me.+ 18 Why has my pain become chronic+ and my stroke incurable?+ It has refused to be healed. You positively become to me like something deceitful,+ like waters that have proved untrustworthy.+

19 Therefore this is what Jehovah has said: “If you will come back, then I shall bring you back.+ Before me you will stand.+ And if you will bring forth what is precious from valueless things, you will become like my own mouth. They themselves will come back to you, but you yourself will not come back to them.”

20 “And I have made you to this people a fortified copper wall;+ and they will certainly fight against you, but they will not prevail over you.+ For I am with you, to save you and to deliver you,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah. 21 “And I will deliver you out of the hand of the bad ones,+ and I will redeem you out of the palm of the tyrannical ones.”

16 And the word of Jehovah continued to occur to me, saying: 2 “You must not take for yourself a wife, and you must not come to have sons and daughters in this place.+ 3 For this is what Jehovah has said concerning the sons and concerning the daughters that are born in this place, and concerning their mothers who are giving them birth and concerning their fathers who are causing their birth in this land,+ 4 ‘With deaths from maladies they will die.+ They will not be bewailed,+ neither will they be buried.+ As manure upon the surface of the ground they will become;+ and by the sword and by famine they will come to an end,+ and their dead bodies will actually serve as food for the flying creatures of the heavens and for the beasts of the earth.’+

5 “For this is what Jehovah has said, ‘Do not enter into the house of a mourners’ feast, and do not go to bewail and do not sympathize with them.’+

“‘For I have taken away my peace from this people,’ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘even loving-kindness* and mercies.+ 6 And they will certainly die, the great ones and the small ones, in this land. They will not be buried,+ neither will people beat themselves for them, nor will anyone make cuts upon himself+ or make himself bald for them.+ 7 And they will not deal out to them any bread on account of mourning to comfort someone over the dead;+ neither will they give them the cup of consolation to drink on account of one’s father and on account of one’s mother.+ 8 And you must enter no house of banqueting at all to sit down with them to eat and to drink.’+

9 “For this is what Jehovah of armies, the God* of Israel, has said, ‘Here I am causing to cease out of this place before the eyes of YOU people and in YOUR days the voice of exultation and the voice of rejoicing, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride.’+

10 “And it must occur that, when you tell to this people all these words and they actually say to you, ‘On what account has Jehovah spoken against us all this great calamity, and what is our error and what is our sin with which we have sinned against Jehovah our God?’+ 11 you must also say to them, ‘“On account of the fact that YOUR fathers left me,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah, “and they kept going after other gods* and serving them and bowing down to them.+ But me they left, and my law they did not keep.+ 12 And YOU yourselves have acted worse in YOUR doing than YOUR fathers,+ and here YOU are walking each one after the stubbornness+ of his bad heart in not obeying me.+ 13 And I will hurl YOU out from off this land+ into the land that YOU yourselves have not known,+ neither YOUR fathers, and there YOU will have to serve other gods+ day and night, because I shall not give YOU any favor.”’

14 “‘Therefore,* look! days are coming,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘when it will no more be said: “As Jehovah is alive who brought the sons of Israel up out of the land of Egypt!”+ 15 but: “As Jehovah is alive who brought the sons of Israel up out of the land of the north and out of all the lands to which he had dispersed them!” and I shall certainly bring them back to their soil, which I gave to their forefathers.’+

16 “‘Here I am sending for many fishers,’ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘and they will certainly fish for them; and afterward I shall send for many hunters,+ and they will certainly hunt them from every mountain and from every hill and out of the clefts of the crags.+ 17 For my eyes are upon all their ways. They have not been concealed from before me, neither has their error been hid from in front of my eyes.+ 18 And, first of all, I will repay the full amount* of their error+ and of their sin, on account of their profaning my land.+ With the corpses of their disgusting things and their detestable things they had filled my inheritance.’”+

19 O Jehovah my strength and my stronghold, and my place for flight in the day of distress,+ to you the nations themselves will come from the ends of the earth,*+ and they will say: “Indeed our forefathers came to possess sheer falsehood,+ vanity and things in which there was nothing beneficial.”+ 20 Can earthling man make for himself gods when they are no gods?+

21 “Therefore here I am causing them to know; at this one time I shall cause them to know my hand and my mightiness,+ and they will have to know that my name is Jehovah.”+

17 “The sin of Judah is written down with an iron stylus.+ With a diamond point it is engraved on the tablet of their heart,+ and on the horns of their* altars,+ 2 when their sons remember their altars and their sacred poles* beside a luxuriant tree, upon the high hills,+ 3 [on] the mountains in the field. Your* resources, all your treasures, I shall give for mere plunder+—your high places because of sin throughout all your territories.+ 4 And you let loose, even of your own accord, from your hereditary possession that I had given you.+ I also will make you serve your enemies in the land that you have not known;+ for as a fire YOU people have been ignited in my anger.+ To time indefinite it will keep kindled.”

5 This is what Jehovah has said: “Cursed is the able-bodied man* who puts his trust in earthling man*+ and actually makes flesh his arm,+ and whose heart turns away from Jehovah himself.+ Ps.146:3 6 And he will certainly become like a solitary tree in the desert plain and will not see when good comes;+ but he must reside in parched places* in the wilderness, in a salt country that is not inhabited.+ 7 Blessed is the able-bodied man who puts his trust in Jehovah, and whose confidence* Jehovah has become.+ 8 And he will certainly become like a tree planted by the waters, that sends out its roots right by the watercourse; and he will not see when heat comes, but his foliage will actually prove to be luxuriant.+ And in the year of drought+ he will not become anxious, nor will he leave off from producing fruit. Josh.1:7-8; Ps.1:1-3

9 “The heart is more treacherous than anything else and is desperate.+ Who can know it? 10 I, Jehovah, am searching the heart,+ examining the kidneys,*+ even to give to each one according to his ways,*+ according to the fruitage of his dealings.+ 11 [As] the partridge that has gathered together* what it has not laid is the one making riches, but not with justice.+ At the half of his days he will leave them,+ and in his finale he will prove to be senseless.”+

12 There is the glorious throne on high from the start;+ it is the place of our sanctuary.+ 13 O Jehovah, the hope of Israel,+ all those who are leaving you will be put to shame.+ Those apostatizing from me+ will be written down even in the earth, because they have left the source of living water, Jehovah.+ 14 Heal me, O Jehovah, and I shall be healed.+ Save me, and I will be saved;+ for you are my praise.+

15 Look! There are those saying to me: “Where is the word of Jehovah?+ Let it come in, please.” 16 But as for me, I did not hasten from being a shepherd following you, and for the desperate day I did not show any craving. You yourself have known the expression of my lips; in front of your face it has occurred. 17 Do not become something terrifying to me.+ You are my refuge in the day of calamity.+ 18 Let my persecutors be put to shame,+ but let me personally be put to no shame.+ Let them be the ones to be struck with terror, but let me personally not be struck with terror. Bring upon them the day of calamity,+ and break them even with twice as much breakdown.+

19 This is what Jehovah has said to me: “Go,* and you must stand in the gate of the sons of the people by which the kings of Judah enter in and by which they go out, and in all the gates of Jerusalem.+ 20 And you must say to them, ‘Hear the word of Jehovah, YOU kings of Judah and all Judah and all YOU inhabitants of Jerusalem, who are entering in by these gates.+ 21 This is what Jehovah has said: “Watch out for YOUR souls,*+ and do not carry on the sabbath day any load that YOU must bring in through the gates of Jerusalem.+ 22 And YOU must bring no load out of YOUR homes on the sabbath day; and no work at all must YOU do.+ And YOU must sanctify the sabbath day, just as I commanded YOUR forefathers;+ 23 but they did not listen or incline their ear,+ and they proceeded to harden their neck+ in order not to hear and in order to receive no discipline.”’+

24 “‘“And it must occur that, if YOU strictly obey me,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah, “to bring in no load through the gates of this city on the sabbath day+ and to sanctify the sabbath day by not doing on it any work,+ 25 there will also certainly enter in by the gates of this city kings with princes,+ sitting on the throne of David,+ riding in the chariot and upon horses, they and their princes, the men* of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem; and this city will certainly be inhabited to time indefinite. 26 And people will actually come from the cities of Judah and from round about Jerusalem and from the land of Benjamin+ and from the lowland*+ and from the mountainous region+ and from the Negeb,*+ bringing whole burnt offering+ and sacrifice+ and grain offering+ and frankincense+ and bringing thanksgiving sacrifice into the house of Jehovah.+

27 “‘“But if YOU will not obey me by sanctifying the sabbath day and not carrying a load,+ but there is a coming in [with it] through the gates of Jerusalem on the sabbath day, I will also set a fire ablaze in her gates,+ and it will certainly devour the dwelling towers of Jerusalem+ and will not be extinguished.”’”+

18 The word that occurred to Jeremiah* from Jehovah, saying: 2 “Rise up, and you must go down to the house of the potter,+ and there I shall cause you to hear my words.”

3 And I proceeded to go down to the house of the potter, and there he was doing work upon the potter’s wheels. 4 And the vessel that he was making with the clay was spoiled by the potter’s hand, and he turned back and went making it into another vessel, just as it looked right in the eyes of the potter* to make.+

5 And the word of Jehovah continued to occur to me, saying: 6 “‘Am I not able to do just like this potter to YOU people, O house of Israel?’ is the utterance of Jehovah. ‘Look! As the clay in the hand of the potter, so YOU are in my hand, O house of Israel.+ 7 At any moment that I may speak against a nation and against a kingdom to uproot [it] and to pull [it] down and to destroy [it],+ 8 and that nation actually turns back from its badness against which I spoke,+ I will also feel regret over the calamity that I had thought to execute upon it.+ 9 But at any moment that I may speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom to build [it] up and to plant [it],+ 10 and it actually does what is bad in my eyes by not obeying my voice,+ I will also feel regret over the good that I said [to myself] to do for its good.’

11 “And now say, please, to the men of Judah and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, ‘This is what Jehovah has said: “Here I am forming against YOU a calamity and thinking against YOU a thought.+ Turn back, please, each one from his bad way, and make YOUR ways and YOUR dealings good.”’”+

12 And they said: “It is hopeless!+ For after our own thoughts we shall walk, and we are going to carry out each one the stubbornness of his bad heart.”+

13 Therefore this is what Jehovah has said: “Ask for yourselves, please, among the nations. Who has heard things like these? There is a horrible thing that the virgin of Israel has done to an excess.+ 14 Will the snow of Lebanon go away from the rock of the open field? Or will strange waters, cool, trickling, be dried up? 15 For my people have forgotten me+ in that they make sacrificial smoke to something worthless,+ and in that they make men stumble in their ways,+ the paths of long ago,+ to walk in roadways, a way not banked up, 16 in order to make their land an object of astonishment,+ for whistling at to time indefinite.+ Every last one passing along by it will stare in astonishment and shake his head.+ 17 As with an east wind I shall scatter them before the enemy.+ The back, and not the face,+ I shall show them in the day of their disaster.”

18 And they proceeded to say: “Come, men, and let us think out against Jeremiah some thoughts,+ for the law will not perish from the priest+ or counsel from the wise one or the word from the prophet.+ Come and let us strike him with the tongue,+ and let us pay no attention to any of his words.”

19 Do pay attention to me, O Jehovah, and listen to the voice of my opponents.*+ 20 Should bad be repaid for good?+ For they have excavated a pit for my soul.+ Remember my standing before you to speak good even concerning them, to turn back your rage from them.+ 21 Therefore give their sons over to the famine,+ and deliver them over to the power* of the sword;+ and may their wives become women bereaved of children, and widows.+ And may their own men become those killed with deadly plague, their young men those struck down with the sword in the battle.+ 22 Let a cry be heard out of their houses, when you bring upon them suddenly a marauder band.+ For they have excavated a pit to capture me, and traps they have hid for my feet.+

23 But you yourself, O Jehovah, well know all their counsel against me for [my] death.+ Do not cover over* their error, and do not wipe out that sin of theirs from before you; but let them become those who are made to stumble before you.+ In the time of your anger take action against them.+

19 This is what Jehovah said: “Go,* and you must get an earthenware flask of a potter+ and some of the older men of the people and some of the older men of the priests. 2 And you must go out to the valley of the son of Hinnom,*+ which is at the entrance of the Gate of the Potsherds.* And there you must proclaim the words that I shall speak to you.+ 3 And you must say, ‘Hear the word of Jehovah, O YOU kings of Judah and YOU inhabitants of Jerusalem.+ This is what Jehovah of armies,+ the God* of Israel, has said:

“‘“Here I am bringing a calamity upon this place, of which when anyone hears, his ears will tingle;+ 4 for the reason that they have left me+ and have proceeded to make this place unrecognizable+ and to make sacrificial smoke in it to other gods* whom they had not known,+ they and their forefathers and the kings of Judah; and they have filled this place with the blood of the innocent ones.+ 5 And they built the high places of the Baal in order to burn their sons in the fire as whole burnt offerings to the Baal,+ something that I had not commanded or spoken of,+ and that had not come up into my heart.”’+

6 “‘“Therefore, look! there are days coming,” is the utterance of Jehovah, “when this place will be called no more Topheth+ and the valley of the son of Hinnom,+ but the valley of the killing. 7 And I will make void the counsel of Judah and of Jerusalem in this place,+ and I will cause them to fall by the sword before their enemies and by the hand of those seeking for their soul.+ And I will give their dead bodies as food to the flying creatures of the heavens and to the beasts of the earth.+ 8 And I will make this city an object of astonishment and something to be whistled at.+ Every last one passing along by it will stare in astonishment and whistle over all its plagues.+ 9 And I will make them eat the flesh of their sons and the flesh of their daughters; and they will eat each one the flesh of his fellowman, because of the tightness and because of the stress with which their enemies and those seeking for their soul will hem them in.”’+

10 “And you must break the flask before the eyes of the men who are going with you. 11 And you must say to them, ‘This is what Jehovah of armies has said: “In the same way I shall break this people and this city as someone breaks the vessel of the potter so that it is no more able to be repaired;+ and in Topheth+ they will bury until there is no more place* to bury.”’+

12 “‘That is how I shall do to this place,’ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘and to the inhabitants of it, even to make this city like Topheth.+ 13 And the houses of Jerusalem and the houses of the kings of Judah must become like the place of Topheth,+ unclean ones, that is, all the houses upon the roofs of which they made sacrificial smoke to all the army of the heavens+ and there was a pouring out of drink offerings to other gods.’”*+

14 And Jeremiah proceeded to come from Topheth,+ to which Jehovah had sent him to prophesy, and to stand in the courtyard of the house of Jehovah and say to all the people:+ 15 “This is what Jehovah of armies, the God* of Israel, has said, ‘Here I am bringing upon this city and upon all its cities all the calamity that I have spoken against it, because they have hardened their neck in order not to obey my words.’”+

20  Now Pashhur the son of Immer,+ the priest, who was also the leading commissioner in the house of Jehovah,+ kept listening to Jeremiah while prophesying these words. 2 Then Pashhur struck Jeremiah the prophet+ and put him into the stocks+ that were in the Upper Gate of Benjamin, which was in the house of Jehovah. 3 But it came about on the following day that Pashhur proceeded to let Jeremiah out from the stocks,+ and Jeremiah now said to him:

“Jehovah has called your name,+ not Pashhur,* but Fright all around.*+ 4 For this is what Jehovah has said, ‘Here I am making you a fright to yourself and to all your lovers,* and they will certainly fall by the sword of their enemies+ while your eyes will be looking on;+ and all Judah I shall give into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he will actually take them into exile in Babylon and strike them down with the sword.+ 5 And I will give all the stored-up things of this city and all its product and all its precious things; and all the treasures of the kings of Judah I am going to give into the hand of their enemies.+ And they will certainly plunder them and take them and bring them to Babylon.*+ 6 And as for you, O Pashhur, and all the inhabitants of your house, YOU will go into captivity;+ and to Babylon you will come and there you will die and there you yourself will be buried with all your lovers,+ because you have prophesied to them in falsehood.’”+

7 You have fooled me, O Jehovah, so that I was fooled. You used your strength against me, so that you prevailed.+ I became an object of laughter all day long; everyone is holding me in derision.+ 8 For as often as I speak, I cry out. Violence and despoiling are what I call out.+ For the word of Jehovah became for me a cause for reproach and for jeering all day long.+ 9 And I said: “I am not going to make mention of him, and I shall speak no more in his name.”+ And in my heart it proved to be like a burning fire shut up in my bones; and I got tired of holding in, and I was unable [to endure it].*+ 10 For I heard the bad report of many.+ There was fright all around.* “TELL out, that we may tell out about him.”+ Every mortal man bidding me “Peace!”*—they are watching for my limping:+ “Perhaps he will be fooled,+ so that we may prevail against him and take our revenge upon him.” 11 But Jehovah was with me+ like a terrible mighty one.+ That is why the very ones persecuting me will stumble and not prevail.+ They will certainly be put to much shame, because they will not have prospered. [Their] indefinitely lasting humiliation will be one that will not be forgotten.+

12 But you, O Jehovah of armies, are examining the righteous one;+ you are seeing the kidneys* and the heart.+ May I see your vengeance upon them,+ for to you I have revealed my case at law.+

13 Sing to Jehovah, YOU people! Praise Jehovah! For he has delivered the soul of the poor one out of the hand of evildoers.+

14 Cursed be the day on which I was born! May the day that my mother gave me birth not become blessed!+ 15 Cursed be the man* that brought good news to my father, saying: “There has been born to you a son, a male!” He positively made him rejoice.+ 16 And that very man must become like cities that Jehovah has overthrown while He has felt no regret.+ And he must hear an outcry in the morning and an alarm signal at the time of midday.+

17 Why did he not definitely put me to death from the womb, that my mother should become to me my burial place and her womb be pregnant to time indefinite?+ 18 Why is it that I have come forth from the very womb+ in order to see hard work and grief+ and that my days should come to their end in mere shame?+  

21 The word+ that occurred to Jeremiah from Jehovah, when King Zedekiah*+ sent to him Pashhur+ the son of Malchiah and Zephaniah+ the son of Maaseiah, the priest, saying: 2 “Please inquire in our behalf of Jehovah,+ because Nebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon is making war against us.+ Perhaps Jehovah will do with us according to all his wonderful works, so that he will withdraw from us.”+

3 And Jeremiah proceeded to say to them: “This is what YOU will say to Zedekiah, 4 ‘This is what Jehovah the God of Israel has said: “Here I am turning in reverse the weapons of war that are in the hand of YOU people, with which YOU are fighting the king of Babylon,+ and the Chaldeans+ who are laying siege against YOU outside the wall, and I will gather them into the middle of this city.+ 5 And I myself will fight against YOU+ with a stretched-out hand and with a strong arm and with anger and with rage and with great indignation.+ 6 And I will strike the inhabitants of this city, both man* and beast. With a great pestilence they will die.”’+

7 “‘“And after that,” is the utterance of Jehovah, “I shall give Zedekiah the king of Judah and his servants and the people and those who are remaining over in this city from the pestilence, from the sword and from the famine, into the hand of Nebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon, even into the hand of their enemies and into the hand of those who are seeking for their soul, and he will certainly strike them with the edge* of the sword.+ He will not feel sorry for them, nor will he show compassion or have any mercy.”’+

8 “And to this people you will say, ‘This is what Jehovah has said: “Here I am putting before YOU people the way of life and the way of death.+ 9 The one sitting still in this city will die by the sword and by the famine and by the pestilence;+ but the one who is going out and who actually falls away* to the Chaldeans who are laying siege against YOU will keep living, and his soul will certainly come to be his as a spoil.”’+

10 “‘“For I have set my face against this city for calamity and not for good,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah. “Into the hand of the king of Babylon it will be given,+ and he will certainly burn it with fire.”+

11 “‘And as regards the household of the king of Judah, hear, O men, the word of Jehovah.+ 12 O house of David,+ this is what Jehovah has said: “Every morning+ render sentence in justice,+ and deliver the one being robbed out of the hand of the defrauder,+ that my rage may not go forth just like a fire+ and actually burn and there be no one to extinguish it because of the badness of YOUR dealings.”’+

13 “‘Here I am against you, O inhabitress of the low plain,+ O rock of the level land,’ is the utterance of Jehovah. ‘As for YOU who are saying: “Who will descend against us? And who will come into our dwellings?”+ 14 I will also hold an accounting against YOU+ according to the fruitage of YOUR dealings,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah. ‘And I will set a fire ablaze in her forest,+ and it will certainly devour all the things round about her.’”+ 

22 This is what Jehovah has said: “Go down to the house of the king of Judah, and you must speak there this word. 2 And you must say, ‘Hear the word of Jehovah, O king of Judah who are sitting on the throne of David,+ you with your servants and your people, those who are coming in through these gates.+ 3 This is what Jehovah has said: “RENDER justice and righteousness, and deliver the one that is being robbed out of the hand of the defrauder; and do not maltreat any alien resident,* fatherless boy or widow.+ Do [them] no violence.+ And do not shed any innocent blood in this place.+ 4 For if YOU will by all means perform this word, there will also certainly come in through the gates of this house the kings sitting for David upon his throne,+ riding in chariots and on horses, he with his servants and his people.”’+

5 “‘But if YOU will not obey these words, by myself I do swear,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘that this house will become a mere devastated place.’+

6 “For this is what Jehovah has said concerning the house of the king of Judah, ‘You are as Gilead to me, the head* of Lebanon.+ Assuredly I shall make you a wilderness;+ as for the cities, not one will be inhabited.+ 7 And I will sanctify against you those bringing ruin,+ each one* and his weapons;+ and they must cut down the choicest of your cedars+ and cause them to fall into the fire.+ 8 And many nations will actually pass along by this city and say one to the other: “On what account did Jehovah do like this to this great city?”+ 9 And they will have to say: “On account of the fact that they left the covenant of Jehovah their God+ and proceeded to bow down to other gods* and to serve them.”’+

10 “Do not weep for the dead one,+ and do not sympathize with him, YOU people. Weep profusely for the one going away, for he will return no more and he will actually not see the land of his relatives. 11 For this is what Jehovah has said concerning Shallum*+ the son of Josiah, the king of Judah who is reigning instead of Josiah his father,+ who has gone forth from this place, ‘He will return there no more. 12 For in the place where they have taken him into exile he will die, and this land he will see no more.’+

13 “Woe to the one building his house,+ but not with righteousness, and his upper chambers, but not with justice, by use of his fellowman who serves for nothing, and whose wages he does not give him;+ 14 the one saying, ‘I am going to build for myself a roomy house and commodious upper chambers;+ and my windows must be widened out for it, and the paneling will be with cedar+ and smeared with vermilion.’+ 15 Will you continue reigning because you are competing by use of cedar? As for your father, did he not eat and drink and execute justice and righteousness?+ In that case it went well with him.+ 16 He pleaded the legal claim of the afflicted one and the poor one.+ In that case it went well. ‘Was not that a case of knowing me?’ is the utterance of Jehovah. 17 ‘Assuredly your eyes and your heart are upon nothing but upon your unjust gain,+ and upon the blood of the innocent one in order to shed [it],+ and upon defrauding and upon extortion in order to carry [them] on.’

18 “Therefore this is what Jehovah has said concerning Jehoiakim+ the son of Josiah, the king of Judah, ‘They will not wail for him: “Alas, my brother! And alas, [my] sister!” They will not wail for him: “Alas, O master! And alas, his dignity!”+ 19 With the burial of a he-ass he will be buried,+ with a dragging about and a throwing away, out beyond the gates of Jerusalem.’+

20 “Go up onto Lebanon+ and cry out, and on Bashan+ let your* voice out. And cry out from Abarim,*+ because all those intensely loving you have been broken.+ 21 I spoke to you during your freedom from care.+ You said, ‘I shall not obey.’+ This has been your way since your youth, for you did not obey my voice.+ 22 A wind will shepherd all your own shepherds;+ and as for those intensely loving you, they will go into captivity itself.+ For at that time you will be ashamed and certainly feel humiliated because of all your calamity.+ 23 O you who are dwelling in Lebanon,+ being nested in the cedars,+ how you will certainly sigh when there come to you birth pangs,+ the labor pains like those of a woman giving birth!”+

24 “‘As I am alive,’ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘even if Coniah*+ the son of Jehoiakim,+ the king of Judah, happened to be the seal ring+ on my right hand, from there I would pull you off!+ 25 And I will give you* into the hand of those who are seeking for your soul+ and into the hand of those of whom you are scared and into the hand of Nebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon and into the hand of the Chaldeans.+ 26 And I will hurl you and your mother+ who gave you birth out into another land in which YOU people were not born, and there is where YOU will die.+ 27 And into the land to which they will be lifting up their soul* to return, there they will not return.+ 28 Is this man* Coniah+ a mere form despised, dashed to pieces,+ or a vessel in which there is no delight?+ Why is it that he himself and his offspring must be hurled down and thrown into the land that they have not known?’+

29 “O earth, earth, earth, hear the word of Jehovah.+ 30 This is what Jehovah has said, ‘WRITE down this man as childless,+ as an able-bodied man who will not have any success in his days; for from his offspring not a single one will have any success,+ sitting upon the throne of David+ and ruling anymore in Judah.’”

23 “Woe to the shepherds who are destroying and scattering the sheep of my pasturage!”+ is the utterance of Jehovah. Ezek.34:2

2 Therefore this is what Jehovah the God of Israel has said against the shepherds who are shepherding my people: “YOU yourselves have scattered my sheep; and YOU kept dispersing them, and YOU have not turned your attention to them.”+

“Here I am turning my attention upon YOU for the badness of YOUR dealings,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah.

3 “And I myself shall collect together the remnant of my sheep out of all the lands to which I had dispersed them,+ and I will bring them back to their pasture ground,+ and they will certainly be fruitful and become many.+  Ezek.34:11 4 And I will raise up over them shepherds who will actually shepherd them;+ and they will be afraid no more, neither will they be struck with any terror,+ and none will be missing,” is the utterance of Jehovah.

5 “Look! There are days coming,” is the utterance of Jehovah, “and I will raise up to David a righteous sprout.+ And a king will certainly reign+ and act with discretion and execute justice and righteousness in the land.+ 6 In his days Judah will be saved,+ and Israel itself will reside in security.+ And this is his name with which he will be called, Jehovah Is Our Righteousness.”*+

7 “Therefore, look! there are days coming,” is the utterance of Jehovah, “and they will no more say, ‘Jehovah is alive who brought the sons of Israel up out of the land of Egypt,’+ 8 but, ‘Jehovah is alive who brought up and who brought in the offspring* of the house of Israel out of the land of the north and out of all the lands to which I have dispersed them,’ and they will certainly dwell on their own ground.”+

9 As regards the prophets, my heart has been broken within me. All my bones have begun shaking. I have become like a man* that is drunk,+ and like an able-bodied man* whom wine has overcome, because of Jehovah and because of his holy words. 10 For it is with adulterers*+ that the land has become full.+ For because of the curse* the land has gone to mourning,+ the pasture grounds of the wilderness have dried up;+ and their course of action proves to be bad, and their mightiness is not right.

11 “For both the prophet and the priest themselves have become polluted.+ Also in my own house I have found their badness,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah. 12 “Therefore their way will become for them like slippery places+ in the gloom, into which they will be pushed and certainly fall.”+

“For I shall bring upon them a calamity, the year of their being given attention,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah. 13 “And in the prophets of Samaria+ I have seen impropriety.* They have acted as prophets [incited] by Baal,+ and they keep making my people, even Israel, wander about.+ 14 And in the prophets of Jerusalem I have seen horrible things,+ committing adultery+ and walking in falsehood;+ and they have strengthened the hands of evildoers in order that they should not return,+ each one from his own badness. To me all of them have become like Sodom,+ and the inhabitants of her like Gomorrah.”+

15 Therefore this is what Jehovah of armies has said against the prophets: “Here I am making them eat wormwood, and I will give them poisoned water to drink.+ For from the prophets of Jerusalem apostasy+ has gone forth to all the land.”

16 This is what Jehovah of armies has said: “Do not listen to the words of the prophets who are prophesying to YOU people.+ They are making YOU become vain.+ The vision of their own heart is what they speak+—not from the mouth of Jehovah.+ 17 They are saying again and again to those who are disrespectful of me, ‘Jehovah has spoken: “Peace is what YOU people will come to have.”’+ And [to] every one walking in the stubbornness of his heart+ they have said, ‘No calamity will come upon YOU people.’+ 18 For who has stood in the intimate+ group of Jehovah that he might see and hear his word?+ Who has given attention to his word that he might hear it?+ 19 Look! The windstorm of Jehovah, rage itself, will certainly go forth, even a whirling tempest.+ Upon the head of the wicked ones it will whirl itself.+ 20 The anger of Jehovah will not turn back until he will have carried out+ and until he will have made the ideas of his heart come true.+ In the final part of the days YOU people will give YOUR consideration to it with understanding.+

21 “I did not send the prophets, yet they themselves ran. I did not speak to them, yet they themselves prophesied.+ 22 But if they had stood in my intimate+ group, then they would have made my people hear my own words, and they would have caused them to turn back from their bad way and from the badness of their dealings.”+

23 “Am I a God* nearby,” is the utterance of Jehovah, “and not a God far away?”+

24 “Or can any man* be concealed in places of concealment and I myself not see him?”+ is the utterance of Jehovah.

“Is it not the heavens and the earth that I myself actually fill?”+ is the utterance of Jehovah. 25 “I have heard what the prophets who are prophesying falsehood in my own name+ have said, saying, ‘I have had a dream! I have had a dream!’+ 26 How long will it exist in the heart of the prophets who are prophesying the falsehood and who are prophets of the trickiness of their own heart?+ 27 They are thinking of making my people forget my name by means of their dreams that they keep relating each one to the other,+ just as their fathers forgot my name by means of Baal.+ 28 The prophet with whom there is a dream, let him relate the dream; but the one with whom my own word is, let him speak forth my word truthfully.”+

“What does the straw have to do with the grain?”+ is the utterance of Jehovah.

29 “Is not my word correspondingly like a fire,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah, “and like a forge hammer that smashes the crag?”+

30 “Therefore here I am against the prophets,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah, “the ones who are stealing away my words, each one from his companion.”+

31 “Here I am against the prophets,” is the utterance of Jehovah, “the ones who are employing their tongue that they may utter forth, ‘An utterance!’”*+

32 “Here I am against the prophets of false dreams,” is the utterance of Jehovah, “who relate them and cause my people to wander about because of their falsehoods+ and because of their boasting.”+

“But I myself did not send them or command them. So they will by no means benefit this people,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah.

33 “And when this people or the prophet or priest asks you, saying, ‘What is the burden* of Jehovah?’+ you must also say to them, ‘“YOU people are—O what a burden!*+ And I shall certainly abandon YOU,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah.’ 34 As for the prophet or the priest or the people who say, ‘The burden of Jehovah!’ I will also turn my attention upon that man* and upon his household.+ 35 This is what YOU keep saying each one to his fellow and each one to his brother, ‘What has Jehovah answered? And what has Jehovah spoken?’+ 36 But the burden+ of Jehovah mention no more+ YOU people, for the burden itself becomes to each one his own word,+ and YOU have changed the words of the living God,*+ Jehovah of armies, our God.

37 “This is what you will say to the prophet, ‘What answer has Jehovah given you? And what has Jehovah spoken?+ 38 And if “The burden of Jehovah!” is what YOU keep on saying, therefore this is what Jehovah has said: “By reason of YOUR saying, ‘This word is the very burden of Jehovah,’ when I kept sending to YOU, saying, ‘YOU must not say: “The burden of Jehovah!”’ 39 therefore here I am! And I will give YOU people to neglect, with finality,+ and I will desert YOU and the city that I gave to YOU and to YOUR forefathers—from before me.+ 40 And I will put upon YOU reproach to time indefinite and humiliation to time indefinite, which will not be forgotten.”’”+

24 And Jehovah showed me, and, look! two baskets of figs set before the temple of Jehovah, after Nebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon had carried into exile Jeconiah*+ the son of Jehoiakim,+ the king of Judah, and the princes of Judah and the craftsmen+ and the builders of bulwarks, from Jerusalem that he might bring them to Babylon.+ 2 As for the one basket, the figs were very good, like early figs;+ and as for the other basket, the figs were very bad, so that they could not be eaten for badness.

3 And Jehovah proceeded to say to me: “What are you seeing, Jeremiah?” So I said: “Figs, the good figs being very good, and the bad ones being very bad, so that they cannot be eaten for badness.”+

4 Then the word of Jehovah occurred to me, saying: 5 “This is what Jehovah the God of Israel has said, ‘Like these good figs, so I shall regard the exiles of Judah, whom I will send away from this place to the land of the Chaldeans,+ in a good way.+ 6 And I will set my eye upon them in a good way,+ and I shall certainly cause them to return to this land.+ And I will build them up, and I shall not tear down; and I will plant them, and I shall not uproot.+ 7 And I will give them a heart to know me,+ that I am Jehovah; and they must become my people,+ and I myself shall become their God, for they will return to me with all their heart.+

8 “‘And like the bad figs that cannot be eaten for badness,+ this in fact is what Jehovah has said: “So I shall give Zedekiah+ the king of Judah and his princes and the remnant of Jerusalem who are remaining over in this land+ and those who are dwelling in the land of Egypt+— 9 I will also give them over for quaking, for calamity, in all the kingdoms of the earth,+ for reproach and for a proverbial saying, for a taunt+ and for a malediction,+ in all the places to which I shall disperse them.+ 10 And I will send against them the sword,+ the famine+ and the pestilence,+ until they come to their finish off the ground that I gave to them and to their forefathers.”’”+

25 The word that occurred to Jeremiah concerning all the people of Judah in the fourth year of Jehoiakim+ the son of Josiah, the king of Judah, that is, the first year of Nebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon; 2 which Jeremiah the prophet spoke concerning all the people of Judah and concerning all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, saying:

3 “From the thirteenth year of Josiah+ the son of Amon, the king of Judah, and down to this day, these twenty-three years the word of Jehovah has occurred to me, and I kept speaking to YOU people, rising up early and speaking, but YOU did not listen.+ 4 And Jehovah sent to YOU all his servants the prophets, rising up early and sending [them], but YOU did not listen,+ neither did YOU incline YOUR ear to listen,+ 5 they saying, ‘Turn back, please, every one from his bad way and from the badness of YOUR dealings,+ and continue dwelling upon the ground that Jehovah gave to YOU and to YOUR forefathers from long ago and to a long time to come.+ 6 And do not walk after other gods* in order to serve them and to bow down to them, that YOU may not offend me with the work of YOUR hands, and that I may not cause calamity to YOU.’+ 2Chr.36:15-18

7 “‘But YOU did not listen to me,’ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘to the intent that YOU might offend me with the work of YOUR hands, for calamity to yourselves.’+

8 “Therefore this is what Jehovah of armies has said, ‘“For the reason that YOU did not obey my words, 9 here I am sending and I will take all the families of the north,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah, “even [sending] to Nebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon, my servant,+ Ezek.29:20 and I will bring them against this land+ and against its inhabitants and against all these nations round about;+ and I will devote them to destruction and make them an object of astonishment and something to whistle+ at and places devastated to time indefinite.+ 10 And I will destroy out of them the sound of exultation and the sound of rejoicing,+ the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride,+ the sound of the hand mill+ and the light of the lamp.+ 11 And all this land must become a devastated place, an object of astonishment, and these nations will have to serve the king of Babylon seventy years.”’+ 29:10; 2Chr.36:21; Dan.9:1-2; Zech.1:12

12 “‘And it must occur that when seventy years have been fulfilled+ I shall call to account against the king of Babylon and against that nation,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘their error, even against the land of the Chaldeans,+ and I will make it desolate wastes to time indefinite.+ 13 And I will bring in upon that land all my words that I have spoken against it, even all that is written in this book that Jeremiah has prophesied against all the nations.+ 14 For even they themselves, many nations and great kings,+ have exploited them as servants;+ and I will repay them according to their activity and according to the work of their hands.’”+

15 For this is what Jehovah the God of Israel said to me: “Take this cup of the wine of rage out of my hand, and you must make all the nations to whom I am sending you drink it.*+ 16 And they must drink and shake back and forth and act like crazed men because of the sword that I am sending among them.”+

17 And I proceeded to take the cup out of the hand of Jehovah and to make all the nations drink to whom Jehovah had sent me:+ 18 namely, Jerusalem and the cities of Judah and her kings, her princes, to make them a devastated place, an object of astonishment,+ something to whistle at and a malediction, just as at this day;+ 19 Pharaoh the king of Egypt and his servants and his princes and all his people;+ 20 and all the mixed company, and all the kings of the land of Uz,+ and all the kings of the land of the Philistines+ and Ashkelon+ and Gaza+ and Ekron+ and the remnant of Ashdod;+ 21 Edom+ and Moab+ and the sons of Ammon;+ 22 and all the kings of Tyre+ and all the kings of Sidon+ and the kings of the island* that is in the region of the sea; 23 and Dedan+ and Tema+ and Buz and all those with hair clipped at the temples;+ 24 and all the kings of the Arabs+ and all the kings of the mixed company who are residing in the wilderness; 25 and all the kings of Zimri and all the kings of Elam+ and all the kings of the Medes;+ 26 and all the kings of the north who are near and far away, one after the other, and all the [other] kingdoms of the earth that are on the surface of the ground; and the king of Sheshach*+ himself will drink after them.

27 “And you must say to them, ‘This is what Jehovah of armies, the God* of Israel, has said: “Drink and get drunk and puke and fall so that YOU cannot get up+ because of the sword that I am sending among YOU.”’+ 28 And it must occur that in case they refuse to take the cup out of your hand to drink, you must also say to them, ‘This is what Jehovah of armies has said: “YOU will drink without fail.+ 29 For, look! it is upon the city upon which my name is called that I am starting off in bringing calamity,+ and should YOU yourselves in any way go free of punishment?”’+

“‘YOU will not go free of punishment, for there is a sword that I am calling against all the inhabitants of the earth,’ is the utterance of Jehovah of armies.

30 “And as for you, you will prophesy to them all these words, and you must say to them, ‘From on high Jehovah himself will roar,+ and from his holy dwelling he will give forth his voice.+ Without fail he will roar upon* his abiding place. A shout like that of those treading [the winepress] he will sing out against all the inhabitants of the earth.’+

31 “‘A noise will certainly come clear to the farthest part* of the earth, for there is a controversy that Jehovah has with the nations.+ He must personally put himself in judgment with all flesh.+ As regards the wicked ones, he must give them to the sword,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah.

32 “This is what Jehovah of armies has said, ‘Look! A calamity is going forth from nation to nation,+ and a great tempest itself will be roused up from the remotest parts of the earth.+ 33 And those slain by Jehovah will certainly come to be in that day from one end of the earth clear to the other end of the earth.*+ They will not be bewailed, neither will they be gathered up or be buried.+ As manure on the surface of the ground they will become.’+

34 “Howl, YOU shepherds, and cry out!+ And wallow about,+ YOU majestic ones of the flock,+ because YOUR days for slaughtering and for YOUR scatterings have been fulfilled,*+ and YOU must fall like a desirable vessel!+ 35 And a place to flee to has perished from the shepherds, and a means of escape from the majestic ones of the flock.+ 36 Listen! The outcry of the shepherds, and the howling of the majestic ones of the flock, for Jehovah is despoiling their pasturage. 37 And the peaceful abiding places have been rendered lifeless* because of the burning anger of Jehovah.+ 38 He has left his covert just like a maned young lion,+ for their land has become an object of astonishment because of the maltreating sword* and because of his burning anger.”+

26 In the beginning of the royal rule of Jehoiakim+ the son of Josiah, the king of Judah, this word occurred from Jehovah, saying: 2 “This is what Jehovah has said, ‘Stand in the courtyard of the house of Jehovah,+ and you must speak concerning all the cities of Judah that are coming in to bow down at the house of Jehovah all the words that I will command you to speak to them.+ Do not take away a word.+ 3 Perhaps they will listen and return, each one from his bad way,+ and I shall have to feel regret for the calamity that I am thinking to execute upon them because of the badness of their dealings.+ 4 And you must say to them: “This is what Jehovah has said, ‘If YOU will not listen to me by walking in my law+ that I have put before YOU,+ 5 by listening to the words of my servants the prophets, whom I am sending to YOU, even rising up early and sending [them], whom YOU have not listened to,+ 6 I will, in turn, make this house like that in Shiloh,+ and this city I shall make a malediction to all the nations of the earth.’”’”+

7 And the priests and the prophets and all the people began to hear Jeremiah speaking these words in the house of Jehovah.+ 8 So it came about that when Jeremiah had completed speaking all that Jehovah had commanded [him] to speak to all the people, then the priests and the prophets and all the people laid hold of him, saying: “You will positively die.+ 9 Why is it that you have prophesied in the name of Jehovah, saying, ‘Like that in Shiloh+ is how this house will become, and this very city will be devastated so as to be without an inhabitant’?” And all the people kept congregating themselves about Jeremiah in the house of Jehovah.

10 In time the princes of Judah got to hear these words, and they proceeded to come up from the house of the king to the house of Jehovah+ and to sit down in the entrance of the new gate of Jehovah.+ 11 And the priests and the prophets began to say to the princes and to all the people: “To this man* the judgment of death belongs,+ because he has prophesied concerning this city just as YOU have heard with YOUR own ears.”+

12 At that Jeremiah said to all the princes and to all the people: “It was Jehovah that sent me to prophesy concerning this house and concerning this city all the words that YOU have heard.+ 13 And now make YOUR ways and YOUR dealings good,+ and obey the voice of Jehovah YOUR God, and Jehovah will feel regret for the calamity that he has spoken against YOU.+ 14 And as for me, here I am in YOUR hand.+ Do to me according to what is good and according to what is right in YOUR eyes.+ 15 Only YOU should by all means know that, if YOU are putting me to death, it is innocent blood that YOU are putting upon yourselves and upon this city and upon her inhabitants,+ for in truth Jehovah did send me to YOU to speak in YOUR ears all these words.”+

16 Then the princes+ and all the people said to the priests and to the prophets: “There is no judgment of death belonging to this man,*+ for it was in the name of Jehovah our God that he spoke to us.”+

17 Furthermore, certain ones* of the older men of the land rose up and began saying to all the congregation of the people:+ 18 “Micah*+ of Moresheth*+ himself happened to be prophesying in the days of Hezekiah* the king of Judah+ and went on to say to all the people of Judah, ‘This is what Jehovah of armies has said: “Zion herself will be plowed up as a mere field,+ and Jerusalem herself will become mere heaps of ruins,+ and the mountain of the House will be for high places of a forest.”’+ 19 Did Hezekiah the king of Judah and all those of Judah by any means put him to death? Did he not fear Jehovah and proceed to soften the face of Jehovah,+ so that Jehovah got to feeling regret for the calamity that he had spoken against them?+ So we are working up a great calamity against our souls.*+

20 “And there also happened to be a man* prophesying in the name of Jehovah, Urijah* the son of Shemaiah* from Kiriath-jearim.+ And he kept prophesying against this city and against this land in accord with all the words of Jeremiah. 21 And King Jehoiakim+ and all his mighty men and all the princes got to hear his words, and the king began seeking to put him to death.+ When Urijah got to hear [of it] he at once became afraid+ and ran away and came into Egypt. 22 But King Jehoiakim sent men to Egypt, Elnathan the son of Achbor+ and other men with him to Egypt. 23 And they proceeded to bring Urijah out from Egypt and to bring him to King Jehoiakim, who then struck him down with the sword+ and cast his dead body into the graveyard of the sons of the people.”

24 Moreover, it was the hand of Ahikam+ the son of Shaphan+ that proved to be with Jeremiah, in order not to give him into the hand of the people to have him put to death.+

27  In the beginning of the kingdom of Jehoiakim* the son of Josiah,+ the king of Judah, this word occurred to Jeremiah* from Jehovah, saying: 2 “This is what Jehovah has said to me, ‘Make for yourself bands and yoke bars,+ and you must put them upon your neck.+ 3 And you must send them to the king of Edom+ and to the king of Moab+ and to the king of the sons of Ammon+ and to the king of Tyre+ and to the king of Sidon+ by the hand of the messengers who are coming to Jerusalem to Zedekiah* the king of Judah. 4 And you must give them a command for their masters,* saying:

“‘“This is what Jehovah of armies, the God of Israel,+ has said; this is what YOU should say to YOUR masters, 5 ‘I myself have made the earth,+ mankind*+ and the beasts+ that are upon the surface of the earth by my great power+ and by my stretched-out arm;+ and I have given it to whom it has proved right in my eyes.+ 6 And now I myself have given all these lands into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar* the king of Babylon,*+ my servant;+ and even the wild beasts of the field I have given him to serve him.+ 7 And all the nations must serve even him+ and his son and his grandson until the time even of his own land comes,+ and many nations and great kings must exploit him as a servant.’+

8 “‘“‘And it must occur that the nation and the kingdom that will not serve him, even Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon; and the one that will not put its neck under the yoke of the king of Babylon, with the sword+ and with the famine+ and with the pestilence+ I shall turn my attention upon that nation,’ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘until I shall have finished them off by his hand.’+

9 “‘“‘And as for YOU men, do not listen to YOUR prophets+ and to YOUR practicers of divination and to YOUR dreamers*+ and to YOUR practicers of magic and to YOUR sorcerers,+ who are saying to YOU: “YOU men will not serve the king of Babylon.”+ 10 For falsehood is what they are prophesying to YOU, for the purpose of having YOU taken far away from off YOUR ground; and I shall have to disperse YOU, and YOU will have to perish.+

11 “‘“‘And as for the nation that will bring its neck under the yoke of the king of Babylon and actually serve him, I will also let it rest upon its ground,’ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘and it will certainly cultivate it and dwell in it.’”’”+

12 Even to Zedekiah*+ the king of Judah I spoke according to all these words,+ saying: “Bring YOUR necks under the yoke of the king of Babylon and serve him and his people and keep on living.+ 13 Why should you yourself and your people die by the sword,+ by the famine+ and by the pestilence+ according to what Jehovah has spoken to the nation that does not serve the king of Babylon? 14 And do not listen to the words of the prophets that are saying to YOU men, ‘YOU will not serve the king of Babylon,’+ because falsehood is what they are prophesying to YOU.+

15 “‘For I have not sent them,’ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘but they are prophesying in my name falsely, to the end that I shall disperse YOU,+ and YOU will have to perish,+ YOU men and the prophets that are prophesying to YOU.’”+

16 And to the priests and to all this people I spoke, saying: “This is what Jehovah has said, ‘Do not listen to the words of YOUR prophets that are prophesying to YOU, saying: “Look! The utensils of the house of Jehovah are being brought back from Babylon soon now!”+ For falsehood is what they are prophesying to YOU.+ 17 Do not listen to them. Serve the king of Babylon and keep on living.+ Why should this city become a devastated place?+ 18 But if they are prophets and if the word of Jehovah does exist with them, let them, please, beseech Jehovah of armies,+ that the utensils that are remaining over in the house of Jehovah and the house of the king of Judah and in Jerusalem may not come into Babylon.’

19 “For this is what Jehovah of armies has said concerning the pillars+ and concerning the sea+ and concerning the carriages+ and concerning the remainder of the utensils that are remaining over in this city,+ 20 that Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon had not taken when he carried Jeconiah*+ the son of Jehoiakim, the king of Judah, into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon, together with all the nobles of Judah and Jerusalem;+  28:4; 2Chr.36:9-10; Dan.1:1-4; Ezek.33:21 21 for this is what Jehovah of armies, the God* of Israel, has said concerning the utensils that are remaining over at the house of Jehovah and the house of the king of Judah and Jerusalem,+ 22 ‘“To Babylon is where they will be brought+ and there they will continue to be until the day of my turning my attention to them,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah. “And I will bring them up and restore them to this place.”’”+

28 Then it came about in that year, in the beginning of the kingdom of Zedekiah*+ the king of Judah, in the fourth year, in the fifth month, that Hananiah+ the son of Azzur, the prophet who was from Gibeon,+ said to me in the house of Jehovah before the eyes of the priests and of all the people: 2 “This is what Jehovah of armies, the God of Israel, has said, ‘I will break the yoke of the king of Babylon.+ 3 Within two full years more I am bringing back to this place all the utensils of the house of Jehovah that Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon+ took from this place that he might bring them to Babylon.’” 4 “‘And Jeconiah+ the son of Jehoiakim,+ the king of Judah, and all the exiles of Judah who have come to Babylon+ I am bringing back to this place,’ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘for I shall break the yoke+ of the king of Babylon.’”

5 And Jeremiah the prophet proceeded to say to Hananiah the prophet before the eyes of the priests and before the eyes of all the people who were standing in the house of Jehovah;+ 6 yes, Jeremiah the prophet proceeded to say: “Amen!*+ Thus may Jehovah do! May Jehovah establish your words that you have prophesied by bringing back the utensils of the house of Jehovah and all the exiled people from Babylon to this place!+ 7 However, hear, please, this word that I am speaking in your ears and in the ears of all the people.+ 8 As regards the prophets that happened to be prior to me and prior to you from long ago,+ they also used to prophesy concerning many lands and concerning great kingdoms, of war and of calamity* and of pestilence.+ 9 As regards the prophet that prophesies of peace,+ when the word of the prophet comes true the prophet whom Jehovah has sent in truth will become known.”+

10 At that Hananiah the prophet took the yoke bar from off the neck of Jeremiah the prophet and broke it.+ 11 And Hananiah+ went on to say before the eyes of all the people: “This is what Jehovah has said,+ ‘Just like this I shall break the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon within two full years more from off the neck of all the nations.’”+ And Jeremiah the prophet proceeded to go his way.+

12 Then the word of Jehovah occurred to Jeremiah,+ after Hananiah the prophet had broken the yoke bar from off the neck of Jeremiah the prophet, saying: 13 “Go,* and you must say to Hananiah, ‘This is what Jehovah has said: “Yoke bars+ of wood you have broken, and instead of them you will have to make yoke bars of iron.”+ 14 For this is what Jehovah of armies, the God of Israel, has said: “A yoke of iron I will put upon the neck of all these nations, to serve Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon;+ and they must serve him.+ And even the wild beasts of the field I will give him.”’”+

15 And Jeremiah the prophet went on to say to Hananiah+ the prophet: “Listen, please, O Hananiah! Jehovah has not sent you, but you yourself have caused this people to trust in a falsehood.+ 16 Therefore this is what Jehovah has said, ‘Look! I am sending you away from off the surface of the ground. This year you yourself must die,+ for you have spoken outright revolt against Jehovah.’”+

17 So Hananiah the prophet died in that year, in the seventh month.+

29 And these are the words of the letter that Jeremiah the prophet sent from Jerusalem to the remainder of the older men of the exiled people and to the priests and to the prophets and to all the people, whom Nebuchadnezzar had carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon,+ 2 after Jeconiah+ the king and the lady+ and the court officials, the princes of Judah and Jerusalem,+ and the craftsmen and the builders of bulwarks+ had gone forth from Jerusalem. 3 It was by the hand of Elasah the son of Shaphan+ and Gemariah the son of Hilkiah, whom Zedekiah+ the king of Judah sent to Babylon to Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, saying:

4 “This is what Jehovah of armies, the God of Israel, has said to all the exiled people, whom I have caused to go into exile+ from Jerusalem to Babylon, 5 ‘Build houses and inhabit [them], and plant gardens and eat their fruitage.+ 6 Take wives and become father to sons and to daughters;+ and take wives for YOUR own sons and give YOUR own daughters to husbands, that they may give birth to sons and to daughters; and become many there, and do not become few. 7 Also, seek the peace of the city to which I have caused YOU to go into exile, and pray in its behalf to Jehovah, for in its peace there will prove to be peace for YOU yourselves.+ 8 For this is what Jehovah of armies, the God of Israel, has said: “Let not YOUR prophets who are in among YOU and YOUR practicers of divination deceive YOU,+ and do not YOU listen to their* dreams that they* are dreaming.+ 9 For ‘it is in falsehood that they are prophesying to YOU in my name. I have not sent them,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah.”’”

10 “For this is what Jehovah has said, ‘In accord with the fulfilling of seventy years at Babylon 25:11; Zech.1:12 I shall turn my attention to YOU people,+ and I will establish toward YOU my good word in bringing YOU back to this place.’+

11 “‘For I myself well know the thoughts that I am thinking toward YOU,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘thoughts of peace, and not of calamity,+ to give YOU a future and a hope.+ 12 And YOU will certainly call me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to YOU.’+

13 “‘And YOU will actually seek me and find [me],+ for YOU will search for me with all YOUR heart.+ 14 And I will let myself be found by YOU,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah. ‘And I will gather YOUR body of captives and collect YOU together out of all the nations and out of all the places to which I have dispersed YOU,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah. ‘And I will bring YOU back to the place from which I caused YOU to go into exile.’+

15 “But YOU have said, ‘Jehovah has raised up for us prophets in Babylon.’

16 “For this is what Jehovah has said to the king sitting on the throne of David+ and to all the people dwelling in this city, YOUR brothers that have not gone forth with YOU into exile,+ 17 ‘This is what Jehovah of armies has said: “Here I am sending against them the sword,+ the famine+ and the pestilence,+ and I will make them like the burst-open figs that cannot be eaten for badness.”’+

18 “‘And I will pursue after them with the sword, with the famine and with the pestilence, and I will give them for a quaking to all the kingdoms of the earth,+ for a curse and for an object of astonishment and for a whistling at and for a reproach among all the nations to which I shall certainly disperse them,+ 19 due to the fact that they have not listened to my words,’ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘that I have sent to them with my servants the prophets, getting up early and sending [them].’+

“‘But YOU have not listened,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah.

20 “And as for YOU, hear the word of Jehovah, all you exiled people,+ whom I have sent away from Jerusalem to Babylon.+ 21 This is what Jehovah of armies, the God of Israel, has said concerning Ahab the son of Kolaiah and to Zedekiah the son of Maaseiah, who are prophesying to YOU falsehood in my own name,+ ‘Here I am giving them into the hand of Nebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon, and he must strike them down before YOUR eyes.+ 22 And from them a malediction will certainly be taken on the part of the entire body of exiles of Judah that is in Babylon, saying: “May Jehovah make you like Zedekiah and like Ahab,+ whom the king of Babylon roasted in the fire!”+ 23 for the reason that they have carried on senselessness in Israel,+ and they keep committing adultery with the wives of their companions+ and keep speaking falsely in my own name the word that I did not command them.+

“‘“And I am the One knowing and am a witness,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah.’”

24 “And to Shemaiah*+ of Nehelam you will say, 25 ‘This is what Jehovah of armies, the God of Israel, has said: “For the reason that you yourself have sent in your name letters+ to all the people who are in Jerusalem, and to Zephaniah+ the son of Maaseiah, the priest, and to all the priests, saying, 26 ‘Jehovah himself has made you priest instead of Jehoiada the priest, in order to become the grand overseer* of the house of Jehovah+ toward any man* maddened+ and behaving like a prophet, and you must put him into the stocks and into the pillory;+ 27 now, then, why have you not rebuked Jeremiah of Anathoth,+ who is behaving as a prophet to YOU people?+ 28 For that is why he has sent to us at Babylon, saying: “It* is long drawn out! Build houses and inhabit [them], and plant gardens and eat their fruitage,+—”’”’”

29 And Zephaniah+ the priest proceeded to read this letter in the ears of Jeremiah the prophet.

30 Then the word of Jehovah occurred to Jeremiah, saying: 31 “Send to all the exiled people,+ saying, ‘This is what Jehovah has said concerning Shemaiah of Nehelam: “For the reason that Shemaiah has prophesied to YOU people, but I myself did not send him, and he tried to make YOU trust in falsehood,+ 32 therefore this is what Jehovah has said, ‘Here I am turning my attention upon Shemaiah+ of Nehelam and upon his offspring.’+

“‘“‘He will not come to have a man dwelling in the midst of this people;+ and he will not look upon the good that I am doing for my people,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘for he has spoken outright revolt against Jehovah.’”’”+

30 The word that occurred to Jeremiah from Jehovah, saying: 2 “This is what Jehovah the God of Israel has said, ‘Write for yourself in a book all the words that I will speak to you.+ 3 For, “look! there are days coming,” is the utterance of Jehovah, “and I will gather the captive ones of my people, Israel and Judah,”+ Jehovah has said, “and I will bring them back to the land that I gave to their forefathers, and they will certainly repossess it.”’”+

4 And these are the words that Jehovah has spoken to Israel and to Judah. 5 For this is what Jehovah has said: “The sound of trembling we have heard, dread,+ and there is no peace. 6 Ask, please, O men, and see whether a male is giving birth. Why is it that I have seen every able-bodied man with his hands upon his loins like a female that is giving birth,+ and all faces have turned pale?+ 7 Alas! For that day is a great one,+ so that there is no other like it,+ and it is the time of distress for Jacob.+ But he will be saved even out of it.”

8 “And it must occur in that day,” is the utterance of Jehovah of armies, “that I shall break one’s yoke from off your neck, and your bands I shall tear in two,+ and no more will strangers exploit him as a servant. 9 And they will certainly serve Jehovah their God and David their king,+ whom I shall raise up for them.”+

10 “And as for you, do not be afraid, O my servant Jacob,” is the utterance of Jehovah, “and do not be struck with terror, O Israel.+ For here I am saving you from far off and your offspring from the land of their captivity.+ And Jacob will certainly return and be free of disturbance and be at ease, and there will be no one causing trembling.”+

11 “For I am with you,” is the utterance of Jehovah, “to save you;+ but I shall make an extermination among all the nations to which I have scattered you.+ However, in your case I shall make no extermination.+ And I shall have to correct you to the proper degree, as I shall by no means leave you unpunished.”+

12 For this is what Jehovah has said: “There is no cure for your* breakdown.+ Your stroke is chronic.+ 13 There is no one pleading your cause, for [your] ulcer.+ There are no means of healing, no mending, for you.+ 14 All those intensely loving you are the ones that have forgotten you.+ You are not the one for whom they keep searching. For with the stroke of an enemy I have struck you,+ with the chastisement of someone cruel,+ on account of the abundance of your error;+ your sins have become numerous.+ 15 Why do you cry out on account of your breakdown?+ Your pain is incurable on account of the abundance of your error; your sins have become numerous.+ I have done these things to you. 16 Therefore all those devouring you will themselves be devoured;+ and as for all your adversaries, into captivity they will all of them go.+ And those pillaging you* will certainly come to be for pillaging, and all those plundering you I shall give over to plundering.”+

17 “For I shall bring up a recuperation for you, and from your strokes I shall heal you,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah. “For a woman chased away is what they called you:+ ‘That is Zion, for whom no one is searching.’”+

18 This is what Jehovah has said: “Here I am gathering the captive ones of the tents of Jacob,+ and for his tabernacles I shall have pity. And the city will actually be rebuilt upon her mound;+ and upon its rightful site the dwelling tower itself will sit.+ 19 And from them there will certainly go forth thanksgiving, and the sound of those who are laughing.+ And I will multiply them, and they will not become few;+ and I will make them heavy in number, and they will not become insignificant.+ 20 And his sons must become as in former times, and before me his own assembly will be firmly established.+ And I will turn my attention upon all his oppressors.+ 21 And his majestic one will certainly come to be from him,+ and from the midst of him his own ruler will go forth;+ and I will cause him to come near, and he must approach to me.”+

“For who, now, is this one that has given his heart in pledge in order to approach to me?”+ is the utterance of Jehovah. 22 “And YOU will certainly become my people,+ and I myself shall become YOUR God.”+

23 Look! A windstorm of Jehovah, rage itself, has gone forth, an onward-sweeping tempest.*+ Upon the head of the wicked ones it will whirl.+ 24 The burning anger of Jehovah will not turn back until he will have executed and until he will have carried out the ideas of his heart.+ In the final part of the days YOU people will give YOUR consideration to it.+

31 “At that time,” is the utterance of Jehovah, “I shall become God to all the families of Israel; and as for them, they will become my people.”+
 

2 This is what Jehovah has said: “The people made up of survivors from the sword found favor in the wilderness,+ when Israel was walking* to get his repose.”+ 3 From far away Jehovah himself appeared to me, [saying:] “And with a love to time indefinite I have loved you.*+ That is why I have drawn you with loving-kindness.*+ 4 Yet shall I rebuild you and you will actually be rebuilt,+ O virgin of Israel. You will yet deck yourself with your tambourines and actually go forth in the dance of those who are laughing.+ 5 You will yet plant vineyards in the mountains of Samaria.+ The planters will certainly plant and start to use [them].+ 6 For there exists a day when the lookouts in the mountainous region of Ephraim will actually call out, ‘Rise up, O men, and let us go up to Zion, to Jehovah our God.’”+
 

7 For this is what Jehovah has said: “CRY out loudly to Jacob with rejoicing, and CRY shrilly at the head of nations.+ PUBLISH [it].+ GIVE praise and SAY, ‘Save, O Jehovah, your people, the remnant of Israel.’+ 8 Here I am bringing them from the land of the north,+ and I will collect them together from the remotest parts of the earth.+ Among them will be the blind and the lame, the pregnant woman and the one giving birth, all together.+ As a great congregation they will return here.+ 9 With weeping they will come,+ and with [their] entreaties for favor I shall bring them. I shall make them walk to torrent valleys of water,+ in a right way in which they will not be caused to stumble. For I have become to Israel a Father;+ and as for Ephraim, he is my firstborn.”+
 

10 Hear the word of Jehovah, O YOU nations, and tell [it] among the islands* far away,+ and say: “The One scattering Israel will himself collect him together,+ and he will certainly keep him as a shepherd does his drove.+ 11 For Jehovah will actually redeem Jacob+ and reclaim him out of the hand of the one stronger than he is.+ 12 And they will certainly come and cry out joyfully on the height of Zion+ and become radiant over the goodness of Jehovah,+ over the grain and over the new wine+ and over the oil and over the young ones* of the flock and the cattle.+ And their soul will simply become like a well-watered garden,+ and no more will they languish again.”+
 

13 “At that time the virgin will rejoice in the dance, also the young men and the old men, all together.+ And I will change their mourning into exultation, and I will comfort them and make them rejoice away from their grief.+ 14 And I will saturate the soul of the priests with fatness,+ and with my goodness my own people will become satisfied,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah.
 

15 “This is what Jehovah has said, ‘In Ramah+ a voice is being heard, lamentation and bitter weeping;+ Rachel+ weeping over her sons.+ She has refused to be comforted over her sons,+ because they are no more.’”+

 16 This is what Jehovah has said: “‘Hold back your* voice from weeping, and your eyes from tears,+ for there exists a reward for your activity,’ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘and they will certainly return from the land of the enemy.’+
 

17 “‘And there exists a hope+ for your future,’ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘and the sons will certainly return to their own territory.’”+
 

18 “I have positively heard Ephraim bemoaning himself,+ ‘You have corrected me, that I may be corrected,+ like a calf that has not been trained.+ Cause me to turn back, and I shall readily turn back,+ for you are Jehovah my God.+ 19 For after my turning back I felt regret;+ and after my being led to know I made a slap upon the thigh.+ I became ashamed, and I also felt humiliated,+ for I had carried the reproach of my youth.’”+
 

20 “Is Ephraim a precious son to me, or a fondly treated child?+ For to the extent of my speaking against him I shall without fail remember him further.+ That is why my intestines have become boisterous for him.+ By all means I shall have pity upon him,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah.
 

21 “Set up road marks for yourself.* Place signposts for yourself.+ Fix your heart upon the highway, the way that you will have to go.*+ Come back, O virgin of Israel. Come back to these cities of yours.+ 22 How long will you turn this way and that,+ O unfaithful daughter?+ For Jehovah has created a new thing in the earth: A mere female will press around an able-bodied man.”*
 

23 This is what Jehovah of armies, the God of Israel, has said: “They will yet say this word in the land of Judah and in his cities, when I shall gather their captives, ‘May Jehovah bless you,*+ O righteous dwelling place,+ O holy mountain.’+ 24 And in it* Judah and all his cities will certainly dwell all together, farmers and those who have set out with the drove.+ 25 For I will saturate the tired soul, and every languishing soul I will fill.”+
 

26 At this thing I awoke and began to see; and as for my sleep, it had been pleasurable to me.
 

27 “Look! There are days coming,” is the utterance of Jehovah, “and I will sow the house of Israel and the house of Judah with the seed of man* and with the seed of domestic animal.”+

28 “And it must occur that just as I had kept alert toward them+ to uproot and to pull down and to tear down and to destroy and to do damage,+ so I shall keep alert toward them to build up and to plant,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah. 29 “In those days they will no more say, ‘The fathers were the ones that ate the unripe grape, but it was the teeth of the sons that got set on edge.’*+ 30 But it will be each one for his own error that one will die.+ Any man* eating the unripe grape, his will be the teeth that will be set on edge.”

31 “Look! There are days coming,” is the utterance of Jehovah, “and I will conclude* with the house of Israel+ and with the house of Judah+ a new covenant;*+  Heb.8:8 32 not one like the covenant that I concluded with their forefathers in the day of my taking hold of their hand to bring them forth out of the land of Egypt,+ ‘which covenant of mine they themselves broke,+ although* I myself had husbandly ownership+ of them,’* is the utterance of Jehovah.”

33 “For this is the covenant+ that I shall conclude with the house of Israel after those days,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah. “I will put my law within them,+ and in their heart I shall write it.+ And I will become their God, and they themselves will become my people.”+ Heb.8:10

34 “And they will no more teach each one his companion and each one his brother,+ saying, ‘KNOW Jehovah!’+ for they will all of them know me, from the least one of them even to the greatest one of them,”+ is the utterance of Jehovah. “For I shall forgive their error, and their sin I shall remember no more.”+ Heb.8:11 ■
 

35 This is what Jehovah, the Giver of the sun for light by day,+ the statutes+ of* the moon+ and the stars for light by night,+ the One stirring up the sea that its waves may become boisterous,+ the One whose name is Jehovah of armies,+ has said: 36 “‘If these regulations could be removed from before me,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘those who are the seed of Israel could likewise cease from proving to be a nation before me always.’”+
 

37 This is what Jehovah has said: “‘If the heavens up above could be measured and the foundations of the earth below could be searched out,+ I myself also could reject the entire seed of Israel on account of all that they have done,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah.”
 

38 “Look! There are days coming,”* is the utterance of Jehovah, “and the city will certainly be built+ to Jehovah from the Tower of Hananel+ to the Corner Gate.+ 39 And the line for measurement+ will yet actually go forth straight ahead to the hill of Gareb, and it will certainly go around to Goah. 40 And all the low plain of the carcasses+ and of the fatty ashes,+ and all the terraces as far as the torrent valley of Kidron,+ clear to the corner of the Horse Gate*+ toward the sunrising, will be something holy to Jehovah.+ It will not be uprooted, neither will it be torn down anymore to time indefinite.”+

32  The word that occurred to Jeremiah from Jehovah in the tenth year of Zedekiah the king of Judah,+ that is, the eighteenth year of Nebuchadrezzar.+ 2 And at that time the military forces of the king of Babylon were laying siege to Jerusalem;+ and as for Jeremiah the prophet, he happened to be under restraint in the Courtyard of the Guard+ that is in the house of the king of Judah; 3 because Zedekiah the king of Judah had restrained him,+ saying:
 

“Why is it that you are prophesying,+ saying, ‘This is what Jehovah has said: “Here I am giving this city into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he will certainly capture it;+ 4 and Zedekiah himself, the king of Judah, will not escape from the hand of the Chaldeans, for he will without fail be given into the hand of the king of Babylon, and his mouth will actually speak with the mouth of that one, and his own eyes will see even the eyes of that one”’;+ 5 ‘and to Babylon he will take Zedekiah, and there he will continue until I turn my attention to him,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah; ‘although YOU men keep warring against the Chaldeans, YOU will not succeed’?”+
 

6 And Jeremiah proceeded to say: “The word of Jehovah has occurred to me, saying, 7 ‘Here is Hanamel the son of Shallum your paternal uncle coming in to you, saying: “Buy for yourself the field of mine that is in Anathoth,+ because the right of repurchase belongs to you for buying [it].”’”+

8 In time Hanamel the son of my paternal uncle came in to me, according to the word of Jehovah, into the Courtyard of the Guard,+ and proceeded to say to me: “Buy,* please, the field of mine that is in Anathoth,+ which is in the land of Benjamin,+ for the right of hereditary possession is yours, and the repurchasing power is yours. Buy [it] for yourself.” At that I knew that it had been the word of Jehovah.+

9 So I proceeded to buy from Hanamel+ the son of my paternal uncle the field that was in Anathoth.+ And I began to weigh out to him the money,+ seven shekels* and ten silver pieces. 10 Then I wrote in a deed+ and affixed the seal+ and took witnesses+ as I went weighing+ the money in the scales. 11 After that I took the deed of purchase, the one sealed according to the commandment and the regulations,+ and the one left open; 12 and I then gave the deed of purchase to Baruch+ the son of Neriah+ the son of Mahseiah before the eyes of Hanamel [the son of] my paternal uncle and before the eyes of the witnesses, those writing in the deed of purchase,+ before the eyes of all the Jews who were sitting in the Courtyard of the Guard.+

13 I now commanded Baruch before their eyes, saying: 14 “This is what Jehovah of armies, the God of Israel, has said, ‘Taking these deeds, this deed of purchase, even the sealed one, and the other deed left open,+ you must also put them into an earthenware vessel, in order that they may last for many days.’ 15 For this is what Jehovah of armies, the God of Israel, has said, ‘Houses and fields and vineyards will yet be bought in this land.’”+

16 And I began to pray+ to Jehovah after my having given the deed of purchase to Baruch+ the son of Neriah,+ saying: 17 “Alas, O Sovereign Lord Jehovah!+ Here you yourself have made the heavens and the earth by your great power+ and by your outstretched arm.+ The whole matter is not too wonderful for you yourself,+ 18 the One exercising loving-kindness toward thousands,+ and repaying the error of the fathers into the bosom of their sons after them,+ the [true] God,* the great One,+ the mighty One,*+ Jehovah of armies+ being his name,+ 19 great in counsel+ and abundant in acts,+ you whose eyes are opened upon all the ways of the sons of men,*+ in order to give to each one according to his ways and according to the fruitage of his dealings;+ 20 you who set signs and miracles in the land of Egypt down to this day and in Israel and among men,*+ that you might make a name for your own self, just as at this day.+ 21 And you proceeded to bring forth your people Israel out of the land of Egypt,+ with signs and with miracles+ and with a strong hand and with a stretched-out arm and with great fearsomeness.+

22 “In time you gave them this land that you swore to their forefathers to give to them,+ a land flowing with milk and honey.+ 23 And they proceeded to come in and take possession of it,+ but they did not obey your voice, and in your law they did not walk.+ All the things that you commanded them to do they did not do,+ so that you caused all this calamity to befall them.+ 24 Look! With siege ramparts+ men have come to the city to capture it,+ and the very city will certainly be given into the hand of the Chaldeans who are fighting against it,+ because of the sword+ and the famine+ and the pestilence;+ and what you have said has happened, and here you are seeing [it].+ 25 Yet you yourself have said to me, O Sovereign Lord Jehovah, ‘Buy for yourself the field with money+ and take witnesses,’+ although the city itself must be given into the hand of the Chaldeans.”+

26 At that the word of Jehovah occurred to Jeremiah, saying: 27 “Here I am, Jehovah, the God of all flesh.+ For me is there any matter at all too wonderful?+ 28 Therefore this is what Jehovah has said, ‘Here I am giving this city into the hand of the Chaldeans and into the hand of Nebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon, and he must capture it.+ 29 And the Chaldeans who are fighting against this city must come in and set this city aflame with fire and must burn it down+ and the houses upon the roofs of which they have made sacrificial smoke to Baal and have poured out drink offerings to other gods* for the purpose of offending me.’+

30 “‘For the sons of Israel and the sons of Judah have proved to be mere doers of what was bad in my eyes, from their youth on up;+ for the sons of Israel are even offending me by the work of their hands,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah. 31 ‘For this city, from the day that they built it, clear down to this day, has proved to be nothing but a cause of anger in me+ and a cause of rage in me, in order to remove it from before my face,+ 32 on account of all the badness of the sons of Israel+ and of the sons of Judah+ that they have done to offend me,+ they, their kings,+ their princes,+ their priests+ and their prophets,+ and the men* of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem. 33 And they kept turning to me the back and not the face;+ though there was a teaching of them, a rising up early and teaching, but there were none of them listening to receive discipline.+ 34 And they went putting their disgusting things in the house upon which my own name has been called, in order to defile it.+ 35 Furthermore, they built the high places of Baal+ that are in the valley of the son of Hinnom,*+ in order to make their sons and their daughters pass through [the fire]+ to Molech,+  Deut.12:31 a thing that I did not command them,+ neither did it come up into my heart to do this detestable thing,+ for the purpose of making Judah sin.’+

36 “And now, therefore, this is what Jehovah the God of Israel has said concerning this city which YOU persons are saying will certainly be given into the hand of the king of Babylon by the sword and by the famine and by the pestilence,+ 37 ‘Here I am collecting them together out of all the lands to which I shall have dispersed them in my anger and in my rage and in great indignation;+ and I will bring them back to this place and make them dwell in security.+ 38 And they will certainly become my people,+ and I myself shall become their God.+ 39 And I will give them one heart+ and one way in order to fear me always,* for good to them and to their sons after them.+ 40 And I will conclude with them an indefinitely lasting covenant,+ that I shall not turn back from behind them, for me to do them good;+ and the fear of me I shall put in their heart in order not to turn aside from me.+ 41 And I will exult over them to do them good,+ and I will plant them in this land+ in trueness* with all my heart and with all my soul.’”

42 “For this is what Jehovah has said, ‘Just as I have brought in upon this people all this great calamity, so I am bringing in upon them all the goodness that I am speaking concerning them.+ 43 And fields* will certainly be bought in this land+ of which YOU people will be saying: “It is a desolate waste+ without man* and domestic animal. It has been given into the hand of the Chaldeans.”’+

44 “‘With money people will buy fields themselves, and there will be a recording in the deed+ and a sealing and a taking of witnesses+ in the land of Benjamin+ and in the surroundings of Jerusalem+ and in the cities of Judah+ and in the cities of the mountainous region and in the cities of the lowland*+ and in the cities of the south,*+ because I shall bring back their captives,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah.”

33  And the word of Jehovah proceeded to occur to Jeremiah the second time, while he was yet shut up in the Courtyard of the Guard,+ saying: 2 “This is what Jehovah the Maker+ of [earth]* has said, Jehovah the Former+ of it to establish it firmly,+ Jehovah being his name,+ 3 ‘Call to me, and I shall answer you*+ and readily tell you great and incomprehensible things that you have not known.’”+

4 “For this is what Jehovah the God of Israel has said concerning the houses of this city and concerning the houses of the kings of Judah that are pulled down on account of the siege ramparts and on account of the sword;+ 5 [concerning] those who are coming to fight against the Chaldeans and to fill places with the carcasses of the men* whom I have struck down in my anger and in my rage,+ and on account of all whose badness I have concealed my face from this city,+ 6 ‘Here I am bringing up for her a recuperation and health;+ and I will heal them and reveal to them an abundance of peace and truth.+ 7 And I will bring back the captives of Judah and the captives of Israel,+ and I will build them just as at the start.+ 8 And I will purify them from all their error with which they have sinned against me,+ and I will forgive all their errors with which they have sinned against me and with which they have transgressed against me.+ 9 And she will certainly become to me a name of exultation,+ a praise and a beauty toward all the nations of the earth who will hear of all the goodness that I am rendering to them.+ And they will certainly be in dread+ and be agitated+ on account of all the goodness and on account of all the peace that I am rendering to her.’”+

10 “This is what Jehovah has said, ‘In this place that YOU people will be saying is waste without man* and without domestic animal, in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem that are desolated+ without man and without inhabitant and without domestic animal, there will yet be heard+ 11 the sound of exultation and the sound of rejoicing,+ the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, the voice of those saying: “LAUD Jehovah of armies, for Jehovah is good;+ for to time indefinite is his loving-kindness!”’*+

“‘They will be bringing a thanksgiving offering into the house of Jehovah,+ for I shall bring back the captives of the land just as at the start,’+ Jehovah has said.”

12 “This is what Jehovah of armies has said, ‘In this waste place without man and even domestic animal+ and in all its cities there will yet come to be the pasture ground of the shepherds who are making the flock lie down.’+

13 “‘In the cities of the mountainous region, in the cities of the lowland+ and in the cities of the south+ and in the land of Benjamin+ and in the surroundings of Jerusalem+ and in the cities of Judah+ flocks will yet pass by under the hands of the one taking the count,’+ Jehovah has said.”

14 “‘Look! There are days coming,’+ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘and I shall certainly carry out the good word that I have spoken,+ concerning the house of Israel+ and concerning the house of Judah. 15 In those days and at that time I shall make sprout for David a righteous sprout,+ and he will certainly execute justice and righteousness in the land.*+ 16 In those days Judah will be saved+ and Jerusalem itself will reside in security.+ And this is what she will be called, Jehovah Is Our Righteousness.’”*+

17 “For this is what Jehovah has said, ‘There will not be cut off in David’s case a man to sit* upon the throne of the house of Israel.+ 18 And in the case of the priests, the Levites,* there will not be cut off a man from before me to offer up whole burnt offering and to make smoke with a grain offering and to render sacrifice always.’”*+