"For my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the spring of living waters, and cut them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water.

"How can you say, 'I am not defiled. I have not gone after the Baals'? See your way in the valley. Know what you have done. You are a swift dromedary traversing her ways;

a wild donkey used to the wilderness, that snuffs up the wind in her desire. When she is in heat, who can turn her away? All those who seek her will not weary themselves. In her month, they will find her.

"But where are your gods that you have made for yourselves? Let them arise, if they can save you in the time of your trouble: for according to the number of your cities are your gods, Judah.

"Can a virgin forget her ornaments, or a bride her attire? Yet my people have forgotten me for days without number.

Circumcise yourselves to the LORD, and take away the foreskins of your heart, you men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem; lest my wrath go forth like fire, and burn so that none can quench it, because of the evil of your doings.

My anguish, my anguish. I am pained at my very heart; my heart is disquieted in me; I can't hold my peace; because you have heard, O my soul, the sound of the trumpet, the alarm of war.

"Run back and forth through the streets of Jerusalem, and see now, and know, and seek in the broad places of it, if you can find a man, if there are any who does justly, who seeks truth; and I will pardon her.

"How can I pardon you? Your children have forsaken me, and sworn by what are no gods. When I had fed them to the full, they committed adultery, and assembled themselves in troops at the prostitutes' houses.

Do you not fear me?' says the LORD 'Won't you tremble at my presence, who have placed the sand for the bound of the sea, by a perpetual decree, that it can't pass it? And though its waves toss themselves, yet they can't prevail; though they roar, yet they can't pass over it.'

To whom shall I speak and testify, that they may hear? Behold, their ear is uncircumcised, and they can't listen. Behold, the word of the LORD has become a reproach to them. They have no delight in it.

To what purpose comes there to me frankincense from Sheba, and the sweet cane from a far country? Your burnt offerings are not acceptable, nor your sacrifices pleasing to me.'

Behold, you trust in lying words, that can't profit.

How can you say, "We are wise, and the law of the LORD is with us?" But, behold, the false pen of the scribes has worked falsely.

"For the mountains will I take up a weeping and wailing, and for the pastures of the wilderness a lamentation, because they are burned up, so that none passes through; neither can men hear the voice of the livestock; both the birds of the sky and the animals are fled, they are gone."

They are like a palm tree, of turned work, and do not speak: they must be carried, because they can't go. Do not be afraid of them; for they can't do evil, neither is it in them to do good."

"If you have run with the footmen, and they have wearied you, then how can you contend with horses? And though in a land of peace you are secure, yet how will you do in the pride of the Jordan?

Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots? Then may you also do good, who are accustomed to do evil.

Why should you be like a scared man, as a mighty man who can't save? Yet you, LORD, are in the midst of us, and we are called by your name; do not leave us."

Are there any among the vanities of the nations that can cause rain? Or can the sky give showers? Aren't you he, LORD our God? Therefore we will wait for you; for you have made all these things."

Can one break iron, even iron from the north, and bronze?

The heart is deceitful above all things, and it is exceedingly corrupt: who can know it?

"'House of Israel, can't I do with you as this potter?' says the LORD. 'Behold, as the clay in the potter's hand, so are you in my hand, house of Israel.'

and shall tell them, 'Thus says the LORD of hosts: "Even so will I break this people and this city, as one breaks a potter's vessel, that can't be made whole again; and they shall bury in Topheth, until there is no place to bury.

If I say, "I will not make mention of him, nor speak any more in his name," then there is in my heart as it were a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I am weary with forbearing, and I can't contain it.

'House of David, thus says the LORD, "Execute justice in the morning, and deliver him who is robbed out of the hand of the oppressor, lest my wrath go forth like fire, and burn so that none can quench it, because of the evil of your doings.

Can any hide himself in secret places so that I shall not see him?' says the LORD. 'Do I not fill heaven and earth?' says the LORD.

Then the LORD said to me, "What do you see, Jeremiah?" I said, "Figs; the good figs, very good; and the bad, very bad, that can't be eaten, they are so bad."

As the bad figs, which can't be eaten, they are so bad, surely thus says the LORD, 'So will I give up Zedekiah the king of Judah, and his officials, and the remnant of Jerusalem, who remain in this land, and those who dwell in the land of Egypt,

thus says the LORD of hosts; 'Behold, I will send on them the sword, the famine, and the pestilence, and will make them like vile figs, that can't be eaten, they are so bad.

Thus says the LORD: "If heaven above can be measured, and the foundations of the earth searched out beneath, then will I also cast off all the seed of Israel for all that they have done," says the LORD.

"Thus says the LORD: 'If you can break my covenant of the day, and my covenant of the night, so that there shall not be day and night in their season;

As the host of heaven can't be numbered, neither the sand of the sea measured; so will I multiply the seed of David my servant, and the Levites who minister to me.'"

Jeremiah commanded Baruch, saying, "I am shut up; I can't go into the house of the LORD:

Zedekiah the king said, "Behold, he is in your hand; for the king is not he who can do anything against you."

They shall cut down her forest, says the LORD, though it can't be searched; because they are more than the locusts, and are innumerable.

How can you be quiet, since the LORD has given you a command? Against Ashkelon, and against the seashore, there has he appointed it.'"

How can you say, "We are mighty men, and valiant men for the war?"

Of Damascus. "Hamath is confounded, and Arpad; for they have heard evil news, they are melted away: there is sorrow on the sea; it can't be quiet.

Behold, the enemy shall come up like a lion from the pride of the Jordan against the strong habitation: for I will suddenly make them run away from it; and whoever is chosen, him will I appoint over it: for who is like me? And who will appoint me a time? And who is the shepherd who can stand before me?"