Then the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,

But the LORD said unto me, Say not, I am a child: for you shall go to all that I shall send you, and whatsoever I command you you shall speak.

Then the LORD put forth his hand, and touched my mouth. And the LORD said unto me, Behold, I have put my words in your mouth.

Moreover the word of the LORD came unto me, saying, Jeremiah, what see you? And I said, I see a rod of an almond tree.

Then said the LORD unto me, You have well seen: for I will hasten my word to perform it.

And the word of the LORD came unto me the second time, saying, What see you? And I said, I see a boiling pot; and it is facing away from the north.

Then the LORD said unto me, Out of the north an evil shall break forth upon all the inhabitants of the land.

And I will utter my judgments against them concerning all their wickedness, who have forsaken me, and have burned incense unto other gods, and worshiped the works of their own hands.

Moreover the word of the LORD came to me, saying,

Go and cry in the ears of Jerusalem, saying, Thus says the LORD; I remember you, the kindness of your youth, the love of your betrothal, when you followed me in the wilderness, in a land that was not sown.

Thus says the LORD, What iniquity have your fathers found in me, that they have gone far from me, and have walked after vanity, and are become vain?

And I brought you into a plentiful country, to eat its fruit and its goodness; but when you entered, you defiled my land, and made my heritage an abomination.

The priests said not, Where is the LORD? and they that handle the law knew me not: the rulers also transgressed against me, and the prophets prophesied by Baal, and walked after things that do not profit.

Has a nation changed its gods, which are yet no gods? but my people have changed their glory for that which does not profit.

For my people have committed two evils; they have forsaken me the fountain of living waters, and hewed themselves out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water.

Your own wickedness shall correct you, and your backslidings shall reprove you: know therefore and see that it is an evil thing and bitter, that you have forsaken the LORD your God, and that my fear is not in you, says the Lord GOD of hosts.

Yet I had planted you a noble vine, wholly a right seed: how then are you turned into the degenerate plant of a wild vine unto me?

For though you wash yourself with lye, and use much soap, yet your iniquity is marked before me, says the Lord GOD.

Saying to a tree, You are my father; and to a stone, You have brought me forth: for they have turned their back unto me, and not their face: but in the time of their trouble they will say, Arise, and save us.

Why will you plead with me? you all have transgressed against me, says the LORD.

O generation, see you the word of the LORD. Have I been a wilderness unto Israel? a land of darkness? why say my people, We are lords; we will come no more unto you?

Can a maid forget her ornaments, or a bride her attire? yet my people have forgotten me days without number.

Yet you say, Because I am innocent, surely his anger shall turn from me. Behold, I will plead with you, because you say, I have not sinned.

They say, If a man puts away his wife, and she goes from him, and becomes another man's, may he return unto her again? shall not that land be greatly polluted? but you have played the harlot with many lovers; yet return again to me, says the LORD.

Will you not from this time cry unto me, My father, you are the guide of my youth?

The LORD said also unto me in the days of Josiah the king, Have you seen that which backsliding Israel has done? she has gone up upon every high mountain and under every green tree, and there has played the harlot.

And I said after she had done all these things, Turn you unto me. But she returned not. And her treacherous sister Judah saw it.

And yet for all this her treacherous sister Judah has not turned unto me with her whole heart, but in pretense, says the LORD.

And the LORD said unto me, The backsliding Israel has justified herself more than treacherous Judah.

Go and proclaim these words toward the north, and say, Return, you backsliding Israel, says the LORD; and I will not cause my anger to fall upon you: for I am merciful, says the LORD, and I will not keep anger forever.

Only acknowledge your iniquity, that you have transgressed against the LORD your God, and have scattered your favors to the strangers under every green tree, and you have not obeyed my voice, says the LORD.

And I will give you shepherds according to my heart, which shall feed you with knowledge and understanding.

But I said, How shall I put you among the children, and give you a pleasant land, a beautiful heritage of the hosts of nations? and I said, You shall call me, My father; and shall not turn away from me.

Surely as a wife treacherously departs from her husband, so have you dealt treacherously with me, O house of Israel, says the LORD.

If you will return, O Israel, says the LORD, return unto me: and if you will put away your abominations out of my sight, then shall you not be moved.

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

At that time shall it be said to this people and to Jerusalem, A dry wind of the high places blows in the wilderness toward the daughter of my people, not to fan, nor to cleanse,

Even a full wind from those places shall come unto me: now also will I give sentence against them.

O Jerusalem, wash your heart from wickedness, that you may be saved. How long shall your vain thoughts lodge within you?

Like keepers of a field, are they against her round about; because she has been rebellious against me, says the LORD.

My soul, my soul! I am pained at my very heart; my heart makes a noise in me; I cannot hold my peace, because you have heard, O my soul, the sound of the trumpet, the alarm of war.

Destruction upon destruction is cried; for the whole land is plundered: suddenly are my tents plundered, and my curtains in a moment.

For my people are foolish, they have not known me; they are stupid children, and they have no understanding: they are wise to do evil, but how to do good they have no knowledge.

For I have heard a voice like a woman in travail, and the anguish as of her that brings forth her first child, the voice of the daughter of Zion, that bewails herself, that spreads her hands, saying, Woe is me now! for my soul is wearied because of murderers.

I will get me unto the great men, and will speak unto them; for they have known the way of the LORD, and the law of their God: but these have altogether broken the yoke, and burst the bonds.

How shall I pardon you for this? your children have forsaken me, and sworn by them that are no gods: when I had fed them to the full, they then committed adultery, and assembled themselves by troops in the harlots' houses.

Shall I not punish for these things? says the LORD: and shall not my soul be avenged on such a nation as this?

For the house of Israel and the house of Judah have dealt very treacherously against me, says the LORD.

Therefore thus says the LORD God of hosts, Because you speak this word, behold, I will make my words in your mouth fire, and this people wood, and it shall devour them.

And it shall come to pass, when you shall say, Why does the LORD our God all these things unto us? then shall you answer them, Like you have forsaken me, and served foreign gods in your land, so shall you serve strangers in a land that is not yours.

Fear you not me? says the LORD: will you not tremble at my presence, who has placed the sand for the bound of the sea by a perpetual decree, that it cannot pass it: and though its waves toss themselves, yet can they not prevail; though they roar, yet can they not pass over it?

For among my people are found wicked men: they lie in wait, as he that sets snares; they set a trap, they catch men.

Shall I not punish for these things? says the LORD: shall not my soul be avenged on such a nation as this?

The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests bear rule by their own power; and my people love to have it so: and what will you do in the end?

As a fountain casts out her waters, so she casts out her wickedness: violence and plundering are heard in her; before me continually are grief and wounds.

Be you instructed, O Jerusalem, lest my soul depart from you; lest I make you desolate, a land not inhabited.

To whom shall I speak, and give warning, that they may hear? behold, their ear is uncircumcised, and they cannot hearken: behold, the word of the LORD is unto them a reproach; they have no delight in it.

And their houses shall be turned unto others, with their fields and wives together: for I will stretch out my hand upon the inhabitants of the land, says the LORD.

They have healed also the hurt of the daughter of my people lightly, saying, Peace, peace; when there is no peace.

Hear, O earth: behold, I will bring evil upon this people, even the fruit of their thoughts, because they have not hearkened unto my words, nor to my law, but rejected it.

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

O daughter of my people, gird yourself with sackcloth, and roll yourself about in ashes: make yourself mourn, as for an only son, most bitter lamentation: for the spoiler shall suddenly come upon us.

I have set you for a tester and a fortress among my people, that you may know and test their way.

And come and stand before me in this house, which is called by my name, and say, We are delivered to do all these abominations?

Has this house, which is called by my name, become a den of robbers in your eyes? Behold, even I have seen it, says the LORD.

But go you now unto my place which was in Shiloh, where I set my name at the first, and see what I did to it for the wickedness of my people Israel.

Therefore will I do unto this house, which is called by my name, in which you trust, and unto the place which I gave to you and to your fathers, as I have done to Shiloh.

And I will cast you out of my sight, as I have cast out all your brethren, even the whole descendants of Ephraim.

Therefore pray not for this people, neither lift up cry nor prayer for them, neither make intercession to me: for I will not hear you.

The children gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead their dough, to make cakes to the queen of heaven, and to pour out drink offerings unto other gods, that they may provoke me to anger.

Do they provoke me to anger? says the LORD: do they not provoke themselves to the shame of their own faces?

Therefore thus says the Lord GOD; Behold, my anger and my fury shall be poured out upon this place, upon man, and upon beast, and upon the trees of the field, and upon the fruit of the ground; and it shall burn, and shall not be quenched.

But this thing commanded I them, saying, Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be my people: and walk you in all the ways that I have commanded you, that it may be well unto you.

Since the day that your fathers came forth out of the land of Egypt unto this day I have even sent unto you all my servants the prophets, daily rising up early and sending them:

Yet they hearkened not unto me, nor inclined their ear, but hardened their neck: they did worse than their fathers.

For the children of Judah have done evil in my sight, says the LORD: they have set their abominations in the house which is called by my name, to pollute it.

And they have built the high places of Topheth, which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire; which I commanded them not, neither came it into my heart.

Yea, the stork in the heavens knows her appointed times; and the turtledove and the crane and the swallow observe the time of their coming; but my people know not the law of the LORD.

For they have healed the hurt of the daughter of my people lightly, saying, Peace, peace; when there is no peace.

When I would comfort myself against sorrow, my heart is faint in me.

Behold the voice of the cry of the daughter of my people because of them that dwell in a far country: Is not the LORD in Zion? is not her king in her? Why have they provoked me to anger with their graven images, and with foreign idols?

For the hurt of the daughter of my people am I hurt; I am mourning; dismay has taken hold on me.

Is there no balm in Gilead; is there no physician there? why then has not the health of the daughter of my people recovered?

Oh that my head were waters, and my eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people!

Oh that I had in the wilderness a lodging place for wayfaring men; that I might leave my people and go from them! For they are all adulterers, an assembly of treacherous men.

And they bend their tongues like their bow for lies: but they are not valiant for the truth upon the earth; for they proceed from evil to evil, and they know not me, says the LORD.

Your habitation is in the midst of deceit; through deceit they refuse to know me, says the LORD.

Therefore thus says the LORD of hosts, Behold, I will refine them, and test them; for how shall I deal with the daughter of my people?

Shall I not visit them for these things? says the LORD: shall not my soul be avenged on such a nation as this?

Who is the wise man, that may understand this? and who is he to whom the mouth of the LORD has spoken, that he may declare it, for why is the land perished and is burned up like a wilderness, that none passes through?

And the LORD says, Because they have forsaken my law which I set before them, and have not obeyed my voice, neither walked in it;

Thus says the LORD of hosts, Consider you, and call for the mourning women, that they may come; and send for skillful women, that they may come:

And let them make haste, and take up a wailing for us, that our eyes may run down with tears, and our eyelids gush out with water.

But let him that glories glory in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the LORD who exercises lovingkindness, justice, and righteousness, in the earth: for in these things I delight, says the LORD.

For thus says the LORD, Behold, I will sling out the inhabitants of the land at this time, and will distress them, that they may find it so.

Woe is me for my hurt! my wound is grievous: but I said, Truly this is a grief, and I must bear it.

My tent is plundered, and all my cords are broken: my children are gone forth from me, and they are not: there is none to stretch forth my tent anymore, and to set up my curtains.

O LORD, correct me, but with justice; not in your anger, lest you bring me to nothing.

Which I commanded your fathers in the day that I brought them forth out of the land of Egypt, from the iron furnace, saying, Obey my voice, and do them, according to all which I command you: so shall you be my people, and I will be your God:

That I may perform the oath which I have sworn unto your fathers, to give them a land flowing with milk and honey, as it is this day. Then answered I, and said, So be it, O LORD.