Then said the LORD unto me, Thou hast well seen: for I will hasten my word to perform it.

Indeed, I am about to summon all the clans and kingdoms of the north.”

This is the Lord’s declaration.

They will come, and each king will set up his throne
at the entrance to Jerusalem’s gates.
They will attack all her surrounding walls
and all the other cities of Judah.

'And thou, thou dost gird up thy loins, and hast arisen, and spoken unto them all that I command thee: be not affrighted because of them, lest I affright thee before them.

Today, I am the One who has made you a fortified city, an iron pillar, and bronze walls against the whole land—against the kings of Judah, its officials, its priests, and the population.

They will fight against you but never prevail over you, since I am with you to rescue you.”

This is the Lord’s declaration.

'Go, and thou hast called in the ears of Jerusalem, saying, Thus said Jehovah: I have remembered for thee The kindness of thy youth, the love of thine espousals, Thy going after Me in a wilderness, in a land not sown.

Now listen to what the Lord has to say, you descendants of Jacob, all you family groups from the nation of Israel.

Therefore, I will bring a case against you again.
This is the Lord’s declaration.
I will bring a case against your children’s children.

“For cross over to the coasts of Kittim (Cyprus) [to the west] and see,
Send also to Kedar (Arabia) [to the east] and carefully observe and consider
And see whether there has been such [a thing] as this!

“Has a nation [ever] changed gods
Even though they were not gods [but merely man-made objects]?
But My people have exchanged their Glory (the true God)
For that [man-made idol] which does not benefit [them].

“Is Israel a servant? Is he a slave by birth?
Why has he become a captive and a prey?

Hast thou not procured this unto thyself, in that thou hast forsaken the LORD thy God, when he led thee by the way?

And now what hast thou to do in the way of Egypt, to drink the waters of Sihor? or what hast thou to do in the way of Assyria, to drink the waters of the river?

Thine own wickedness shall correct thee, and thy backslidings shall reprove thee: know therefore and see that it is an evil thing and bitter, that thou hast forsaken the LORD thy God, and that my fear is not in thee, saith the Lord GOD of hosts.

For of old thou hast broken thy yoke, and burst thy bands; and thou saidst, I will not serve. For upon every high hill, and under every green tree, thou bowest down, playing the harlot.

And I planted thee a choice vine, wholly a true seed, And how hast thou been turned to Me, To the degenerate shoots of a strange vine?

Even if you wash with lye
and use a great amount of soap,
the stain of your sin is still in front of Me.
This is the Lord God’s declaration.

How canst thou say, I am not polluted, I have not gone after Baalim? see thy way in the valley, know what thou hast done: thou art a swift dromedary traversing her ways;

Like the shame of a thief when he is caught,
so the house of Israel has been put to shame.
They, their kings, their officials,
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 their back unto me, and not their face: but in the time of their trouble they will say, Arise, and save us.

But where are thy gods that thou hast made thee? let them arise, if they can save thee in the time of thy trouble: for according to the number of thy cities are thy gods, O Judah.

Why do you bring a case against Me?
All of you have rebelled against Me.
This is the Lord’s declaration.

I have struck down your children in vain;
they would not accept discipline.
Your own sword has devoured your prophets
like a ravaging lion.

Why trimmest thou thy way to seek love? therefore hast thou also taught the wicked ones thy ways.

Yet you keep saying, ‘I am innocent;
Surely His anger has turned away from me.’
Behold (listen very carefully), I will bring you to judgment and will plead my case against you
Because you say, ‘I have not sinned.’

What? thou art very vile to repeat thy way, Even of Egypt thou art ashamed, As thou hast been ashamed of Asshur,

“From Egypt also you will come away [as captives]
With your hands on your head;
For the Lord has rejected those in whom you trust (confide),
And you will not be successful with them.”

They say, If a man put away his wife, and she go from him, and become another man's, shall he return unto her again? shall not that land be greatly polluted? but thou hast played the harlot with many lovers; yet return again to me, saith the LORD.

Lift up thine eyes unto the high places, and see where thou hast not been lien with. In the ways hast thou sat for them, as the Arabian in the wilderness; and thou hast polluted the land with thy whoredoms and with thy wickedness.

Therefore the showers have been withholden, and there hath been no latter rain; yet thou hast a harlot's forehead, thou refusedst to be ashamed.

Hast thou not henceforth called to Me, 'My father, Thou art the leader of my youth?

Will he reserve his anger for ever? will he keep it to the end? Behold, thou hast spoken and done evil things as thou couldest.

The LORD said also unto me in the days of Josiah the king, Hast thou seen that which backsliding Israel hath done? she is gone up upon every high mountain and under every green tree, and there hath played the harlot.

I thought, ‘After she has done all these things she will return to Me’; but she did not return, and her treacherous (faithless) sister Judah saw it.

Yet in spite of all this her treacherous sister Judah did not return to Me with her whole heart, but rather in [blatant] deception [she merely pretended obedience to King Josiah’s reforms],” declares the Lord.

And the Lord said to me, “Faithless Israel has proved herself less guilty than treacherous Judah [a land of renegades].

Go, and thou hast proclaimed these words toward the north, and hast said, Turn back, O backsliding Israel, An affirmation of Jehovah! I cause not Mine anger to fall upon you, For I am kind, an affirmation of Jehovah, I watch not to the age.

Only acknowledge thine iniquity, that thou hast transgressed against the LORD thy God, and hast scattered thy ways to the strangers under every green tree, and ye have not obeyed my voice, saith the LORD.

But, you have been unfaithful to me, nation of Israel, like an unfaithful wife who has left her husband," says the Lord.

“But the shameful act [of idolatry] has consumed the labor of our fathers since our youth—their flocks and their herds, their sons and their daughters.

If you return, Israel—
this is the Lord’s declaration—
you will return to Me,
if you remove your detestable idols
from My presence
and do not waver,

And thou hast sworn -- Jehovah liveth, In truth, in judgment, and in righteousness, And blessed themselves in Him have nations, And in Him they boast themselves.

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.

“A lion has left his lair,
And a destroyer of nations is on his way.
He has gone out from his place
To desolate your land;
Your cities will be in ruins
Without an inhabitant.

“For this reason, put on sackcloth [for mourning],
Lament (mourn with expressions of grief for the dead) and wail,
For the fierce anger of the Lord
Has not turned back from us.”

Then said I, Ah, Lord GOD! surely thou hast greatly deceived this people and Jerusalem, saying, Ye shall have peace; whereas the sword reacheth unto the soul.

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.

‘Like watchmen of a field they are against her on all sides,
Because she has rebelled against Me,’ says the Lord.

"You obtained this for yourself [because of] your way and your deeds. This [is] your doom, for [it is] bitter, yes, it has reached up to your heart."

My bowels, my bowels! I am pained at my very heart; my heart maketh a noise in me; I cannot hold my peace, because thou hast heard, O my soul, the sound of the trumpet, the alarm of war.

“For My people are stupid and foolish,” [says the Lord to Jeremiah];
“They do not know Me;
They are foolish children
And have no understanding.
They are shrewd [enough] to do evil,
But they do not know [how] to do good.”

For this is what the Lord has said: All the land will become a waste; I will make destruction complete.

All the land is in flight because of the noise of the horsemen and the bowmen; they have taken cover in the woodland and up on the rocks: every town has been given up, not a man is living in them.

A voice has come to my ears like the voice of a woman in birth-pains, the pain of one giving birth to her first child, the voice of the daughter of Zion, fighting for breath, stretching out her hands, saying, Now sorrow is mine! for my strength is gone from me before the takers of life.

O LORD, are not thine eyes upon the truth? thou hast stricken them, but they have not grieved; thou hast consumed them, but they have refused to receive correction: they have made their faces harder than a rock; they have refused to return.

Should I not punish them for these things?
This is the Lord’s declaration.
Should I not avenge Myself
on such a nation as this?

They, the house of Israel and the house of Judah,
have dealt very treacherously with Me.
This is the Lord’s declaration.

The prophets will prove to be full of wind. The Lord has not spoken through them. So, let what they say happen to them.'"

For this reason the Lord, the God of armies, has said: Because you have said this, I will make my words in your mouth a fire, and this people wood, and they will be burned up by it.

I am about to bring a nation
from far away against you,
house of Israel.
This is the Lord’s declaration.
It is an established nation,
an ancient nation,
a nation whose language you do not know
and whose speech you do not understand.

And they shall eat up thy harvest, and thy bread, which thy sons and thy daughters should eat: they shall eat up thy flocks and thy herds: they shall eat up thy vines and thy fig-trees: they shall impoverish with the sword thy fortified cities, in which thou hast trusted.

And it hath come to pass, when ye say, 'For what hath Jehovah our God done to us all these?' That thou hast said unto them, 'As ye have forsaken Me, And serve the gods of a foreigner in your land, So do ye serve strangers in a land not yours.

‘Do you not fear Me?’ says the Lord.
‘Do you not tremble [in awe] in My presence?
For I have placed the sand as a boundary for the sea,
An eternal decree and a perpetual barrier beyond which it cannot pass.
Though the waves [of the sea] toss and break, yet they cannot prevail [against the sand ordained to hold them back];
Though the waves and the billows roar, yet they cannot cross over [the barrier].
[Is not such a God to be feared?]

"But this people has a revolting and a rebellious heart; they have revolted and gone.

Should I not punish them for these things?
This is the Lord’s declaration.
Should I not avenge Myself
on such a nation as this?

“An appalling and horrible thing [bringing desolation and destruction]
Has come to pass in the land:

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].

This is what the Lord of armies has said: Everything will be taken from the rest of Israel as the last grapes are taken from the vine; let your hand be turned to the small branches, like one pulling off grapes.

To whom shall I (Jeremiah) speak and give warning
That they may hear?
Behold, their ears are closed [absolutely deaf to God]
And they cannot listen.
Behold, the word of the Lord has become a reprimand and an object of scorn to them;
They have no delight in it.

This is what the Lord has said: Take your place looking out on the ways; make search for the old roads, saying, Where is the good way? and go in it that you may have rest for your souls. But they said, We will not go in it.

For this reason the Lord has said, See, I will put stones in the way of this people: and the fathers and the sons together will go falling over them; the neighbour and his friend will come to destruction.

The Lord has said, See, a people is coming from the north country, a great nation will be put in motion from the inmost parts of the earth.

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.

You must not go out [into] the field, and you must not walk on the road, for {the enemy has a sword}, terror [is] all around.

A watch-tower I have given thee, Among My people a fortress, And thou knowest, and hast tried their way.

The fiery bellows of judgment burn fiercely. But there is too much dross to be removed. The process of refining them has proved useless. The wicked have not been purged.

They call them rejected silver [only dross, without value],
Because the Lord has rejected them.

Stand in the gate of the house of Jehovah, and thou hast proclaimed there this word, and hast said, Hear a word of Jehovah, all ye of Judah, who are coming in at these gates, to bow before Jehovah:

Has this house, which is called by My Name, become a den of robbers in your eyes [a place of retreat for you between acts of violence]? Behold, I Myself have seen it,” says the Lord.

So this is what the Lord God has said: See, my wrath and my passion will be let loose on this place, on man and beast, and on the trees of the field, and on the produce of the earth; it will be burning and will not be put out.

And thou hast spoken unto them all these words, And they do not hearken to thee, And thou hast called unto them, And they do not answer thee.

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 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.’

And thou hast said unto them: Thus said Jehovah, Do they fall, and not rise? Doth he turn back, and not return?

Why has this people, Jerusalem, turned away [in] enduring apostasy? They have kept hold of deceit, they have refused to return.

I have paid careful attention.
They do not speak what is right.
No one regrets his evil,
asking, ‘What have I done?’
Everyone has stayed his course
like a horse rushing into battle.

“How can you say, ‘We are wise,
And the law of the Lord is with us [and we are learned in its language and teachings]’?
Behold, [the truth is that] the lying pen of the scribes
Has made the law into a lie [a mere code of ceremonial observances].

I will gather them and bring them to an end.
This is the Lord’s declaration.
There will be no grapes on the vine,
no figs on the fig tree,
and even the leaf will wither.
Whatever I have given them will be lost to them.

Why are we sitting still [the people wonder]?
Assemble yourselves, and let us enter the fortified cities
And let us die there,
For the Lord our God has decreed our ruin
And given us bitter and poisonous water to drink,
Because we have sinned against the Lord.

We waited for peace, but no good has come, for a time of healing, but instead there was terror.

See, I will send snakes and poison-snakes among you, against which the wonder-worker has no power; and they will give you wounds which may not be made well, says the Lord.

My joy has flown away;
grief has settled on me.
My heart is sick.

“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 the brokenness of the daughter of my people I (Jeremiah) am broken;
I mourn, anxiety has gripped me.

Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no healer there? Why, then, has the healing of the daughter of my people not been restored?

Oh that I had in the wilderness
A lodging place (a mere shelter) for wayfaring men,
That I might leave my people
And go away from them!
For they are all adulterers [worshiping idols instead of the Lord],
[They are] an assembly of treacherous men [of weak character, men without integrity].

Everyone has to be on guard against his friend.
Don’t trust any brother,
for every brother will certainly deceive,
and every friend spread slander.

So the Lord of armies has said, See, I will make them soft in the fire and put them to the test; this I will do because of their evil-doing.

Should I not punish them for these things?
This is the Lord’s declaration.
Should I not avenge Myself
on such a nation as this?

I will raise weeping and a lament
over the mountains,
a dirge over the wilderness grazing land,
for they have been so scorched
that no one passes through.
The sound of cattle is no longer heard.
From the birds of the sky to the animals,
everything has fled—they have gone away.