And it will be in the days of Jehoiakim son of Josiah king of Judah, even to the fulness of the eleventh year to Zedekiah son of Josiah king of Judah, even to the captivity of Jerusalem in the fifth month.

And the word of Jehovah will be to me, saying,

But Yahweh said to me, "You must not say, 'I [am] a youth,' for to {whomever} I send you, you will go, and {whatever} I command you, you will speak.

Do not be afraid of anyone,
for I will be with you to deliver you.
This is the Lord’s declaration.

And Jehovah will stretch forth his hand and touch upon my mouth: and Jehovah will say to me, Behold, I gave my words into thy mouth.

Know for certain that I hereby give you the authority to announce to nations and kingdoms that they will be uprooted and torn down, destroyed and demolished, rebuilt and firmly planted."

And the word of Jehovah will be to me, saying, What seem thou, Jeremiah? and saying, I see the shoot 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 Jehovah will be to me the second time, saying, What seest thou? and saying, I see a pot blown under, and its face from the face of the north.

Then Yahweh said to me, "From [the] north disaster will be unleashed on all the inhabitants of the land.

For, look, I [am] calling to all [the] clans of [the] kingdoms of [the] north," {declares} Yahweh, "and they will come and set each one his throne [at] the entrance of the gates of Jerusalem, and against all its surrounding walls, and against all the cities of Judah.

And I will pass my judgments on them because of all their wickedness [in] that they have forsaken me, and they made sacrifices to other gods, and they bowed in worship to the works of their hands.

But you, you must gird your loins, and stand, and speak to them all that I command you. {Do not be afraid of them}, or I will shatter you {before} them.

I, the Lord, hereby promise to make you as strong as a fortified city, an iron pillar, and a bronze wall. You will be able to stand up against all who live in the land, including the kings of Judah, its officials, its priests and all the people of the land.

And they will fight against you but they will not prevail against you, for I [am] with you," {declares} Yahweh, "to deliver you."

And the word of Jehovah will be to me, saying,

And I will bring you to the land of Carmel, to eat its fruit and its goodness; and ye will come and defile my land, and ye set mine inheritance for an abomination.

The priests said not Where is Jehovah? and they holding the law knew me not: and the shepherds transgressed against me, and the prophets prophesied by Baal, and they went After what will not profit

Therefore will I yet plead with you, saith Jehovah, and with your children's children will I plead.

Did a nation change their gods, and they no gods? and my people changed their glory for what will not profit

For my people did two evils: they forsook me the fountain of living waters, to hew out for them wells, broken wells which will not hold water.

Upon him the young lions roared, they gave their voice, they will set his land for a desolation: his cities were burned from not being inhabited.

Moreover, people of Memphis and Tahpanhes will {shave} your skull.

Wilt thou not do this to thyself? thou didst forsake Jehovah thy God in the time of thy being led in the way.

Now what will you gain
by traveling along the way to Egypt
to drink the waters of the Nile?
What will you gain
by traveling along the way to Assyria
to drink the waters of the Euphrates?

Your wickedness will chastise you, and your apostasies will reprove you. Therefore know and see that [it is] evil and bitter, your forsaking of Yahweh, your God, and fear of me [is] not in you," {declares} the Lord, Yahweh of hosts.

"For from long ago you have broken your yoke, you tore to pieces your bonds. And you said, 'I will not serve!' But on every high hill and under every leafy tree you [were] lying down [as] a prostitute.

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?

How wilt thou say, I was not defiled? I went not after the Baalims? See thy way in the valley, know what thou didst; a young she camel entangling her ways;

A wild ass accustomed to [the] desert, in the desire of her soul. She gasps [for] wind [in] her rutting time. Who can quell her [lust]? All [those who] seek her will not grow weary, in her month they will find her.

Restrain your foot from [being] barefoot, and your throat from thirst. But you said, '[It is] hopeless. No! For I have loved strangers, and after them I will go.'

As [the] shame of a thief when he is caught in the act, so the house of Israel will be ashamed. They, their kings, their officials, and their priests, and their prophets.

saying to a stock, Thou art my father; and to a stone, Thou hast brought me forth; for they have turned the back unto me, and not the face; and in the time of their trouble they will say, Arise, and save us!

And where thy gods which thou didst make to thee? they will arise, if they shall save thee in the time of thine evil: for from the numbering of thy cities were thy gods, O Judah.

Wherefore will ye contend with me? ye all have transgressed against me, saith Jehovah.

O generation, you see the word of Yahweh. Have I been a desert to Israel? Or a land of great darkness? Why do my people say, 'We roam about freely, we will not come again to you'?

Will a virgin forget her ornaments, or a bride her girdles? and my people forgat me days of no numbering.

How wilt thou make good thy way to seek love? for this also thou didst teach the evil ones thy ways.

Yet thou saidst, I am innocent; surely his anger is turned away from me. Behold, I will enter into judgment with thee, because thou sayest, I have not sinned.

How you go about so much changing your way! Also by Egypt you will be put to shame, just as you were put to shame by Assyria.

Also from there you will come out with your hands on your head, for Yahweh has rejected {those in whom you trust}, and you will not prosper through them.

A {saying}: 'Look, [if] a man divorces his wife, and she goes from him {and she becomes another man's wife}, will he return to her again?' Will not that land be greatly defiled? And you have prostituted [yourself] [with] many lovers, [would] you now return to me?" {declares} Yahweh.

Lift up thine eyes upon the naked hills and see where thou wert not lain with. Upon the ways thou didst sit for them as the ravens in the desert; and thou wilt defile the land with thy fornications and with thine evil

So the showers have been kept back, and there has been no spring rain; still your brow is the brow of a loose woman, you will not let yourself be shamed.

Wilt thou not from this time cry unto me, My Father, thou art the guide of my youth?

Will he be angry {forever}? Will he maintain [it] {always}'? Look, you have spoken, but you have done all the evil that you could."

And Jehovah will say to me in the days of Josiah the king, Sawest thou what Israel turning back, did? She went up upon every high mountain and under every green tree, and she will commit fornication there.

And I thought, 'After her doing all these [things] to me she will return,' but she did not return. And her treacherous sister Judah saw [it].

And I shall see for all the causes that Israel turning away committed adultery, I sent her away and I shall give a writing of her cutting off to her; and her faithless sister Judah was not afraid, and she will go and commit fornication, she also.

And it was her fornication being light, and she will defile the land, and she will commit adultery with stones and with woods.

And Jehovah will say to me, Israel turning away justified her soul above faithless Judah.

Go, and proclaim these words toward the north, and say, 'Return, apostate Israel,' {declares} Yahweh. 'I will not cause my {anger} to fall on you. For I [am] loyal,' {declares} Yahweh. 'I will not be angry {forever}.

Only know thine iniquity that thou didst transgress against Jehovah thy God, and thou wilt scatter thy ways to strangers under every green tree, and to my voice ye heard not, says Jehovah.

"Return, apostate children," {declares} Yahweh. "For {I am your master}, and I will take you one from a city and two from a clan, and I will bring you [to] Zion.

Then I will give you shepherds after my own heart and they will feed you knowledge and insight.

And it will be when you have multiplied and become fruitful in the land in those days," {declares} Yahweh, "they will no longer say, 'The ark of the covenant of Yahweh.' And {it will not come to mind}, nor will they remember it, nor will they miss [it], nor will it be made again.

At that time they will call Jerusalem 'The Throne of Yahweh,' and all the nations will be gathered to it, to the name of Yahweh, to Jerusalem, and they will no longer go after the stubbornness of their evil heart.

In those days the house of Judah will walk along with the house of Israel and they will come together from [the] land of [the] north to the land that I gave as an inheritance [to] your ancestors.

But I said, How I will put thee among the children, and give thee a pleasant land, a goodly heritage of the hosts of the nations! and I said, Ye shall call me My Father, and shall not turn away from following me.

Return, apostate children, I will heal your backsliding. 'Look, we come to you, for you are Yahweh our God.

We shall lie down in our shame, and our reproach will cover us: for we sinned against Jehovah our God, we and our fathers, from our youth even to this day, and we heard not to the voice of Jehovah our God.

If thou wilt return, O Israel, saith Jehovah, if thou wilt return unto me, and if thou wilt put away thine abominations out of my sight; then shalt thou not be removed;

and you swear, '{As Yahweh lives},' in truth, in justice, and in righteousness, then nations will be blessed by him, and in him they will boast."

Yes, the Lord has this to say to the people of Judah and Jerusalem: "Like a farmer breaking up hard unplowed ground, you must break your rebellious will and make a new beginning; just as a farmer must clear away thorns lest the seed is wasted, you must get rid of the sin that is ruining your lives.

Circumcise yourselves to the Lord;
remove the foreskin of your hearts,
men of Judah and residents of Jerusalem.
Otherwise, My wrath will break out like fire
and burn with no one to extinguish it
because of your evil deeds.

Announce ye in Judah, and cause to be heard in Jerusalem; and say, Strike the trumpet in the land: call, fill up, and say, Be ye gathered together and we will go to the fortified cities.

Set up a standard toward Zion: flee for safety, stay not; for I will bring evil from the north, and a great destruction.

A lion has gone up from his thicket, and a destroyer of nations has set out. He has gone out from his place to make your land as a horror, your cities will go to ruin {without} inhabitant.

And then on that day," {declares} Yahweh, "the heart of the king and the heart of the officials will be destroyed, and the priests will be appalled, and the prophets will be astonished."

Then I said, "Ah, Lord Yahweh, surely you have utterly deceived this people and Jerusalem, saying, 'It will be peace for you,' while the sword reaches up to the throat."

At that time it will be said to this people and to Jerusalem, "{A hot wind from the barren heights} in the desert, {in the direction of} the daughter of my people, not to winnow and not to cleanse,

{a wind too strong for} these will come for me, now also I speak judgments against them."

See, he will come up like the clouds, and his war-carriages like the storm-wind: his horses are quicker than eagles. Sorrow is ours, for destruction has come on us.

Cleanse your heart from wickedness, Jerusalem, so that you may be saved. {How long} will your thoughts of mischief dwell in your inner part?

Make this come to the minds of the nations, make a statement openly against Jerusalem, that attackers are coming from a far country and their voices will be loud against the towns of Judah.

They will surround Jerusalem like men guarding a field because they have rebelled against me," says the Lord.

"The way you have lived and the things you have done will bring this on you. This is the punishment you deserve, and it will be painful indeed. The pain will be so bad it will pierce your heart."

How long will I go on seeing the flag and hearing the sound of the war-horn?

The Lord answered, "This will happen because my people are foolish. They do not know me. They are like children who have no sense. They have no understanding. They are skilled at doing evil. They do not know how to do good."

I beheld, The earth; and lo! it was waste and wild, - The heavens also and their light was not:

For thus says Yahweh, "All of the land will be a desolation, yet I will not make a complete desolation.

Because of this the earth will mourn, and the heavens above will become dark. Because I have spoken, I have planned, and I have not relented, and I will not turn back from it."

At the sound of the approaching horsemen and archers the people of every town will flee. Some of them will hide in the thickets. Others will climb up among the rocks. All the cities will be deserted. No one will remain in them.

And thou, when thou art made desolate, what wilt thou do? Though thou clothest thyself with scarlet, though thou deckest thee with ornaments of gold, though thou enlargest thine eyes with paint, in vain dost thou make thyself fair; thy lovers despise thee, they seek thy life.

For I heard. the voice as of her bringing forth, the anguish as of her bearing her first child; the voice of the daughter of Zion, she will sigh, she will spread forth her hands, Wo now to me for my soul fainted for those slaying.

Run ye to and fro through the streets of Jerusalem, and see now, and know, and seek in the broad places thereof, if ye can find a man, if there be any that doeth justly, that seeketh truth; and I will pardon her.

And if Jehovah lives, they will say, for this they will swear to a falsehood.

I will get me unto the great men, and will speak unto them; for they know the way of Jehovah, and the law of their God. But these with one accord have broken the yoke, and burst the bonds.

Therefore a lion from [the] forest will kill them, A wolf [from the] desert plains will devastate them. A leopard [is] watching their cities, everyone [who] goes out from there will be torn, because their transgressions are many, their apostasies are numerous.

How shall I forgive to thee for this? thy sons forsook me, and they will swear by not God; and I will satisfy them, and they will commit adultery, and they will crowd themselves together to the house of the harlot

They were horses seducing to fornication: roaming about, they will neigh, a man for the wife of his neighbor.

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

"They have denied Yahweh, and have said, 'Not he, {for} evil will not come on us, we will see neither sword nor famine.

And the prophets are like wind, and the word [is] not in them.' Thus it will be done to them."

{Therefore} thus says Yahweh, the God of hosts, "Because you have spoken this word, look, I [am] making my words in your mouth like a fire, and this people wood, and it will devour them.

Lo, I will bring a nation upon you from far, O house of Israel, saith Jehovah: it is a mighty nation, it is an ancient nation, a nation whose language thou knowest not, neither understandest what they say.

All of its soldiers are strong and mighty. Their arrows will send you to your grave.

And they will eat your harvest and your food, they will eat your sons and your daughters, they will eat your flock and your herd, they will eat your vine and your fig tree, they will smash with the sword {your fortified cities}, in which you trust.

"But even in those days," {declares} Yahweh, "I will not make you a complete destruction.

{And then}, when you [people] say, 'Why has Yahweh our God done all of these [things] to us?' Then you will say to them, 'As you have forsaken me and have served gods of a foreign land in your land, so will you serve strangers in {a land that does not belong to you}.'