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

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 I will pronounce My judgments against them regarding all their evil, those who have forsaken Me, and burned incense to other gods, and worshiped the works of their own hands.

Therefore I will contend with you, says Jehovah, and with your son's sons I will enter into judgment.

For long ago you broke your yoke and tore up your bonds; and you said, I will not transgress, when on every high hill and under every green tree you lay down like a harlot.

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.

Withhold your foot from being bare, and your throat from thirst. But you said, There is no hope; no; for I have loved strangers, and after them I will go.

saying to a tree, You are my father; and to a stone, You gave me birth. For they have turned their back to 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 sinned against Me, says Jehovah.

O generation, see the Word of Jehovah. Have I been a wilderness to Israel, or a land of darkness? Why do My people say, We roam freely; we will come no more to You?

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 you not from this time cry to Me, My father, You are the guide of my youth?

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.

Go and cry these words toward the north, and say, Return, O backsliding Israel, says Jehovah; and I will not cause My anger to fall on you; for I am merciful, says Jehovah, and I will not keep anger forever.

Turn, O backsliding sons, says Jehovah; for I am married to you; and I will take you one from a city, and two from a family, and I will bring you to Zion.

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

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.

Return, O backsliding sons, and I will heal your backslidings. Behold, we come to You; for You are Jehovah our God.

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.

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.

A wind more full than these shall come for Me. Now also I will utter judgments against them.

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.

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.

Run to and fro through the streets of Jerusalem, and see now, and know, and seek in her open places, if you can find a man, if there is one who does justice, who seeks the truth; and I will pardon her.

I will go up for myself to the great men, and will speak to them; for they have known the way of Jehovah and the judgment of their God. But these have broken the yoke together and have torn off the bonds!

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.

But even in those days, says Jehovah, I will not make a complete end with you.

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.

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?

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?

I will destroy the daughter of Zion, the beautiful and tender one.

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.

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.

Also I set watchmen over you, saying, Listen to the sound of the ram's horn. But they said, We will not listen.

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.

Therefore so says Jehovah, Behold, I will lay stumbling-blocks before this people, and the fathers and the sons together shall fall on them; the neighbor and his friend shall perish.

So says Jehovah of Hosts, the God of Israel, Make your ways and your doings good, and I will cause you to dwell in this place.

then I will cause you to dwell in this place, in the land that I gave to your fathers, forever and ever.

Will you steal, murder, and commit adultery, and swear falsely, and burn incense to Baal, and walk after other gods whom you do not know;

therefore I will do to this house, which is called by My name, in which you trust, and to 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 brothers, the whole seed of Ephraim.

Therefore do not pray for this people, nor lift up cry nor prayer for them, nor make intercession to Me; for I will not hear you.

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.

So you shall speak all these words to them, but they will not listen to you; you shall also call to them, but they will not answer you.

Then I will cause the voice of gladness to cease from the cities of Judah and from the streets of Jerusalem, and the voice of joy, the voice of the bridegroom, and the voice of the bride. For the land shall be desolate.

Therefore I will give their wives to others, and their fields to those who shall inherit them, for everyone from the least even to the greatest cuts off a profit. From the prophet even to the priest everyone deals falsely.

I will utterly consume them, says Jehovah; there shall be no grapes on the vine, nor figs on the fig tree, and the leaf shall fade; and the things that I have given them, those who pass over them.

For, behold, I will send serpents and adders among you, which will not be charmed; and they shall bite you, says Jehovah.

Everyone beware of his neighbor, and do not trust any brother! For every brother will supplant his neighbor, and will walk with slanders.

And everyone will deceive his neighbor and will not speak the truth; they have taught their tongue to speak lies, and they weary themselves to commit iniquity.

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?

I will take up a weeping and a wailing for the mountains, and a mourning for the pastures of the wilderness; because they are burned up, so that none can pass through them; nor can men hear the voice of the cattle. Both the birds of the heavens and the beast have fled; they are gone.

And I will make Jerusalem ruins, a den of jackals; and I will make the cities of Judah a desolation, without a living soul.

Therefore so says Jehovah of Hosts, the God of Israel, Behold, I will feed them, even this people, with wormwood, and make them drink poisonous water.

I will also scatter them among the nations, whom neither they nor their fathers have known. And I will send a sword after them until I have consumed them.

Behold, the days come, says Jehovah, that I will punish all the circumcised with the uncircumcised;

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

For so says Jehovah, Behold, I will sling out the people of the land at this time, and will distress them, so that they may find Me.

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 that I command you; so you shall be My people, and I will be your God;

Yet they did not obey nor bow down their ear, but walked each one in the stubbornness of his evil heart. So I will bring on them all the Words of this covenant, which I commanded them to do; but they did not do them.

So Jehovah says this: Behold, I will bring evil on them, which they shall not be able to escape; and though they shall cry to Me, I will not listen to them.

And you, do not pray for this people, nor lift up a cry or prayer for them. For I will not hear them in the time they cry to Me for their trouble.

So says Jehovah of Hosts, Behold, I will punish them. The young men shall die by the sword; their sons and their daughters shall die by famine;

and there shall be no remnant of them. For I will bring evil on the men of Anathoth, the year of their judgment.

If you have run with footmen, and they wore you out, then how can you compete with horses? And if you feel secure in the land of peace, then how will you do in the swelling of the Jordan?

So says Jehovah against all My evil neighbors who touch the inheritance which I have caused My people Israel to inherit: Behold, I will pluck them out of their land, and pluck out the house of Judah from among them.

And it will be after I have plucked them out, I will return and have pity on them, and will bring them again, each man to his inheritance and each man to his land.

And it will be if they will carefully learn the ways of My people, to swear by My name, As Jehovah lives; as they taught the people to swear by Baal; then they shall be built in the midst of My people.

But if they will not obey, I will uproot and destroy that nation, says Jehovah.

So says Jehovah, In this way I will spoil the pride of Judah and the great pride of Jerusalem.

So you will speak to them this Word: So says Jehovah, the God of Israel, Every skin shall be filled with wine. And they shall say to you, Do we not surely know that every skin shall be filled with wine?

Then you shall say to them, So says Jehovah, Behold, I will fill all the people of this land, even the kings that sit on David's throne, and the priests, and the prophets, and all the people of Jerusalem, with drunkenness.

And I will smash them one against another, even the fathers and the sons together, says Jehovah. I will not pity, nor spare, nor have mercy, to keep them from their destruction.

But if you will not hear it, my soul shall weep in secret places for your pride. And my eye shall weep sore and run down with tears, because Jehovah's flock was captured.

What will you say when he comes to punish you? For you have taught them to be rulers over you for a head. Do not pangs seize you, like a woman in travail?

And I will scatter them as the stubble that passes away by the wind of the wilderness.

I have seen your adulteries, and your neighings, the wickedness of your fornication, and your abominations on the hills in the fields. Woe to you, O Jerusalem! Will you not be made clean? How long will it still be?

And the wild asses stood in the high places; they snuffed up the wind like jackals; their eyes failed because there was no grass.

So says Jehovah to this people; So they have loved to wander; they have not restrained their feet; therefore Jehovah does not accept them. He will now remember their iniquity and visit their sins.

When they fast, I will not hear their cry; and when they offer burnt offering and a grain offering, I will not accept them. But I will consume them by the sword, and by the famine, and by the plague.

Then I said, Ah, O Lord Jehovah! Behold, the prophets are saying to them, You shall not see the sword, nor shall you have famine; but I will give you true peace in this place.

And the people to whom they prophesy shall be cast out in the streets of Jerusalem because of the famine and the sword; and they shall have none to bury them, either them, their wives, nor their sons, nor their daughters. For I will pour their evil on them.

Are there any among the vanities of the nations who make rain fall? Or can the heavens give showers? Is it not You, O Jehovah our God? Then we will wait on You; for You do all these things.

And it will be, if they say to you, Where shall we go? Then you shall tell them, So says Jehovah: Those who are for death, go to death; and those for the sword, to the sword; and those for the famine, to the famine; and those for the captivity, to the captivity.

And I will set over them four kinds, says Jehovah; the sword to kill, and the dogs to tear, and the birds of the heaven and the beasts of the earth to devour and destroy.

And I will make them a horror to all kingdoms of the earth, because of Manasseh the son of Hezekiah, king of Judah, for what he did in Jerusalem.

You have forsaken Me, says Jehovah; you have gone backward; therefore I will stretch out My hand against you, and destroy you; I am weary with repenting.

And I will winnow them with a fork in the gates of the land; I will bereave them of sons; I will destroy My people, since they do not turn from their ways.

She who bore seven languishes; she has breathed out her life; her sun has gone down while it was yet day. She has been ashamed and humiliated; and I will deliver the rest of them to the sword before their enemies, says Jehovah.

Jehovah said, Truly I will free you for good. Truly I will cause the enemy to entreat you in the time of evil and in the time of affliction.