Thus said Jehovah: Stand ye by the ways and see, and ask for paths of old, Where is this -- the good way? and go ye in it, And find rest for yourselves. And they say, 'We do not go.'

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

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 cometh 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.

Therefore, this is what the Lord says:
I am going to place stumbling blocks before these people;
fathers and sons together will stumble over them;
friends and neighbors will also perish.

This is what the Lord says:

Look, an army is coming from a northern land;
a great nation will be awakened
from the remote regions of the earth.

Bow and javelin they take hold of, Fierce it is, and they have no mercy, Their voice as a sea doth sound, And on horses they ride, set in array as a man of war, Against thee, O daughter of Zion.

We have heard the report of it;
Our hands become limp and helpless.
Anguish has gripped us,
Pain like that of a woman in childbirth.

Do not go out into the field
Nor walk on the road,
For the enemy is armed with the sword;
Terror is on every side.

Daughter of my people, put on sackcloth and roll in ashes. Mourn with bitter wailing, as one mourns at the death of an only son. For the destroyer will come on us suddenly.

I have made you a tester among my people, so that you may have knowledge of their way and put it to the test.

The bellows blow,
blasting the lead with fire.
The refining is completely in vain;
the evil ones are not separated out.

Therefore shall they be called reprobate silver, because the LORD hath cast them out."

Stand in the gate of the LORD'S house, and proclaim there this word, and say, Hear the word of the LORD, all ye of Judah, that enter in at these gates to worship the LORD.

“This is what the Lord of Hosts, the God of Israel, says: Correct your ways and your deeds, and I will allow you to live in this place.

You must change the way you have been living and do what is right. You must treat one another fairly.

If ye oppress not the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow, and shed not innocent blood in this place, neither walk after other gods to your hurt:

"'But just look at you! You are putting your confidence in a false belief that will not deliver you.

What? steal, murder, and commit adultery, and swear falsely, and burn incense unto Baal, and walk after other gods whom ye know not ...

Then come ye, and stand before me in this house, which hath my name given unto it, and say 'Tush, we are absolved quite, though we have done all these abominations.'

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

But go ye 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.

Now, therefore - Because ye have done all these deeds Declareth Yahweh, - And though I spake unto you betimes speaking, Yet ye hearkened not, And though I cried unto you Yet ye answered not,

therefore I will do to the house that is called {by my name}, in which you [are] trusting, and to the place that I gave to you and to your ancestors {what} I did to Shiloh.

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

Then the Lord said, "As for you, Jeremiah, do not pray for these people! Do not cry out to me or petition me on their behalf! Do not plead with me to save them, because I will not listen to you.

Seest thou not what they do in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem?

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.

Is it I whom they provoke to anger? saith Jehovah; is it not themselves, to the shame of their own face?

Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, mine 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.

Thus saith the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel; Put your burnt offerings unto your sacrifices, and eat flesh.

For I spake not unto your fathers, nor commanded them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices:

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

Yet they did not obey, and they did not incline their ear, but they walked in [their own] plans, in the stubbornness of their evil heart, and {they became worse instead of better}.

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.

And you are to say all these words to them, but they will not give ear to you: you will send out your voice to them, but they will give no answer.

And thou hast said unto them: This is the nation that hath not hearkened, To the voice of Jehovah its God, Nor have they accepted instruction, Perished hath stedfastness, Yea, it hath been cut off from their mouth.

Cut off thine hair, O Jerusalem, and cast it away, and take up a lamentation on high places; for the LORD hath rejected and forsaken the generation of his wrath.

For the children of Judah have done evil in my sight, saith 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 Tophet, 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.

Therefore, behold, the days come, saith the LORD, 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, till there be no place.

Then the dead bodies of these people will be left on the ground for the birds and wild animals to eat. There will not be any survivors to scare them away.

At that time, saith the LORD, they shall bring out the bones of the kings of Judah, and the bones of his princes, and the bones of the priests, and the bones of the prophets, and the bones of the inhabitants of Jerusalem, out of their graves:

and they shall spread them out to the sun and to the moon and to all the host of the heavens, which they have loved, and which they have served, and after which they have walked, and which they have sought, and which they have worshipped: they shall not be gathered, nor be buried; they shall be for dung upon the face of the ground.

And death was chosen above life to all the remnant of those being left from this evil family, in all the places being left where I cast them out there, says Jehovah of armies.

“You are to say to them: This is what the Lord says:

Do people fall and not get up again?
If they turn away, do they not return?

I hearkened and heard, but they spake not aright: no man repented him of his wickedness, saying, What have I done? every one turned to his course, as the horse rusheth into the battle.

“Even the stork in the sky
Knows her seasons [of migration],
And the turtledove, the swallow and the crane
Observe the time of their return.
But My people do not know
The law of the Lord.

How do ye say, We are wise, and the law of the LORD is with us? Lo, certainly in vain made he it; the pen of the scribes is in vain.

The wise men are ashamed, they are dismayed and taken: lo, they have rejected the word of the LORD; and what wisdom is in them?

Nevertheless, they heal the hurt of my people with sweet words, saying, 'Peace, peace,' where there is no peace at all.

Were they ashamed when they had committed abomination? nay, they were not at all ashamed, neither could they blush: therefore shall they fall among them that fall: in the time of their visitation they shall be cast down, saith the LORD.

"{I will take away their harvest}," {declares} Yahweh. "There are no grapes on the vine, and there are no figs on the fig tree, and the leaves wither, and [what] I gave to them passed over them." '"

The people say, "Why are we just sitting here? Let us gather together inside the fortified cities. Let us at least die there fighting, since the Lord our God has condemned us to die. He has condemned us to drink the poison waters of judgment because we have sinned against him.

We hoped for good fortune, but nothing good has come of it. We hoped for a time of relief, but instead we experience terror.

The snorting of his horses was heard from Dan: the whole land trembled at the sound of the neighing of his strong ones; for they are come, and have devoured the land, and all that is in it; the city, and those that dwell therein.

Then I said, "There is no cure for my grief! I am sick at heart!

I hear my dear people crying out throughout the length and breadth of the land. They are crying, 'Is the Lord no longer in Zion? Is her divine King no longer there?'" The Lord answers, "Why then do they provoke me to anger with their images, with their worthless foreign idols?"

“The harvest is past, the summer has ended and the gathering of fruit is over,
But we are not saved,” [comes the voice of the people again].

for there is no more treacle at Gilead, and there is no Physician, that can heal the hurt of my people.

And they bend their tongue, as it were their bow, for falsehood; and they are grown strong in the land, but not for truth: for they proceed from evil to evil, and they know not me, saith Jehovah.

And each at his friend they mock, And truth they do not speak, They taught their tongue to speak falsehood, To commit iniquity they have laboured.

Therefore, thus says Yahweh of hosts: "Look, I [am] about to refine them, and I will test them, for what else can I do, because of the {presence} of the daughter of my people?

Their tongue is as an arrow shot out; it speaketh deceit: one speaketh peaceably to his neighbour with his mouth, but in heart he layeth his wait.

Give yourselves to weeping, crying out in sorrow for the mountains; and for the fields of the waste land send up a song of grief, because they are burned up, so that no one goes through; there is no sound of cattle; the bird of the heavens and the beast are in flight and are gone.

Who is the wise man, that may understand this? and who is he to whom the mouth of the LORD hath spoken, that he may declare it, for what the land perisheth and is burned up like a wilderness, that none passeth through?

And Jehovah saith, Because they have forsaken my law which I set before them, and have not hearkened unto my voice, nor walked in it,

Therefore, thus said Jehovah of Hosts, God of Israel: Lo, I am causing them -- this people -- to eat wormwood, And I have caused them to drink water of gall,

This is what the Lord of Hosts says:

Consider, and summon the women who mourn;
send for the skillful women.

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 waters.

For a voice of wailing is heard out of Zion, How are we spoiled! we are greatly confounded, because we have forsaken the land, because our dwellings have cast us out.

Yet hear the word of the LORD, O ye women, and let your ear receive the word of his mouth, and teach your daughters wailing, and every one her neighbour lamentation.

For death is come up into our windows, it is entered into our palaces; to cut off the children from without, and the young men from the streets.

Speak as follows:

This is what the Lord says:

Human corpses will fall
like manure on the surface of the field,
like newly cut grain after the reaper
with no one to gather it.

This is what the Lord says:

The wise man must not boast in his wisdom;
the strong man must not boast in his strength;
the wealthy man must not boast in his wealth.

But if any man has pride, let it be in this, that he has the wisdom to have knowledge of me, that I am the Lord, working mercy, giving true decisions, and doing righteousness in the earth: for in these things I have delight, says the Lord.

“The days are coming”—the Lord’s declaration—“when I will punish all the circumcised yet uncircumcised:

That is, I will punish the Egyptians, the Judeans, the Edomites, the Ammonites, the Moabites, and all the desert people who cut their hair short at the temples. I will do so because none of the people of those nations are really circumcised in the Lord's sight. Moreover, none of the people of Israel are circumcised when it comes to their hearts."

You people of Israel, listen to what the Lord has to say to you.

Thus saith the LORD, Learn not the way of the heathen, and be not dismayed at the signs of heaven; for the heathen are dismayed at them.

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

They deck it with silver and with gold; they fasten it with nails and with hammers, that it move not.

They are upright as the palm tree, but speak not: they must needs be borne, because they cannot go. Be not afraid of them; for they cannot do evil, neither also is it in them to do good.

There is none like You, O Lord;
You are great, and great is Your mighty and powerful name.

Who would not fear thee, O King of nations? for to thee doth it appertain: forasmuch as among all the wise men of the nations, and in all their kingdoms, there is none like unto thee.

But they are together brutish and foolish: the instruction of idols! it is but a stock.

Spread-out silver from Tarshish is brought, And gold from Uphaz, Work of an artisan, and of the hands of a refiner, Blue and purple is their clothing, Work of the skilful -- all of them.

But the LORD is the true God, he is the living God, and an everlasting king: at his wrath the earth shall tremble, and the nations shall not be able to abide his indignation.

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.

He hath made the earth by his power, he hath established the world by his wisdom, and hath stretched out the heavens by his discretion.

When he uttereth his voice, there is a multitude of waters in the heavens, and he causeth the vapours to ascend from the ends of the earth; he maketh lightnings with rain, and bringeth forth the wind out of his treasures.

They [are] vanity, a work of mockery, at the time of their punishment, they will perish.

The portion of Jacob is not like them; for it is he that hath formed all things, and Israel is the rod of his inheritance: Jehovah of hosts is his name.

Gather up thy wares out of the land, O inhabitant of the fortress.

For thus saith the LORD, Behold, I will sling out the inhabitants of the land at this once, 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 hath been spoiled, And all my cords have been broken, My sons have gone out from me, and they are not, There is none stretching out any more my tent, And raising up my curtains.

Behold, the noise of the bruit is come, and a great commotion out of the north country, to make the cities of Judah desolate, and a den of dragons.

O LORD, I know that the way of man is not in himself: it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps.