It also came in the days of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, king of Judah, to the end of the eleventh year of Zedekiah the son of Josiah, king of Judah, to the exiling of Jerusalem in the fifth month.

And it happened, the Word of Jehovah came to me, saying,

Before I formed you in the belly I knew you; and before you came forth out of the womb I consecrated you, and I ordained you a prophet to the nations.

Behold! I have this day set you over the nations and over the kingdoms, to root out, and to pull down, and to destroy, and to throw down, to build, and to plant.

And the Word of Jehovah came to me, saying, Jeremiah, what do you see? And I said, I see a rod of an almond tree.

And Jehovah said to me, You have seen well; for I will watch over My Word to perform it.

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

And Jehovah said to me, Out of the north an evil will be set loose on all the inhabitants of the land.

For, behold, I will call all the families of the kingdoms of the north, says Jehovah. And they shall come, and they shall each one set his throne at the entrance of the gates of Jerusalem, and against all its wall all around, and against all the cities of Judah.

And you must gird up your loins, and arise, and speak to them all that I command you. Do not be terrified at their faces, lest I prostrate you before them.

So says Jehovah, What injustice have your fathers found in Me, that they have gone far from Me and have walked after vanity, and have become vain?

Nor did they say, Where is Jehovah who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, who led us through the wilderness, through a land of deserts and of pits, through a land of dry places, and of the shadow of death, through a land that no man passed through, and where no man lived?

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 inheritance an abomination.

Has a nation changed their gods who are yet no gods? But My people have changed their Glory for that which does not profit.

Be amazed, O heavens, at this, and be horribly afraid; be completely desolated, says Jehovah.

For My people have committed two evils; they have forsaken Me, the Fountain of living waters, to hew out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water.

And now what is for you toward the way of Egypt, to drink the waters of Sihor? Or what for you toward Assyria, to drink the waters of the River?

Your own evil shall correct you, and your backslidings shall reprove you, therefore know and see that it is an evil and bitter thing that you have forsaken Jehovah your God, and that My fear is not in you, says the Lord Jehovah of Hosts.

Yet I planted you a noble vine, wholly a true seed. How then have you turned into the degenerate shoots of an alien vine to Me?

For though you wash yourself with potash, and multiply soap for yourself, yet your iniquity is marked before Me, says the Lord Jehovah.

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 camel crossing its ways;

a wild ass used to the wilderness; in the desire of her passion she snuffs at the wind; in her time who can turn her away? All those who seek her will not tire themselves; in her month they will find her.

Can a virgin 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.

Yes, you shall go out from this place, and your hands on your head. For Jehovah has rejected those in whom you trust, and you will not prosper by them.

They say, If a man puts away his wife, and she goes from him and will be for another man, will he return to her again? Would not that land be greatly defiled? But you play the harlot with many lovers; yet come back to Me, says Jehovah.

Will He keep His anger forever? Will He keep it to the end? Behold, you have spoken and done all the evil things you could do.

And I said after she had done all these things, Turn to Me! But she did not return. And her treacherous sister Judah saw it.

And I saw, when for all the causes for which backsliding Israel committed adultery, I sent her away and gave a bill of divorce to her, yet her treacherous sister Judah did not fear, but she went and whored, she also.

And it happened, from the folly of her whoredom, she defiled the land and fornicated with stones and stocks.

And yet for all this her treacherous sister Judah has not turned to Me with her whole heart, but with falsehood, says Jehovah.

And it will be when you have multiplied and increased in the land, in those days, says Jehovah, they shall say no more, The ark of the covenant of Jehovah! Nor shall it come to mind; nor shall they remember it; nor shall they visit it; nor shall it be made any more.

At that time they shall call Jerusalem the throne of Jehovah; and all nations shall be gathered to it, to the name of Jehovah, to Jerusalem. Nor shall they walk any more after the stubbornness of their evil heart.

In those days the house of Judah shall walk with the house of Israel, and they shall come together out of the land of the north to the land that I have given for an inheritance to your fathers.

If you will return, O Israel, says Jehovah, return to Me. And if you will put away your abominations out of your sight, then you shall not be moved.

Circumcise yourselves to Jehovah, and take away the foreskins of your heart, men of Judah and people of Jerusalem; lest My fury come forth like fire, and burn so that none can put it out; because of the evil of your doings.

Declare in Judah, and let it be heard in Jerusalem; and say, Blow the trumpet in the land; cry, gather together, and say, Gather yourselves and let us go into the fortified cities.

Set up the banner toward Zion; flee for safety and do not wait; for I will bring evil from the north, and a great ruin.

The lion has come up from his thicket, and the destroyer of the nations has set out; he has left his place to make your land a waste. Your cities will fall into ruins without inhabitant.

And it shall be at that day, says Jehovah, the king's heart will perish, and the heart of the rulers; and the priests will be amazed, and the prophets will be astounded.

At that time it shall be said to this people and to Jerusalem, A dry wind from the high places in the wilderness toward the daughter of My people, not to sift nor to cleanse.

Tell it to the nations: Behold! proclaim against Jerusalem! Besiegers are going to come from a distant land; and they will set their voice against the cities of Judah.

Your way and your doings have brought these things on you; this is your evil, because it is bitter, because it reaches to your heart.

I looked on the earth, and, lo, it was without form and void; and the heavens, and they had no light.

For so Jehovah has said, The whole land shall be desolate, yet I will not make a full end.

The earth shall mourn for this, and the heavens above shall be black, because I have spoken, I have purposed, and will not repent, nor will I turn back from it.

And you, O desolate one, what will you do? Though you dress with crimson, though you put on ornaments of gold, though you make your eyes large with paint, you shall make yourself beautiful in vain; your lovers will despise you; they will seek your life.

Therefore a lion out of the forest shall kill them, and a wolf of the deserts shall rob them; a leopard shall watch over their cities. Everyone who goes out from them shall be torn in pieces, because their sins are many and their backslidings are multiplied.

They have lied against Jehovah and said, It is not He; neither shall evil come on us; nor shall we see sword nor famine.

And the prophets shall become wind, and the Word is not in them; so it shall be done to them.

Therefore so says Jehovah, the God of Hosts, Because you spoke this word, behold, I will make My Words in your mouth fire, and these people wood, and it shall devour them.

Lo, I will bring a nation on you from afar, O house of Israel, says Jehovah. It is an enduring nation, it is an ancient nation, a nation whose language you do not know, nor understand what they say.

And they shall eat up your harvest and your bread. They will devour your sons and your daughters. They shall eat up your flocks and your herds; they shall eat up your vines and your fig-trees. One shall beat down your fortified cities with the sword, those in which you trust.

And it will be, when you shall say, Why does Jehovah our God do all these things to us? Then You shall answer them, Just as you have forsaken Me and served foreign gods in your land, so you shall serve strangers in a land that is not yours.

Declare this in the house of Jacob, and cry it in Judah, saying,

Do you not fear Me? says Jehovah. Will you not tremble at My presence, I who have placed the sand for the boundary of the sea by a never-ending decree, so that it cannot pass it? And though they toss themselves, yet they cannot prevail; though its waves roar, yet they cannot pass over it?

For among My people are found wicked ones; they lie in wait, as one who sets snares; they set a trap, they catch men.

The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests bear rule by their means; and my people love to have it so, and what will you do at the end of it?

O sons of Benjamin, take refuge out of the midst of Jerusalem. And blow the ram's horn in Tekoa, and set up a signal-fire over Beth-haccerem; for evil appears out of the north, and great ruin.

Prepare war against her; arise and let us go up at noon. Woe to us! For the day goes away, for the shadows of the evening are stretched out.

To whom shall I speak, and give warning, that they may hear? Behold, their ears are not circumcised, and they cannot listen. Behold, the Word of Jehovah is to them a reproach; they have no delight in it.

Therefore I am full of the fury of Jehovah; I am weary with holding in; I will pour it out on the children in the street, and on the circle of young men together. For even the husband with the wife shall be taken, the aged with fullness of days.

And their houses shall be turned to others, together with their fields and wives; for I will stretch out My hand on the people of the land, says Jehovah.

Were they ashamed when they had committed abomination? No, they were not at all ashamed, nor could they blush; therefore they shall fall among those who fall. At the time that I visit them they shall be cast down, says Jehovah.

So says Jehovah, Stand in the ways and see, and ask for the old paths where the good way is, and walk in it, and you shall find rest for your souls. But they said, We will not walk in it.

Therefore hear, nations, and know, O congregation, what is among them.

Hear, O earth; behold, I will bring evil on this people, the fruit of their thoughts, because they have not listened to My Words, nor to My Law, but have rejected it.

We have heard the rumor of it; our hands become feeble; anguish has taken hold of us, and pain, like a woman in labor.

Do not go out into the field, nor walk by the way; for the sword of the enemy and fear are on every side.

Stand in the gate of Jehovah's house, and declare there this Word, and say, Hear the Word of Jehovah, all Judah, who enter in at these gates to worship Jehovah.

if you do not oppress the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow, and do not shed innocent blood in this place, nor walk after other gods to your hurt;

But go now to 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.

And I will cast you out of My sight, as I have cast out all your brothers, the whole seed of Ephraim.

Do you not see what they do in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem?

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

Do they vex Me? says Jehovah. Is it not themselves, to the shame of their own faces?

Therefore so says the Jehovah God; Behold, My anger and My fury shall be poured out on this place, on man, and on animal, and on the trees of the field, and on the fruit of the ground; and it shall burn, and shall not be put out.

So says Jehovah of Hosts, the God of Israel: Put your burnt offerings to your sacrifices, and eat flesh.

For I did not speak to your fathers, nor command them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices.

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

Since the day that your fathers came out of the land of Egypt until this day I have even sent to you all My servants the prophets, daily rising up early and sending.

Yet they did not listen to Me, nor bow down their ear, but hardened their neck. They did worse than their fathers.

Cut off your hair and throw it away, and take up a weeping on the high places. For Jehovah has rejected and forsaken the generation of His wrath.

For the sons of Judah have done evil in My sight, says Jehovah. They have set their abominations in the house which is called by My name, in order to defile it.

They have built the high places of Tophet, which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire; which I did not command them, nor did it come into My heart.

So, behold, the days come, says Jehovah, that it shall no more be called Tophet, nor the valley of the son of Hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter. For they shall bury in Tophet, until there is no place.

At that time, says Jehovah, they shall bring out the bones of the kings of Judah, and the bones of its rulers, and the bones of the priests, and the bones of the prophets, and the bones of the people of Jerusalem, out of their graves.

I listened and heard, but they did not speak right; no man repented of his wickedness, saying, What have I done? Everyone turned in their own courses, as the horse rushes into the battle.

The wise are ashamed, they are terrified, and are captured. Lo, they have turned away from the Word of Jehovah; and what wisdom is in them?

Were they ashamed when they had done an abomination? No, they were not at all ashamed, nor could they blush; therefore they shall fall among those who fall; in the time of their visitation they shall be cast down, says Jehovah.

The snorting of his horses was heard from Dan; the whole land trembled at the sound of the neighing of his stallions. For they have come, and have devoured the land, and all that is in it; the city, and those who live in it.

Therefore so says Jehovah of Hosts, Behold, I will melt them and try them; for what else can I do for the daughter of My people?

Their tongue is a slaughtering arrow; it speaks deceit; one speaks peaceably to his neighbor with his mouth, but in heart he lies in ambush.

Who is the wise man who may understand this? And who is he to whom the mouth of Jehovah has spoken, that he may declare it? Why does the land perish and burn up like a wilderness, so that none passes through?

And Jehovah says, Because they have forsaken My Law which I set before them, and have not obeyed My voice, and have not walked in it,

For a voice of weeping is heard out of Zion. How are we plundered! We are greatly ashamed, because we have forsaken the land, because they have thrown down our tents.

Yet hear the Word of Jehovah, O women, and let your ear receive the Word of His mouth, and teach your daughters to weep, and each one teach her neighbor to mourn.

So says Jehovah, Do not learn the way of the nations, and do not be terrified at the signs of the heavens; for the nations are terrified at them.

For the customs of the people are vain; for one cuts a tree out of the forest with the axe, the work of the hands of the workman.

They adorn it with silver and with gold; they fasten it with nails and hammers, so that it will not wobble.