And it will be said,
“Build up, build up, clear the way.
Remove the stumbling block out of the way [of the spiritual return] of My people.”

But the wicked are like the tossing sea,
For it cannot be quiet,
And its waters toss up mire and mud.

Go through, go through the gates,
Clear the way for the people;
Build up, build up the highway,
Remove the stones, lift up a banner over the peoples.

Hear the word of the Lord, you who tremble [with awe-filled reverence] at His word:
“Your brothers who hate you, who exclude you for My Name’s sake,
Have said, ‘Let the Lord be glorified, that we may see your joy.’
But they will be put to shame.

For the Lord of hosts has said,

“Cut down her trees
And build a siege [mound] against Jerusalem.
This is the city which must be punished;
There is nothing but oppression inside her [walls].

I will cast you out of My sight, as I have cast out all your brothers (relatives through Jacob), all the descendants of Ephraim.

‘Cut off your hair [your crown, O Jerusalem] and throw it away,
And take up a mournful cry on the barren heights,
For the Lord has rejected and abandoned
The generation of His wrath.’

“For a sound of wailing is heard [coming] from Zion:
‘How we are ruined!
We are greatly perplexed and utterly shamed,
Because we have left the land,
Because they have torn down our dwellings.’”

“I have abandoned My house,
I have given up My [precious] inheritance (Judah);
I have given the [dearly] beloved of My life
Into the hands of her enemies.

And the people to whom they are prophesying will be thrown out into the streets of Jerusalem, victims of famine and sword; and they will have no one to bury them—neither them, nor their wives, nor their sons, nor their daughters. For I will pour out their [own] wickedness on them [and not only on the imposters posing as prophets, for the people could not have been deceived without their own consent].

Therefore I will hurl you out of this land [of Judah] into the land [of the Babylonians] which neither you nor your fathers have known, and there you will serve other gods day and night, for I will show you no compassion.’

“For I will prepare and appoint destroyers [to execute My judgments] against you,
Each with his weapons;
And they will cut down your [palaces built of] choicest cedars
And throw them in the fire.

“He shall be buried with the burial of a donkey—
Dragged off and thrown out beyond the gates of Jerusalem.

“Is this man [King] Coniah a despised, broken jar?
Is he a vessel in which no one takes pleasure?
Why are he and his [royal] descendants hurled out
And cast into a land which they do not know or understand?

“Now when this people or a prophet or a priest asks you [in jest], ‘What is the oracle of the Lord [the burden to be lifted up and carried]?’ Then you shall say to them, ‘What oracle [besides the one that declares you people to be the burden]!’ The Lord says, ‘I will unburden Myself and I will abandon you.’

Therefore behold, I, even I, will assuredly forget you and send you away from My presence, you and the city (Jerusalem) which I gave to you and to your fathers.

And they brought Uriah [God’s spokesman] from Egypt and led him to King Jehoiakim, who executed him with a sword and threw his dead body among the graves of the common people.

Therefore thus says the Lord, ‘Behold, I am about to send you away from the face of the earth. This year you will die, because you have spoken and counseled rebellion against the Lord.’”

‘Fear not, O Jacob My servant,’ says the Lord,
‘Nor be dismayed or downcast, O Israel;
For behold, I will save you from a distant land [of exile]
And your descendants from the land of their captivity.
Jacob will return and will be quiet and at ease,
And no one will make him afraid.

Thus says the Lord,

“If the heavens above can be measured
And the foundations of the earth searched out below,
Then I will also cast off and abandon all the descendants of Israel
For all that they have done,” says the Lord.

“Have you not noticed what this people have spoken, saying, ‘The two families [Israel the northern kingdom, and Judah the southern kingdom] which the Lord chose, He has rejected’? Thus they despise My [chosen] people, no longer are they [considered] as a nation in their sight.

then I would [also] reject the descendants of Jacob and David My servant, not taking from his descendants rulers over the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. But I will restore their fortunes, and will have mercy on them.’”

And after Jehudi had read three or four columns [of the scroll], King Jehoiakim would cut off that portion with a scribe’s knife and throw it into the fire that was in the brazier, until the [entire] scroll was consumed by the fire.

Therefore thus says the Lord concerning Jehoiakim king of Judah, “He shall have no heir to sit on the throne of David, and his dead body shall be thrown out to the heat of the day and to the frost of the night.

So they took Jeremiah and threw him into the cistern of Malchijah the king’s son, which was in the court of the guardhouse; and they let Jeremiah down [into the cistern] with ropes. Now there was no water in the cistern but only mud, and Jeremiah sank in the mud.

“My lord the king, these men have acted wickedly in all that they have done to Jeremiah the prophet whom they have thrown into the cistern; and he will die [of hunger] where he is because of the famine, for there is no more bread in the city.”

Yet when they came into the city, Ishmael the son of Nethaniah and the men who were with him slaughtered them and threw them into the cistern (underground water reservoir).

Now the cistern into which Ishmael had thrown all the corpses of the men whom he had killed along with Gedaliah was the one which King Asa [of Judah] had made [about three hundred years earlier] on account of King Baasha of Israel [believing that Baasha would lay siege to Mizpah]. Ishmael the son of Nethaniah filled it with [the bodies of] those who were killed.

“Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon has devoured me, he has crushed me,
He has set me down like an empty vessel.
Like a monster he has swallowed me up,
He has filled his belly with my delicacies;
He has spit me out and washed me away.

And as soon as you finish reading this scroll, you shall tie a stone to it and throw it into the middle of the Euphrates.

For all this came about in Jerusalem and Judah because of the anger of the Lord, and [in the end] He cast them from His presence. And Zedekiah rebelled against the king of Babylon.

How the Lord has covered the Daughter of Zion (Jerusalem)
With a cloud in His anger!
He has cast down from heaven to the earth
The glory and splendor of Israel
And has not remembered His footstool
In the day of His anger.

The Lord has swallowed up; He has not spared
All the country places of Jacob.
In His wrath He has thrown down
The strongholds of the Daughter of Judah (Jerusalem).
He has brought them down to the ground [in disgrace];
He has debased the kingdom and its princes.

The Lord has rejected His altar;
He has abandoned His sanctuary.
He has given into the hand of the enemy
The walls of her palaces;
They have made a noise in the house of the Lord
As on a day of an appointed feast.

The elders of the Daughter of Zion
Sit on the ground keeping silent;
They have thrown dust on their heads,
They have covered themselves with sackcloth.
The virgins of Jerusalem
Have bowed their heads to the ground.

My soul has been cast far away from peace;
I have forgotten happiness.

For the Lord will not reject forever,

They silenced me in the pit
And placed a stone over me.

Then lay siege against it, build a siege wall, raise a ramp against it; set up [enemy] camps and place battering rams all around it.

Again take some hair and throw them into the fire and burn them in the fire; from it a fire will spread to all the house of Israel.

and your altars will become deserted and your pillars for sun-worship will be smashed in pieces; and I will throw down your slain in front of your idols [that cannot bring them back to life].

They will fling their silver into the streets and their gold will be [discarded] like something unclean; their silver and their gold shall not be able to save them in the day of the wrath of the Lord. These [things] cannot satisfy their soul nor fill their stomachs, for they have become their stumbling block and source of sin.

If it has been thrown into the fire for fuel, and the fire has consumed both of its ends and the middle section has been charred, is it suitable or useful for anything?

No eye looked with pity on you to do any of these things for you, to have compassion on you; but you were thrown out in the open field, for you were loathed on the day that you were born.

Pharaoh with his mighty army and great company will not help him in the war, when they (the Babylonians) put up ramps and build siege walls to destroy many lives.

Cast away from you all your transgressions which you have committed [against Me], and make yourselves a new heart and a new spirit! For why should you die, O house of Israel?

‘But the vine was uprooted in [godly] wrath [by His representative]
And it was thrown down to the ground;
The east wind dried up its fruit.
Its strong branch was broken off
So that it withered;
The fire [of God’s judgment] consumed it.

Then I said to them, ‘Let every man throw away the detestable things on which he feasts his eyes, and do not defile yourselves with the idols of Egypt; I am the Lord your God.’

But they rebelled against Me and were not willing to listen to Me; they did not throw away the detestable things on which they feasted their eyes, nor did they give up the idols of Egypt.

“Then I decided to pour out My wrath on them and finish My anger against them in the land of Egypt.

But the house of Israel rebelled against Me in the wilderness. They did not walk in My statutes and they despised and rejected My ordinances, which, if a man keeps, he will live; and they greatly profaned My Sabbaths. Then I decided to pour out My wrath on them in the wilderness, to annihilate them.

In his right hand is the lot marked for Jerusalem: to set battering rams, to open the mouth calling for destruction, to lift up the voice with a war cry, to set battering rams against the gates, to put up assault ramps, and to build siege walls.

Therefore, thus says the Lord God, ‘Because you have forgotten Me and cast Me behind your back, therefore bear now [the consequences of] your lewdness and prostitution.’”

He will kill your daughters on the mainland with the sword, and he shall make siege walls against you and build a siege ramp against you and raise [a roof of] large shields [as a defense] against you.

And they will make their voice heard [as they wail loudly] over you
And they will cry bitterly.
They will throw dust on their heads;
They will wallow in ashes.

“Through the abundance of your commerce
You were internally filled with lawlessness and violence,
And you sinned;
Therefore I have cast you out as a profane and unholy thing
From the mountain of God.
And I have destroyed you, O covering cherub,
From the midst of the stones of fire.

“Your heart was proud and arrogant because of your beauty;
You destroyed your wisdom for the sake of your splendor.
I cast you to the ground;
I lay you before kings,
That they might look at you.

“I will abandon you to the wilderness, you and all the fish of your rivers;
You will fall on the open field; and you will not be gathered up or buried.
I have given you as food to the [wild] animals of the earth and the birds of the sky.

I made the nations quake at the sound of its fall when I cast it down to Sheol with those who descend into the pit; and all the well-watered trees of Eden, the choicest and the best of Lebanon, will be comforted in the earth beneath [at Assyria’s downfall].

“Then I will leave you (Egypt) on the land;
I will hurl you on the open field.
And I will make all the birds of the sky dwell on you,
And I will satisfy the animals of all the earth with you.

“Son of man, wail over the hordes of Egypt and cast them down, both her and the daughters of the powerful and majestic nations, to the nether world (the place of the dead), with those who go down to the pit;

You shall present them before the Lord, and the priests shall throw salt on them, and they shall offer them up as a burnt offering to the Lord.

Whoever does not fall down and worship shall immediately be thrown into the midst of a furnace of blazing fire.”

Whoever does not fall down and worship shall be thrown into the midst of a furnace of blazing fire.

Now if you are ready, when you hear the sound of the horn, pipe, lyre, trigon, harp, dulcimer, and all kinds of music, to fall down and worship the image which I have made, very good. But if you do not worship, you shall be thrown at once into the midst of a furnace of blazing fire; and what god is there who can rescue you out of my hands?”

He commanded certain strong men in his army to tie up Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego and to throw them into the furnace of blazing fire.

Then these [three] men were tied up in their trousers, their coats, their turbans, and their other clothes, and were thrown into the midst of the furnace of blazing fire.

Then Nebuchadnezzar the king [looked and] was astounded, and he jumped up and said to his counselors, “Did we not throw three men who were tied up into the midst of the fire?” They replied to the king, “Certainly, O king.”

All the commissioners of the kingdom, the prefects and the satraps, the counselors and the governors have consulted and agreed together that the king should establish a royal statute and enforce an injunction that anyone who petitions (prays to) any god or man besides you, O king, during the next thirty days, shall be thrown into the den of lions.

Then they approached and spoke before the king regarding his injunction, “Have you not signed an injunction that anyone who petitions (prays to) any god or man except you, O king, within the designated thirty days, is to be thrown into the den of lions?” The king answered, “The statement is true, in accordance with the law of the Medes and Persians, which may not be altered or revoked.”

Then the king gave a command, and Daniel was brought and thrown into the den of lions. The king said to Daniel, “May your God, whom you constantly serve, rescue you Himself!”

The king then gave a command, and those men who had maliciously accused Daniel were brought and thrown into the den of lions, they, their children and their wives; and before they reached the bottom of the den, the lions overpowered them and crushed all their bones.

And [in my vision] this horn grew up to the host of heaven, and caused some of the host and some of the stars to fall to the earth, and it trampled on them.

Indeed, it magnified itself to be equal with the Commander of the host [of heaven]; and it took away from Him the daily sacrifice (burnt offering), and the place of His sanctuary was thrown down (profaned).

Because of the transgression [of God’s people—their irreverence and ungodliness] the host will be given over to the wicked horn, along with the regular sacrifice; and righteousness and truth will be flung to the ground, and the horn will do as it pleases [by divine permission] and prosper.

When the multitude (army) is captured and carried away, the heart of the Egyptian king will be proud (arrogant), and he will cause tens of thousands to fall, but he will not prevail.

Then the king of the North (Syria) will come and build up siege ramps and capture a well-fortified city. The forces of the South will not stand their ground, not even the finest troops, for there will be no strength to stand [against the Syrian king].

My God will reject them and cast them away
Because they did not listen to Him;
And they will be wanderers (fugitives) among the nations.

How can I give you up, O Ephraim?
How can I surrender you, O Israel?
How can I make you like Admah?
How can I treat you like Zeboiim?
My heart recoils within Me;
All My compassions are kindled together [for My nation of Israel].

I shall be like the dew to Israel;
He will blossom like the lily,
And he will take root like the cedars of Lebanon.

“They have also cast lots for My people,
And have traded a boy for a prostitute
And have sold a girl for wine that they may drink.

“And you shall go out through the breaches [made in the city wall],
Every woman straight before her [unable to turn aside],
And you shall be cast to Harmon,”
Says the Lord.

She has fallen, she will not rise again—
The virgin Israel.
She lies neglected on her land;
There is no one to raise her up.

“For those [shall be consumed] who turn justice into wormwood (bitterness)
And cast righteousness down to the earth.”

In that day, the songs of the palace shall turn to wailing,” says the Lord God. “There will be many dead bodies; in [sacred] silence they will throw them everywhere.”

“On the day that [Jerusalem was destroyed] you stood aloof [from your brother Jacob]—
On the day that strangers took his forces captive and carried off his wealth,
And foreigners entered his gates
And cast lots for Jerusalem [dividing the city for plunder]—
You too were like one of them [collaborating with the enemy].

Then the sailors were afraid, and each man cried out to his god; and to lighten the ship [and diminish the danger] they threw the ship’s cargo into the sea. But Jonah had gone below into the hold of the ship and had lain down and was sound asleep.

And they said to another, “Come, let us cast lots, so we may learn who is to blame for this disaster.” So they cast lots and the lot fell on Jonah.

Jonah said to them, “Pick me up and throw me into the sea. Then the sea will become calm for you, for I know that it is because of me that this great storm has come upon you.”

So they picked up Jonah and threw him into the sea, and the sea stopped its raging.

“For You cast me into the deep,
Into the [deep] heart of the seas,
And the currents surrounded and engulfed me;
All Your breakers and billowing waves passed over me.

“Then I said, ‘I have been cast out of Your sight.
Nevertheless I will look again toward Your holy temple.’

“Therefore, you will have no one stretching a measuring line [dividing the common land]
For you by lot in the assembly of the Lord.

“You evict the women (widows) of My people,
Each one from her pleasant house;
From her [young, fatherless] children you take away My splendor and blessing forever [by putting them among the pagans, away from Me].

“I shall make the lame a [godly] remnant
And the outcasts a strong nation;
And the Lord shall reign over them in Mount Zion
From this time on and forever.

He shall again have compassion on us;
He will subdue and tread underfoot our wickedness [destroying sin’s power].
Yes, You will cast all our sins
Into the depths of the sea.

“I will throw filth on you
And make you vile and treat you with contempt,
And set you up as a spectacle.

Yet she became an exile;
She went into captivity.
Her young children were dashed to pieces
At the head of every street;
They cast lots for her honorable men,
And all her great men were bound with chains.

The Lord has taken away the judgments against you;
He has cleared away your enemies.
The King of Israel, even the Lord [Himself], is in your midst;
You will no longer fear disaster.

I asked, “What are these [horns and craftsmen] coming to do?” And he said, “These are the horns (powers) that have scattered Judah so that no man raised up his head [because of the suffering inflicted by the Gentile nations]. But these craftsmen have come to terrify them and make them panic, and throw down the horns of the nations who have lifted up their horns against the land of Judah in order to scatter it.”

Then he said, “This is Wickedness (Godlessness)!” And he threw her back down into the middle of the ephah and threw the lead cover on its opening.