Then said I, O Lord God! see, I have no power of words, for I am a child.

For my people have done two evils; they have given up me, the fountain of living waters, and have made for themselves water-holes, cut out from the rock, broken water-holes, of no use for storing water.

Has not this come on you because you have given up the Lord your God, who was your guide by the way?

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?

The evil you yourselves have done will be your punishment, your errors will be your judge: be certain then, and see that it is an evil and a bitter thing to give up the Lord your God, and no longer to be moved by fear of me, says the Lord, the Lord of armies.

For even if you are washed with soda and take much soap, still your evil-doing is marked before me, says the Lord God.

An untrained ass, used to the waste land, breathing up the wind in her desire; at her time, who is able to send her away? all those who are looking for her will have no need to make themselves tired; in her month they will get her.

I gave your children blows to no purpose; they got no good from training: your sword has been the destruction of your prophets, like a death-giving lion.

O generation, see the word of the Lord. Have I been a waste land to Israel? or a land of dark night? why do my people say, We have got loose, we will not come to you again?

Only be conscious of your sin, the evil you have done against the Lord your God; you have gone with strange men under every branching tree, giving no attention to my voice, says the Lord.

A voice is sounding on the open hilltops, the weeping and the prayers of the children of Israel; because their way is twisted, they have not kept the Lord their God in mind.

Come back, you children who have been turned away, and I will take away your desire for wandering. See, we have come to you, for you are the Lord our God.

Truly, the hills, and the noise of an army on the mountains, are a false hope: truly, in the Lord our God is the salvation of Israel.

Let us be stretched on the earth in our downfall, covering ourselves with our shame: for we have been sinners against the Lord our God, we and our fathers, from our earliest years even till this day: and we have not given ear to the voice of the Lord our God.

And you will take your oath, By the living Lord, in good faith and wisdom and righteousness; and the nations will make use of you as a blessing, and in you will they take a pride.

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.

Then said I, Ah, Lord God! your words were not true when you said to this people and to Jerusalem, You will have peace; when the sword has come even to the soul.

My soul, my soul! I am pained to my inmost heart; my heart is troubled in me; I am not able to be quiet, because the sound of the horn, the note of war, has come to my ears.

For my people are foolish, they have no knowledge of me; they are evil-minded children, without sense, all of them: they are wise in evil-doing, but have no knowledge of doing good.

Go quickly through the streets of Jerusalem, and see now, and get knowledge, and make a search in her wide places if there is a man, if there is one in her who is upright, who keeps faith; and she will have my forgiveness.

O Lord, do not your eyes see good faith? you have given them punishment, but they were not troubled; you have sent destruction on them, but they did not take your teaching to heart: they have made their faces harder than a rock; they would not come back.

Then I said, But these are the poor: they are foolish, for they have no knowledge of the way of the Lord or of the behaviour desired by their God.

I will go to the great men and have talk with them; for they have knowledge of the way of the Lord and of the behaviour desired by their God. But as for these, their one purpose is a broken yoke and burst bands.

For this reason the Lord, the God of armies, has said: Because you have said this, I will make my words in your mouth a fire, and this people wood, and they will be burned up by it.

See, I will send you a nation from far away, O people of Israel, says the Lord; a strong nation and an old nation, a nation whose language is strange to you, so that you may not get the sense of their words.

And it will come about, when you say, Why has the Lord our God done all these things to us? that you will say to them, As you gave me up, making yourselves servants to strange gods in your land, so will you be servants to strange men in a land which is not yours.

And they do not say in their hearts, Now let us give worship to our God, who gives the rain, the winter and the spring rain, at the right time; who keeps for us the ordered weeks of the grain-cutting.

Through your evil-doing these things have been turned away, and your sins have kept back good from you.

As the fowl-house is full of birds, so are their houses full of deceit: for this reason they have become great and have got wealth.

The fair and delicate one, the daughter of Zion, will be cut off by my hand.

Keepers of sheep with their flocks will come to her; they will put up their tents round her; everyone will get food in his place.

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 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.

The Lord of armies, the God of Israel, says, Let your ways and your doings be changed for the better and I will let you go on living in this place.

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.

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.

These are the words of the Lord of armies, the God of Israel: Put your burned offerings with your offerings of beasts, and take flesh for your food.

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.

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.

Let your hair be cut off, O Jerusalem, and let it go, and let a song of grief go up on the open hilltops; for the Lord is turned away from the generation of his wrath and has given them up.

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.

We were looking for peace, but no good came; and for a time of well-being, but there is only a great fear.

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.

So the Lord of armies, the God of Israel, has said, I will give them, even this people, bitter plants for food and bitter water for drink.

On Egypt and on Judah and on Edom and on the children of Ammon and on Moab and on all who have the ends of their hair cut, who are living in the waste land: for all these nations and all the people of Israel are without circumcision in their hearts.

For that which is feared by the people is foolish: it is the work of the hands of the workman; for a tree is cut down by him out of the woods with his axe.

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.

But the Lord is the true God; he is the living God and an eternal king: when he is angry, the earth is shaking with fear, and the nations give way before his wrath.

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.

Get your goods together and go out of the land, O you who are shut up in the walled town.

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 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.

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?

How long will the land have grief, and the plants of all the land be dry? because of the sins of the people living in it, destruction has overtaken the beasts and the birds; because they said, God does not see our ways.

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.

Though good grain was planted, they have got in thorns: they have given themselves pain without profit: they will be shamed on account of their produce, because of the burning wrath of 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.

So, as the Lord said, I got a band for a price and put it round my body.

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.

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 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?

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.

Is it possible for the skin of the Ethiopian to be changed, or the markings on the leopard? Then it might be possible for you to do good, who have been trained to do evil.

And the asses of the field on the open hilltops are opening their mouths wide like jackals to get air; their eyes are hollow because there is no grass.

And the Lord said to me, Make no prayer for this people for their good.

Then I said, Ah, Lord God! see, the prophets say to them, You will not see the sword or be short of food; but I will give you certain peace in this place.

Have you completely given up Judah? is your soul turned in disgust from Zion? why have you given us blows from which there is no one to make us well? we were looking for peace, but no good came; and for a time of well-being, but there was only a great fear.

Are any of the false gods of the nations able to make rain come? are the heavens able to give showers? are you not he, O Lord our God? so we will go on waiting for you, for you have done all these things.

But to me your word is a joy, making my heart glad; for I am named by your name, O Lord God of armies.

For the Lord of armies, the God of Israel, has said, See, before your eyes and in your days I will put an end in this place to the laughing voices and the voice of joy; to the voice of the newly-married man and the voice of the bride.

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?

The sin of Judah is recorded with a pen of iron, and with the sharp point of a jewel it is cut on their hearts of stone, and on the horns of their altars for a sign to them:

For he will be like the brushwood in the upland, and will not see when good comes; but his living-place will be in the dry places in the waste land, in a salt and unpeopled land.

O Lord, the hope of Israel, all who give you up will be put to shame; those who go away from you will be cut off from the earth, because they have given up the Lord, the fountain of living waters.

But they gave no attention and would not give ear, but they made their necks stiff so that they might not give ear and might not get teaching.

And when the vessel, which he was forming out of earth, got damaged in the hand of the potter, he made it again into another vessel, as it seemed good to the potter to make it.

If, in that very minute, it does evil in my eyes, going against my orders, then my good purpose, which I said I would do for them, will be changed.

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.

Is evil to be the reward of good? for they have made a deep hole for my soul. Keep in mind how I took my place before you, to say a good word for them so that your wrath might be turned away from them.

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;

Say, Give ear to the word of the Lord, O kings of Judah and people of Jerusalem; the Lord of armies, the God of Israel, has said, See, I will send evil on this place which will be bitter to the ears of anyone hearing of it.

The Lord of armies, the God of Israel, has said: See, I will send on this town and on all her towns all the evil which I have said; because they made their necks stiff, so that they might not give ear to my words.

For numbers of them say evil secretly in my hearing (there is fear on every side): they say, Come, let us give witness against him; all my nearest friends, who are watching for my fall, say, It may be that he will be taken by deceit, and we will get the better of him and give him punishment.

Will you get directions from the Lord for us; for Nebuchadrezzar, king of Babylon, is making war against us; it may be that the Lord will do something for us like all the wonders he has done, and make him go away from us.

The Lord God of Israel has said, See, I am turning back the instruments of war in your hands, with which you are fighting against the king of Babylon and the Chaldaeans, who are outside the walls and shutting you in; and I will get them together inside this town.

And after that, says the Lord, I will give up Zedekiah, king of Judah, and his servants and his people, even those in the town who have not come to their end from the disease and the sword and from need of food, into the hands of Nebuchadrezzar, king of Babylon, and into the hands of their haters, and into the hands of those desiring their death: he will put them to the sword; he will not let anyone get away, he will have no pity or mercy.

For my face is turned to this town for evil and not for good, says the Lord: it will be given into the hands of the king of Babylon, and he will have it burned with fire.

See, I am against you, you who are living on the rock of the valley, says the Lord; you who say, Who will come down against us? or who will get into our houses?

And I will make ready those who will send destruction on you, everyone armed for war: by them your best cedar-trees will be cut down and put in the fire.

And they will say, Because they gave up the agreement of the Lord their God, and became worshippers and servants of other gods.

Who says, I will make a wide house for myself, and rooms of great size, and has windows cut out, and has it roofed with cedar and painted with bright red.

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.

And I will get the rest of my flock together from all the countries where I have sent them, and will make them come back again to their resting-place; and they will have offspring and be increased.

Am I only a God who is near, says the Lord, and not a God at a distance?

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 you will no longer put people in mind of the word of weight of the Lord: for every man's word will be a weight on himself; for the words of the living God, of the Lord of armies, our God, have been twisted by you

One basket had very good figs, like the figs which first come to growth: and the other basket had very bad figs, so bad that they were of no use for food.

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.