Take your place in the doorway of the Lord's house, and give out this word there, and say, Give ear to the word of the Lord, all you of Judah who come inside these doors to give worship to the Lord.

If you are not cruel to the man from a strange country, and to the child without a father, and to the widow, and do not put the upright to death in this place, or go after other gods, causing damage to yourselves:

Then I will let you go on living in this place, in the land which I gave to your fathers in the past and for ever.

Will you take the goods of others, put men to death, and be untrue to your wives, and take false oaths, and have perfumes burned to the Baal, and go after other gods which are strange to you;

And come and take your place before me in this house, which is named by my name, and say, We have been made safe; so that you may do all these disgusting things?

Has this house, which is named by my name, become a hole of thieves to you? Truly I, even I, have seen it, says the Lord.

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.

And now, because you have done all these works, says the Lord, and I sent my word to you, getting up early and sending, but you did not give ear; and my voice came to you, but you gave no answer:

For this reason I will do to the house which is named by my name, and in which you have put your faith, and to the place which I gave to you and to your fathers, as I have done to Shiloh.

And as for you (Jeremiah), make no prayers for this people, send up no cry or prayer for them, make no request for them to me: for I will not give ear.

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

The children go for wood, the fathers get the fire burning, the women are working the paste to make cakes for the queen of heaven, and drink offerings are drained out to other gods, moving me to wrath.

Are they moving me to wrath? says the Lord; are they not moving themselves to their shame?

For I said nothing to your fathers, and gave them no orders, on the day when I took them out of Egypt, about burned offerings or offerings of beasts:

But this was the order I gave them, saying, Give ear to my voice, and I will be your God, and you will be my people: go in all the way ordered by me, so that all may be well for you.

From the day when your fathers came out of Egypt till this day, I have sent my servants the prophets to you, getting up early every day and sending them:

And you are to say all these words to them, but they will not give ear to you: you will send out your voice to them, but they will give no answer.

And you are to say to them, This is the nation which has not given ear to the voice of their God, or taken his teaching to heart: good faith is dead and is cut off from their mouths.

And the bodies of this people will be food for the birds of heaven and for the beasts of the earth; and there will be no one to send them away.

And in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem, I will put an end to the laughing voices, the voice of joy and the voice of the newly-married man and the voice of the bride: for the land will become a waste.

And they will put them out before the sun and the moon and all the stars of heaven, whose lovers and servants they have been, after whom they have gone, to whom they have made prayers, and to whom they have given worship: they will not be put together or placed in the earth; they will be waste on the face of the earth.

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?

Why do these people of Jerusalem go back, for ever turning away? they will not give up their deceit, they will 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.

Truly, the stork in the heavens is conscious of her fixed times; the dove and the swallow and the crane keep to the times of their coming; but my people have no knowledge of the law of the Lord.

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?

So I will give their wives to others, and their fields to those who will take them for themselves: for everyone, from the least to the greatest, is given up to getting money; from the priest even to the prophet, everyone is false.

Let them be put to shame because they have done disgusting things. They had no shame, they were not able to become red with shame: so they will come down with those who are falling: in the time of their punishment they will be made low, says the Lord.

I will put an end to them completely, says the Lord: there are no grapes on the vine and no figs on the fig-tree, and the leaf is dry.

Why are we seated doing nothing? come together, and let us go to the walled towns, and let destruction overtake us there, for the Lord our God has sent destruction on us, and given us bitter water for our drink, because we have done evil against the Lord.

The loud breathing of the horses comes to our ears from Dan: at the sound of the outcry of his war-horses, all the land is shaking with fear; for they have come, and have made a meal of the land and everything in it; the town and the people living in it.

The grain-cutting is past, the summer is ended, and no salvation has come to us.

If only my head was a stream of waters and my eyes fountains of weeping, so that I might go on weeping day and night for the dead of the daughter of my people!

Their tongues are bent like a bow to send out false words: they have become strong in the land, but not for good faith: they go on from evil to evil, and they have no knowledge of me, says the Lord.

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.

So the Lord of armies has said, See, I will make them soft in the fire and put them to the test; this I will do because of their evil-doing.

His tongue is an arrow causing death; the words of his mouth are deceit: he says words of peace to his neighbour, but in his heart he is waiting secretly for him.

Am I not to send punishment for these things? says the Lord: will not my soul take payment from such a nation as this?

Give yourselves to weeping, crying out in sorrow for the mountains; and for the fields of the waste land send up a song of grief, because they are burned up, so that no one goes through; there is no sound of cattle; the bird of the heavens and the beast are in flight and are gone.

Who is the wise man able to see this? who is he to whom the word of the Lord has come, so that he may make it clear? why is the land given to destruction and burned up like a waste place, so that no one goes through?

And the Lord said, Because they have given up my law which I put before them, giving no attention to my voice and not being guided by it;

And I will send them wandering among the nations, among people strange to them and to their fathers: and I will send the sword after them till I have put an end to them.

But even now, give ear to the word of the Lord, O you women; let your ears be open to the word of his mouth, training your daughters to give cries of sorrow, everyone teaching her neighbour a song of grief.

But if any man has pride, let it be in this, that he has the wisdom to have knowledge of me, that I am the Lord, working mercy, giving true decisions, and doing righteousness in the earth: for in these things I have delight, says the Lord.

See, the day is coming, says the Lord, when I will send punishment on all those who have circumcision in the flesh;

Give ear to the word which the Lord says to you, O people of Israel:

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.

It is like a pillar in a garden of plants, and has no voice: it has to be lifted, for it has no power of walking. Have no fear of it; for it has no power of doing evil and it is not able to do any good.

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.

Then every man becomes like a beast without knowledge; every gold-worker is put to shame by the image he has made: for his metal image is deceit, and there is no breath in them.

My tent is pulled down and all my cords are broken: my children have gone from me, and they are not: no longer is there anyone to give help in stretching out my tent and hanging up my curtains.

For the keepers of the sheep have become like beasts, not looking to the Lord for directions: so they have not done wisely and all their flocks have been put to flight.

Let your wrath be let loose on the nations which have no knowledge of you, and on the families who give no worship to your name: for they have made a meal of Jacob, truly they have made a meal of him and put an end to him and made his fields a waste.

The word which came to Jeremiah from the Lord, saying,

Give ear to the words of this agreement, and say to the men of Judah and to the people of Jerusalem,

The Lord, the God of Israel, has said, Let that man be cursed who does not give ear to the words of this agreement,

To the order which I gave your fathers on the day when I took them out of the land of Egypt, out of the oven of iron, saying, Give ear to my voice, and do all the orders I have given you: so you will be my people, and I will be your God:

So that I may give effect to the oath which I made to your fathers, to give them a land flowing with milk and honey as at this day. And I said in answer, So be it, O Lord.

And the Lord said to me, Give out these words in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem, saying, Give ear to the words of this agreement and do them.

For I gave certain witness to your fathers on the day when I took them up out of the land of Egypt, and even to this day, getting up early and witnessing and saying, Give ear to my voice.

But they gave no attention and did not give ear, but they went on, every man in the pride of his evil heart: so I sent on them all the curses in this agreement, which I gave them orders to keep, but they did not.

And the Lord said to me, There is an evil design at work among the men of Judah and the people of Jerusalem.

They are turned back to the sins of their fathers, who would not give ear to my words; they have gone after other gods and become their servants: the people of Israel and the people of Judah have not kept the agreement which I made with their fathers.

So the Lord has said, I will send evil on them, which they will not be able to get away from; and they will send up a cry for help to me, but I will not give ear to them.

Then the towns of Judah and the people of Jerusalem will go crying for help to the gods to whom they have been burning perfumes: but they will give them no salvation in the time of their trouble.

For the number of your gods is as the number of your towns, O Judah; and for every street in Jerusalem you have put up altars to the Baal for burning perfumes to the Baal.

And as for you, make no prayers for this people, send up no cry or prayer for them: for I will not give ear to their cry in the time of their trouble.

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?

For the Lord of armies, by whom you were planted, has given his decision for evil against you, because of the evil which the people of Israel and the people of Judah have done, In moving me to wrath by offering perfumes to the Baal.

And the Lord gave me knowledge of it and I saw it: then you made clear to me their doings.

But I was like a gentle lamb taken to be put to death; I had no thought that they were designing evil against me, saying, Come and let us make trouble his food, cutting him off from the land of the living, so that there may be no more memory of his name.

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:

So the Lord of armies has said, See, I will send punishment on them: the young men will be put to the sword; their sons and their daughters will come to death through need of food:

You are in the right, O Lord, when I put my cause before you: still let me take up with you the question of your decisions: why does the evil-doer do well? why are the workers of deceit living in comfort?

But you, O Lord, have knowledge of me; you see me, searching and testing how my heart is with you: let them be pulled out like sheep to be put to death, make them ready for the day of death.

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?

For even your brothers, your father's family, even they have been untrue to you, crying loudly after you: have no faith in them, though they say fair words to you.

My heritage has become like a lion in the woodland to me; her voice has been loud against me; so I have hate for her.

My heritage is like a brightly coloured bird to me; the cruel birds are attacking her on every side: go, get together all the beasts of the field, make them come for destruction.

They have made it waste; it is weeping to me, being wasted; all the land is made waste, because no man takes it to heart.

Those who make waste have come on all the open hilltops in the waste land; for the sword of the Lord sends destruction from one end of the land to the other end of the land: no flesh has peace.

And it will come about that, after they have been uprooted, I will again have pity on them; and I will take them back, every man to his heritage and every man to his land.

And it will be that, if they give their minds to learning the ways of my people, using my name in their oaths, By the living Lord; as they have been teaching my people to take oaths by the Baal; then their place will be made certain among my people.

But if they will not give ear, then I will have that nation uprooted, and given to destruction, says the Lord.

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.

And the word of the Lord came to me a second time, saying,

Take the band which you got for a price, which is round your body, and go to Parah and put it in a secret place there in a hole of the rock.

So I went and put it in a secret place by Parah, as the Lord had said to me.

Then after a long time, the Lord said to me, Up! go to Parah and get the band which I gave you orders to put there.

So I went to Parah and, uncovering the hole, took the band from the place where I had put it away: and the band was damaged and of no use for anything.

Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying,

The Lord has said, In this way I will do damage to the pride of Judah and to the great pride of Jerusalem.

These evil people who say they will not give ear to my words, who go on in the pride of their hearts and have become servants and worshippers of other gods, will become like this band which is of no use for anything.

For as a band goes tightly round a man's body, so I made all the people of Israel and all the people of Judah tightly united to me; so that they might be a people for me and a name and a praise and a glory: but they would not give ear.

So you are to say this word to them: This is the word of the Lord, the God of Israel: Every skin bottle will be full of wine; and they will say to you, Is it not quite clear to us that every skin bottle will be full of wine?

Then you are to say to them, The Lord has said, I will make all the people of this land, even the kings seated on David's seat, and the priests and the prophets and all the people of Jerusalem, overcome with strong drink.

I will have them smashed against one another, fathers and sons together, says the Lord: I will have no pity or mercy, I will have no feeling for them to keep me from giving them to destruction.

Give glory to the Lord your God, before he makes it dark, and before your feet are slipping on the dark mountains, and, while you are looking for a light, he makes it into deep dark, into black night.

But if you do not give ear to it, my soul will be weeping in secret for your pride; my eye will be weeping bitterly, streaming with water, because the Lord's flock has been taken away as prisoners.

Say to the king and to the queen-mother, Make yourselves low, be seated on the earth: for the crown of your glory has come down from your heads.