Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying, Jeremiah, what do you see? And I said, I see a branch of an almond-tree.

And the word of the Lord came to me a second time, saying, What do you see? And I said, I see a boiling pot, and its face is from the north.

These are the words of the Lord: What evil have your fathers seen in me that they have gone far from me, and, walking after what is false, have become false?

Has any nation ever made a change in their gods, though they are no gods? but my people have given up their glory in exchange for what is of no profit.

And now, what have you to do on the way to Egypt, to get your drink from the waters of the Nile? or what have you to do on the way to Assyria, to get your drink from the waters of the River?

How are you able to say, I am not unclean, I have not gone after the Baals? see your way in the valley, be clear about what you have done: you are a quick-footed camel twisting her way in and out;

With what care are your ways ordered when you are looking for love! so ... your ways.

And the Lord said to me in the days of Josiah the king, Have you seen what Israel, turning away from me, has done? She has gone up on every high mountain and under every branching tree, acting like a loose woman there.

For this is what the Lord says to the men of Judah and to Jerusalem: Get your unworked land ploughed up, do not put in your seeds among thorns.

For this is what the Lord has said: All the land will become a waste; I will make destruction complete.

And you, when you are made waste, what will you do? Though you are clothed in red, though you make yourself beautiful with ornaments of gold, though you make your eyes wide with paint, it is for nothing that you make yourself fair; your lovers have no more desire for you, they have designs on your life.

The prophets give false words and the priests give decisions by their direction; and my people are glad to have it so: and what will you do in the end?

For this is what the Lord of armies has said: Let trees be cut down and an earthwork be placed against Jerusalem: sorrow on the false town! inside her there is nothing but cruel ways.

This is what the Lord of armies has said: Everything will be taken from the rest of Israel as the last grapes are taken from the vine; let your hand be turned to the small branches, like one pulling off grapes.

This is what the Lord has said: Take your place looking out on the ways; make search for the old roads, saying, Where is the good way? and go in it that you may have rest for your souls. But they said, We will not go in it.

To what purpose does sweet perfume come to me from Sheba, and spices from a far country? your burned offerings give me no pleasure, your offerings of beasts are not pleasing to me.

But go now to my place which was in Shiloh, where I put my name at first, and see what I did to it because of the evil-doing of my people Israel.

Do you not see what they are doing in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem?

So this is what the Lord God has said: See, my wrath and my passion will be let loose on this place, on man and beast, and on the trees of the field, and on the produce of the earth; it will be burning and will not be put out.

For the children of Judah have done what is evil in my eyes, says the Lord: they have put their disgusting images in the house which is named by my name, making it unclean.

Further, you are to say to them, This is what the Lord has said: Will those who are falling not be lifted up again? will he who has gone away not come back?

I took note and gave ear, but no one said what is right: no man had regret for his evil-doing, saying, What have I done? everyone goes off on his way like a horse rushing to the fight.

The wise men are shamed, they are overcome with fear and taken: see, they have given up the word of the Lord; and what use is their wisdom to them?

Everyone will make sport of his neighbour with deceit, not saying what is true: their tongues have been trained to say false words; they are twisted, hating to come back.

This is what the Lord of armies has said: Take thought and send for the weeping women, so that they may come; and send for the wise women, so that they may come:

This is what the Lord has said: Do not go in the way of the nations; have no fear of the signs of heaven, for the nations go in fear of them.

This is what you are to say to them: The gods who have not made the heavens and the earth will be cut off from the earth and from under the heavens.

About Judah. What have you to do in my house? is it your thought that oaths and holy flesh will get you out of your trouble? will you make yourself safe in this way?

So this is what the Lord of armies has said about the men of Anathoth who have made designs against your life, saying, You are not to be a prophet in the name of the Lord, or death will overtake you by our hands:

If running with the fighting-men has made you tired, how will you be able to keep up with horses? and if in a land of peace you go in flight, what will become of you in the thick growth of Jordan?

This is what the Lord has said against all my evil neighbours, who put their hands on the heritage which I gave my people Israel: See, I will have them uprooted from their land, uprooting the people of Judah from among them.

This is what the Lord said to me: Go and get yourself a linen band and put it round you and do not put it in water.

What will you say when he puts over you those whom you yourself have made your friends? will not pains take you like a woman in childbirth?

This is your fate, the part measured out to you by me, says the Lord, because you have put me out of your memory and put your faith in what is false.

This is what the Lord has said about this people: Even so they have been glad to go from the right way; they have not kept their feet from wandering, so the Lord has no pleasure in them; now he will keep their wrongdoing in mind and send punishment for their sins.

Then the Lord said to me, The prophets say false words in my name, and I gave them no orders, and I said nothing to them: what they say to you is a false vision and wonder-working words without substance, the deceit of their hearts.

So this is what the Lord has said about the prophets who make use of my name, though I sent them not, and say, The sword and need of food will not be in this land: the sword and need of food will put an end to those prophets.

And I will make them a cause of fear to all the kingdoms of the earth, because of Manasseh, the son of Hezekiah, king of Judah, and what he did in Jerusalem.

For this cause the Lord has said, If you will come back, then I will again let you take your place before me; and if you give out what is of value and not that which has no value, you will be as my mouth: let them come back to you, but do not go back to them.

For this is what the Lord has said about the sons and daughters who come to birth in this place, and about their mothers who have given them birth, and about their fathers who have given life to them in this land:

For this is what the Lord has said: Do not go into the house of sorrow, do not go to make weeping or songs of grief for them: for I have taken away my peace from this people, says the Lord, even mercy and pity.

And it will be, that when you say all these words to the people, then they will say to you, Why has the Lord done all this evil against us? what is our wrongdoing and what is our sin which we have done against the Lord our God?

This is what the Lord has said: Cursed is the man who puts his faith in man, and makes flesh his arm, and whose heart is turned away from the Lord.

As for me, I have not said; Let the day of trouble come to them quickly; and I have not been hoping for the death-giving day; you have knowledge of what came from my lips; it was open before you.

This is what the Lord has said to me: Go and take your place in the doorway of Benjamin, where the kings of Judah come in and by which they go out, and in all the doorways of Jerusalem;

This is what the Lord has said: See to yourselves, that you take up no weight on the Sabbath day, or take it in through the doors of Jerusalem;

Now, then, say to the men of Judah and to the people of Jerusalem, This is what the Lord has said: See, I am forming an evil thing against you, and designing a design against you: let every man come back now from his evil way, and let your ways and your doings be changed for the better.

But they will say, There is no hope: we will go on in our designs, and every one of us will do what he is moved by the pride of his evil heart to do.

So this is what the Lord has said: Make search among the nations and see who has had word of such things; the virgin of Israel has done a very shocking thing.

Then they said, Come, let us make a design against Jeremiah; for teaching will never be cut off from the priest, or wisdom from the wise, or the word from the prophet. Come, let us make use of his words for an attack on him, and let us give attention with care to what he says.

This is what the Lord has said: Go and get for money a potter's bottle made of earth, and take with you some of the responsible men of the people and of the priests;

And say to them, This is what the Lord of armies has said: Even so will this people and this town be broken by me, as a potter's bottle is broken and may not be put together again: and the bodies of the dead will be put in the earth in Topheth, till there is no more room.

This is what I will do to this place, says the Lord, and to its people, making this town like Topheth:

Then Jeremiah said to them, This is what you are to say to Zedekiah:

O family of David, this is what the Lord has said: Do what is right in the morning, and make free from the hands of the cruel one him whose goods have been violently taken away, or my wrath will go out like fire, burning so that no one may put it out, because of the evil of your doings.

This is what the Lord has said: Go down to the house of the king of Judah and there give him this word,

This is what the Lord has said: Do what is right, judging uprightly, and make free from the hands of the cruel one him whose goods have been violently taken away: do no wrong and be not violent to the man from a strange country and the child without a father and the widow, and let not those who have done no wrong be put to death in this place.

For this is what the Lord has said about the family of the king of Judah: You are Gilead to me, and the top of Lebanon: but, truly, I will make you waste, with towns unpeopled.

For this is what the Lord has said about Shallum, the son of Josiah, king of Judah, who became king in place of Josiah his father, who went out from this place: He will never come back there again:

A curse is on him who is building his house by wrongdoing, and his rooms by doing what is not right; who makes use of his neighbour without payment, and gives him nothing for his work;

So this is what the Lord has said about Jehoiakim, the son of Josiah, king of Judah: They will make no weeping for him, saying, Ah my brother! or, Ah sister! they will make no weeping for him, saying, Ah lord! or, Ah his glory!

They will do to him what they do to the dead body of an ass; his body will be pulled out and placed on the earth outside the doors of Jerusalem.

So this is what the Lord, the God of Israel, has said against the keepers who have the care of my people: You have let my flock be broken up, driving them away and not caring for them; see, I will send on you the punishment for the evil of your doings, says the Lord.

See, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will give to David a true Branch, and he will be ruling as king, acting wisely, doing what is right, and judging uprightly in the land.

For the land is full of men who are untrue to their wives; because of the curse the land is full of grief; the green fields of the waste land have become dry; and they are quick to do evil, their strength is for what is not right.

So this is what the Lord of armies has said about the prophets: See, I will give them a bitter plant for their food, and bitter water for their drink: for from the prophets of Jerusalem unclean behaviour has gone out into all the land.

This is what the Lord of armies has said: Do not give ear to the words which the prophets say to you: they give you teaching of no value: it is from themselves that their vision comes, and not out of the mouth of the Lord.

In what secret place may a man take cover without my seeing him? says the Lord. Is there any place in heaven or earth where I am not? says the Lord.

My ears have been open to what the prophets have said, who say false words in my name, saying, I have had a dream, I have had a dream, I have had a dream,

If a prophet has a dream, let him give out his dream; and he who has my word, let him give out my word in good faith. What has the dry stem to do with the grain? says the Lord.

And if this people, or the prophet, or a priest, questioning you, says, What word of weight is there from the Lord? then you are to say to them, You are the word, for I will not be troubled with you any more, says the Lord.

But this is what you are to say, every man to his neighbour and every man to his brother, What answer has the Lord given? and, What has the Lord said?

This is what you are to say to the prophet, What answer has the Lord given to you? and, What has the Lord said?

But if you say, The word of weight of the Lord; this is what the Lord has said: Because you say, The weight of the Lord, and I have sent to you, saying, You are not to say, The weight of the Lord

Then the Lord said to me, What do you see, Jeremiah? And I said, Figs; the good figs are very good, and the bad very bad, and of no use for food, they are so bad.

This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, has said: Like these good figs, so in my eyes will be the prisoners of Judah, whom I have sent from this place into the land of the Chaldaeans for their good.

So this is what the Lord of armies has said: Because you have not given ear to my words,

For this is what the Lord, the God of Israel, has said to me: Take the cup of the wine of this wrath from my hand, and make all the nations to whom I send you take of it.

And you are to say to them, This is what the Lord of armies, the God of Israel, has said: Take of this cup and be overcome, and let it come out again from your lips, and from your fall you will never be lifted up again, because of the sword which I will send among you.

And it will be, if they will not take of the cup in your hand, then you are to say to them, This is what the Lord of armies has said: You will certainly take of it.

This is what the Lord of armies has said: See, evil is going out from nation to nation, and a great storm will come up from the inmost parts of the earth.

This is what the Lord has said: Take your place in the open square of the Lord's house and say to all the towns of Judah, who come into the Lord's house for worship, everything I give you orders to say to them: keep back not a word;

And you are to say to them, This is what the Lord has said: If you do not give ear to me and go in the way of my law which I have put before you,

Micah the Morashtite, who was a prophet in the days of Hezekiah, king of Judah, said to all the people of Judah, This is what the Lord of armies has said: Zion will become like a ploughed field, and Jerusalem will become a mass of broken walls, and the mountain of the house like the high places of the woodland.

This is what the Lord has said to me: Make for yourself bands and yokes and put them on your neck;

And give them orders to say to their masters, This is what the Lord of armies, the God of Israel, has said: Say to your masters,

And you are not to give ear to the prophets who say to you, You will not become servants of the king of Babylon: for what they say is not true.

For I have not sent them, says the Lord, but they are saying what is false in my name, so that I might send you out by force, causing destruction to come on you and on your prophets.

And I said to the priests and to all the people, This is what the Lord has said: Give no attention to the words of your prophets who say to you, See, in a very little time now the vessels of the Lord's house will come back again from Babylon: for what they say to you is false.

For this is what the Lord has said about the rest of the vessels which are still in this town,

For this is what the Lord of armies, the God of Israel, has said about the rest of the vessels in the house of the Lord and in the house of the king of Judah and at Jerusalem:

Go and say to Hananiah, This is what the Lord has said: Yokes of wood have been broken by you, but in their place I will make yokes of iron.

Then the prophet Jeremiah said to Hananiah the prophet, Give ear, now, Hananiah; the Lord has not sent you; but you are making this people put their faith in what is false.

This is what the Lord of armies, the God of Israel, has said to all those whom I have taken away prisoners from Jerusalem to Babylon:

For this is what the Lord of armies, the God of Israel, has said: Do not let yourselves be tricked by the prophets who are among you, and the readers of signs, and give no attention to their dreams which they may have;

For they are saying to you what is false in my name: I have not sent them, says the Lord.

For this is what the Lord has said: When seventy years are ended for Babylon, I will have pity on you and give effect to my good purpose for you, causing you to come back to this place.

For this is what the Lord has said about the king who is seated on the seat of David's kingdom, and about all the people living in this town, your countrymen who have not gone out with you as prisoners;

This is what the Lord of armies has said: See, I will send on them the sword and need of food and disease, and will make them like bad figs, which are of no use for food, they are so bad.

This is what the Lord of armies, the God of Israel, has said about Ahab, the son of Kolaiah, and about Zedekiah, the son of Maaseiah, who are saying to you what is false in my name: See, I will give them up into the hands of Nebuchadrezzar, king of Babylon, and he will put them to death before your eyes.