See, I have this day set thee over the nations and over the kingdoms, to root out, and to pull down, and to destroy, and to throw down, to build, and to plant.

"You therefore put your belt on your waist, arise, and speak to them all that I command you. Don't be dismayed at them, lest I dismay you before them.

Wherefore I will yet plead with you, saith the LORD, and with your children's children will I plead.

Wherefore will ye plead with me? ye all have transgressed against me, saith the LORD.

Also in thy skirts is found the blood of the souls of the poor innocents: I have not found it by secret search, but upon all these.

Yet thou sayest, Because I am innocent, surely his anger shall turn from me. Behold, I will plead with thee, because thou sayest, I have not sinned.

They are waxed fat, they shine: yea, they overpass in deeds of wickedness; they plead not the cause, the cause of the fatherless, that they may prosper; and the right of the needy do they not judge.

All of this is because the Lord who rules over all has said: 'Cut down the trees around Jerusalem and build up a siege ramp against its walls. This is the city which is to be punished. Nothing but oppression happens in it.

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:

And I will cast you {out of my sight} just as I cast out all of your blood relatives, all of the offspring of Ephraim." '

"And you, you must not pray for this people, and you must not lift up for them a cry of entreaty or a prayer, and you must not plead with me, for I [will] not hear you.

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.

And Jehovah said to me, A plot is found among the men of Judah, and among the people of Jerusalem.

So, 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. For I will not listen to them when they call out to me for help when disaster strikes them."

Then the Lord gave me knowledge [of their plot], and I knew it;
So You [O Lord] revealed their deeds to me.

Righteous art thou, O LORD, when I plead with thee: yet let me talk with thee of thy judgments: Wherefore doth the way of the wicked prosper? wherefore are all they happy that deal very treacherously?

Many shepherds have destroyed my vineyard, they have trampled down my plot of land. They have made {my pleasant field} like the desert of desolation.

And it shall come to pass, if they will diligently learn the ways of my people, to swear by my name, The LORD liveth; as they taught my people to swear by Baal; then shall they be built in the midst of my people.

Thus says Yahweh to me, Go, and buy yourself a linen belt, and put it on your waist, and don't put it in water.

So I bought a belt according to the word of Yahweh, and put it on my waist.

Take the belt that you have bought, which is on your waist, and arise, go to the Euphrates, and hide it there in a cleft of the rock.

It happened after many days, that Yahweh said to me, Arise, go to the Euphrates, and take the belt from there, which I commanded you to hide there.

Then I went to the Euphrates, and dug, and took the belt from the place where I had hidden it; and behold, the belt was marred, it was profitable for nothing.

This evil people, who refuse to hear my words, who walk in the stubbornness of their heart, and are gone after other gods to serve them, and to worship them, shall even be as this belt, which is profitable for nothing.

For as the belt clings to the waist of a man, so have I caused to cling to me the whole house of Israel and the whole house of Judah, says Yahweh; that they may be to me for a people, and for a name, and for a praise, and for a glory: but they would not hear.

Both the great and the small shall die in this land: they shall not be buried, neither shall men lament for them, nor cut themselves, nor make themselves bald for them:

The Lord says, "I will put a curse on people who trust in mere human beings, who depend on mere flesh and blood for their strength, and whose hearts have turned away from the Lord.

And at what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it;

‘Yet My people have forgotten Me;
They burn incense to worthless gods,
They have stumbled from their ways
From the ancient roads,
To walk in pathways,
Not on a highway,

Then they said, "Come, let's make up a plot against Jeremiah. After all, the priest's instruction, the wise man's counsel, and the prophet's message won't be destroyed. So let's verbally attack him. Pay no attention to anything he says!"

Therefore deliver up their children to the famine, and pour out their blood by the force of the sword; and let their wives be bereaved of their children, and be widows; and let their men be put to death; let their young men be slain by the sword in battle.

Yet, LORD, thou knowest all their counsel against me to slay me: forgive not their iniquity, neither blot out their sin from thy sight, but let them be overthrown before thee; deal thus with them in the time of thine anger.

Because they have forsaken me, and have estranged this place, and have burned incense in it unto other gods, whom neither they nor their fathers have known, nor the kings of Judah, and have filled this place with the blood of innocents;

They have built also the high places of Baal, to burn their sons with fire for burnt offerings unto Baal, which I commanded not, nor spake it, neither came it into my mind:

Beware! I am against you,
you who sit above the valley,
you atop the rocky plateau—
this is the Lord’s declaration—
you who say, “Who can come down against us?
Who can enter our hiding places?”

Thus saith the LORD; Execute ye judgment and righteousness, and deliver the spoiled out of the hand of the oppressor: and do no wrong, do no violence to the stranger, the fatherless, nor the widow, neither shed innocent blood in this place.

“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.

That saith, I will build me a wide house and large chambers, and cutteth him out windows; and it is cieled with cedar, and painted with vermilion.

Did he not plead the cause of the oppressed and the needy, And, then, it was well? Was not, that, to know, me? Demandeth Yahweh.

But thine eyes and thine heart are not but for thy covetousness, and for to shed innocent blood, and for oppression, and for violence, to do it.

You who live in Lebanon, who build your nest in the cedars, how you will groan when pains come upon you, pain like that of a woman giving birth.

Who lay a plot to cause my people to forget my name by their dreams which they relate every man to his neighbour, - Just as their fathers forgat, my name, for Baal.

For I will set mine eyes upon them for good, and I will bring them again to this land: and I will build them, and not pull them down; and I will plant them, and not pluck them up.

A noise shall come even to the ends of the earth; for the LORD hath a controversy with the nations, he will plead with all flesh; he will give them that are wicked to the sword, saith the LORD.

How darest thou be so bold, as to say in the name of the LORD, 'It shall happen to this house as it did unto Shiloh? And this city shall be so waste, that no man shall dwell therein?'"

But know ye for certain, that if ye put me to death, ye shall surely bring innocent blood upon yourselves, and upon this city, and upon the inhabitants thereof: for of a truth the LORD hath sent me unto you to speak all these words in your ears.

Did Hezekiah king of Judah and all the people of Judah put him to death? Did he not fear the Lord and plead for the Lord’s favor, and did not the Lord relent concerning the disaster He had pronounced against them? We are about to bring great harm on ourselves!”

neither have I sent them, sayeth the LORD: howbeit they are bold, falsely for to prophesy in my name: that I might the sooner drive you out, and that ye might perish with your preachers.'"

But if they [are] prophets, and if there is with them the word of Yahweh, let them please plead with Yahweh of hosts, that the vessels that are left over in the {temple} of Yahweh, and the house of the king of Judah, and in Jerusalem, must not go [to] Babylon.'

Build ye houses, and dwell in them; and plant gardens, and eat the fruit of them;

I will make myself available to you,' says the Lord. 'Then I will reverse your plight and will regather you from all the nations and all the places where I have exiled you,' says the Lord. 'I will bring you back to the place from which I exiled you.'

For therefore he sent unto us in Babylon, saying, This captivity is long: build ye houses, and dwell in them; and plant gardens, and eat the fruit of them.

For I, the Lord, affirm that the time will come when I will reverse the plight of my people, Israel and Judah,' says the Lord. 'I will bring them back to the land I gave their ancestors and they will take possession of it once again.'"

There is none to plead thy cause, that thou mayest be bound up: thou hast no healing medicines.

Thus saith Jehovah: Behold, I will turn the captivity of Jacob's tents, and have mercy on his habitations; and the city shall be built upon her own heap; and the palace shall be inhabited after the manner thereof.

Again I will build thee, and thou shalt be built, O virgin of Israel: thou shalt again be adorned with thy tabrets, and shalt go forth in the dances of them that make merry.

And it shall come to pass, that like as I have watched over them, to pluck up, and to break down, and to throw down, and to destroy, and to afflict; so will I watch over them, to build, and to plant, saith the LORD.

Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that the city shall be built to the LORD from the tower of Hananeel unto the gate of the corner.

Even now siege ramps have been built up around the city in order to capture it. War, starvation, and disease are sure to make the city fall into the hands of the Babylonians who are attacking it. Lord, you threatened that this would happen. Now you can see that it is already taking place.

For this city hath been to me as a provocation of mine anger and of my fury from the day that they built it even unto this day; that I should remove it from before my face,

And they built the high places of Baal, which are in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to cause their sons and their daughters to pass through the fire unto Molech; which I commanded them not, neither came it into my mind, that they should do this abomination, to cause Judah to sin.

And I will cause the captivity of Judah and the captivity of Israel to return, and will build them, as at the first.

Neither shall ye build house, nor sow seed, nor plant vineyard, nor have any: but all your days ye shall dwell in tents; that ye may live many days in the land where ye be strangers.

Nor to build houses for us to dwell in: neither have we vineyard, nor field, nor seed:

But in the seventh Month it happened, that Ishmael the son of Nethaniah the son of Elishama, one of the king's blood, came with them that were greatest about the king, and ten men that were sworn with him: unto Gedaliah the son of Ahikam to Mizphah, and ate there together.

If ye will still abide in this land, then will I build you, and not pull you down, and I will plant you, and not pluck you up: for I repent me of the evil that I have done unto you.

Thus shalt thou say unto him, The LORD saith thus; Behold, that which I have built will I break down, and that which I have planted I will pluck up, even this whole land.

For this is the day of the Lord GOD of hosts, a day of vengeance, that he may avenge him of his adversaries: and the sword shall devour, and it shall be satiate and made drunk with their blood: for the Lord GOD of hosts hath a sacrifice in the north country by the river Euphrates.

Baldness has come upon Gaza, Ashkelon is destroyed. O remnant of their valley, {how long} will you cut yourself with a blade?

People will not praise Moab any more. The enemy will capture Heshbon and plot how to destroy Moab, saying, 'Come, let's put an end to that nation!' City of Madmen, you will also be destroyed. A destructive army will march against you.

And the waster shall come upon every city, that not a city shall escape; and the valley shall perish, and the plateau shall be destroyed: as Jehovah hath said.

Cursed be he that doeth the work of the LORD deceitfully, and cursed be he that keepeth back his sword from blood.

And judgment is come upon the country of the plateau; upon Holon, and upon Jahzah, and upon Mephaath;

For every head shall be bald, and every beard clipped: upon all the hands shall be cuttings, and upon the loins sackcloth.

Let the planter of seed be cut off from Babylon, and everyone using the curved blade at the time of the grain-cutting: for fear of the cruel sword, everyone will be turned to his people, everyone will go in flight to his land.

Their Redeemer is strong; the LORD of hosts is his name: he shall throughly plead their cause, that he may give rest to the land, and disquiet the inhabitants of Babylon.

The violence done to me and to my flesh be upon Babylon, shall the inhabitant of Zion say; and my blood upon the inhabitants of Chaldea, shall Jerusalem say.

Therefore thus saith the LORD; Behold, I will plead thy cause, and take vengeance for thee; and I will dry up her sea, and make her springs dry.

And it came to pass in the ninth year of his reign, in the tenth month, in the tenth day of the month, that Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon came, he and all his army, against Jerusalem, and pitched against it, and built forts against it round about.