And he led them safely and they were not afraid, but the sea covered their enemies.

And they turned and were treacherous like their ancestors. They twisted like a crooked bow.

Fire devoured his young men, and his young women were not praised.

[The] mountains were covered with its shade, and [the] mighty cedars [with] its boughs.

"I removed his shoulder from a burden. His hands were freed from [the] basket.

They were destroyed at En-dor; they became dung for the ground.

Before [the] mountains were born and you brought forth [the] earth and [the] world, even from everlasting to everlasting, you [are] God.

When my troubled thoughts were many {within me}, your consolations cheered my soul.

Moses and Aaron [were] among his priests; Samuel also [was] among [those who] called on his name. They called to Yahweh, and he answered them.

O Yahweh our God, you answered them. You were a forgiving God to them, but an avenger of their [wrong] deeds.

When they were {few in number}-- a trifle--and [were] sojourners in it,

And they were jealous of Moses in the camp, [and] of Aaron, the holy one of Yahweh.

And they became unclean by their works, and were unfaithful in their deeds.

And their enemies oppressed them, and they were subdued under their hand.

Many times he delivered them, but they rebelled in their counsel, and were brought low by their iniquity.

Fools, because of their rebellious way and their iniquities, were afflicted.

They reeled and staggered like a drunkard, and {they were at their wits' end}.

Then they were glad because they grew silent, so he guided them to their desired harbor.

They surrounded me like bees; they were extinguished like a fire of thorns. In the name of Yahweh I opposed them indeed.

Oh that my ways were steadfast, to keep your statutes!

When Yahweh restored the fortunes of Zion, we were like dreamers.

Your eyes saw my embryo, and in your book they all were written-- days fashioned [for me] when [there was] not one of them.

[When] their judges are thrown down [the] sides of a cliff, then they will understand that my words were pleasant.

Let them praise the name of Yahweh, because he commanded and they were created.

they were not willing [to accept] my counsel, they despised all my reproof.

When there were no depths, I was brought forth, when there were no springs of {abounding} water.

There is no end to all the people, to all who were before him. Yet the later generation will not rejoice in him, for this also [is] vanity and chasing wind!

Do not say, "Why were the former days better than these?" For [it is] not from wisdom [that] you ask this.

Meanwhile, I saw the wicked being [honorably] buried, but those who came and went from the holy place were forgotten in the city, even though they had done so. This also [is] vanity!

Do not gaze at me because I am black, because the sun has stared [at] me. The sons of my mother were angry with me; they made me keeper of the vineyards, [but] my own "vineyard" I did not keep.

{How I wish that you were my little brother}, [who] nursed {upon my mother's breasts}! [If] {I met you outside}, I would kiss you, {and no one would despise me}!

Many waters cannot quench love; rivers cannot sweep it away. If a man were to give all the wealth of his house {for love}, he would be utterly scorned.

I [was] a wall, and my breasts [were] like the towers, {so [my betrothed] viewed me with great delight}.

Therefore {Yahweh's wrath was kindled} against his people, and he stretched out his hand against them and struck them, and the mountains quaked, and their corpses were like refuse in [the] middle of [the] streets.

Seraphs [were] standing above him. {Each had six wings}: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew.

{But there will be no gloom for those who were in distress}. In former times he treated [the] land of Zebulun and Naphtali with contempt, but in the future he will honor the way of the sea beyond the Jordan, Galilee [of] the nations.

"[The] bricks have fallen, but we will build [with] dressed stone. [The] sycamore-fig trees were felled, but we will replace [them with] cedars."

And the leaders of this people were misleading [them], and those who were led [were] confused.

They devoured on [the] right but [still] were hungry and devoured on [the] left but they were not satisfied. Each one devoured the flesh of his arm,

Manasseh [devoured] Ephraim, and Ephraim Manasseh; together they [were] against Judah. In all of this his anger has not turned away, and still his hand [is] stretched out.

As my hand has reached to the kingdoms of the idols --and their images were {greater than those of} Jerusalem and Samaria--

And you will say on that day, "I will give you thanks, Yahweh, for though you were angry with me, your anger turned away, and you comforted me.

Even [the] cypresses rejoice over you, the cedars of Lebanon: 'Since you were laid down, no [wood] cutter comes up against us.'

All of them will respond and say to you, 'You yourself also were made weak like us! You have become the same as us!'

All of your rulers have fled together without a bow; all of {you who were found} were captured. They were captured together; they had fled far away.

And this happened: the choicest of your valleys were full of chariots, and the cavalry confidently stood at the gate.

and you saw that the breaches in the walls of the city of David were many, and you gathered the waters of the lower pool.

Who has planned this against Tyre, the bestower of crowns, whose merchants [were] princes, her traders [the] honored ones of [the] earth?

Like pregnant woman on the point of giving birth, she writhes; she cries in her labor pains. So we were because of your presence, Yahweh.

Does he strike him {as he struck down those who struck him}? Or is he killed {as those who killed him were killed}?

And this shall happen: on that day, a great trumpet will be blown, and those who were lost in the land of Assyria will come, and those who were scattered in the land of Egypt, and they will bow down to Yahweh on the {holy mountain} at Jerusalem.

to whom he has said, "This [is] rest; give rest to the weary; and this [is] repose"; yet they were not willing to hear.

For the Lord Yahweh, the holy one of Israel, said this: "In returning and rest you shall be saved; your strength shall be in quietness and in trust." But you were not willing,

But they were silent and did not answer him a word, for the command of the king was, "You must not answer him."

Did the gods of the nations that my {predecessors} destroyed deliver them--Gozan, Haran, Rezeph, and the sons of Eden who [were] in Telassar?

to {set} their gods in the fire, for they [were] not gods, but [the] work of human hands, wood and stone, and they destroyed them.

Because you were enraged {against} me, and your noise has come up to my ears, I will put my hook in your nose and my bridle on your lips, and I will turn you back on the way [by] which you came.

And the angel of Yahweh set out and struck one hundred and eighty-five thousand in the camp of the Assyrians. When they rose in the morning, look! All of them [were] dead corpses.

Look! Bitterness was bitter to me for peace. And you were the one who loved my life from [the] pit of destruction, for you have cast all my sins behind your back.

Who gave Jacob to a plunderer and Israel to those who plunder? [Was it] not Yahweh, against whom we have sinned? And they were not willing to walk in his ways, and they would not {obey} his law.

'Only in Yahweh,' one shall say to me, '[are] righteousness and strength.' He shall come to him, and all those who were angry with him shall be ashamed.

To whom will you liken me, and count as equal, and compare with me, as though we were alike?

And [when] he led them through the deserts, they were not thirsty; he made water flow from [the] rock for them, and he split [the] rock, and [the] water gushed out.

Yet the children {born when you were bereaved} will say in your {hearing}, "The place is [too] cramped for me; {make room} for me so that I can dwell."

Thus says Yahweh: "Where [is] this divorce document of your mother's divorce, [with] which I dismissed her? or to whom of my creditors did I sell you? Look! you were sold because of your sin, and your mother was dismissed because of your transgressions.

"Listen to me, you who pursue righteousness, who seek Yahweh. Look to [the] rock [from which] you were hewn, and to [the] excavation of [the] pit [from which] you were quarried.

For thus says Yahweh: "You were sold for nothing, and you shall be redeemed without money."

Just as many were appalled at you-- such [was] his appearance beyond human disfigurement, and his form beyond the sons of mankind--

But he [was] pierced because of our transgressions, crushed because of our iniquities; the chastisement for our peace [was] upon him, and by his wounds {we were healed}.

And of whom were you afraid and feared, that you deceived and did not remember me? Did you not place [it] on your heart? [Have] I not been silent, even from long ago, and [so] you do not fear me?

But they {were the ones who} rebelled, and they grieved {his Holy Spirit}, so he {became an enemy to them}; he himself fought against them.

We have been since antiquity; you did not rule them; {they were not called by your name}.

You meet with the one who rejoices, one who does righteousness. In your ways they remember you. Look! You were angry and we sinned against them [in] ancient [times] and we were saved.

The words of Jeremiah, the son of Hilkiah, among the priests who [were] in Anathoth, in the land of Benjamin,

Israel [was] holy to Yahweh, the first fruit of his produce. All [those who] ate it were held guilty; disaster came to them," {declares} Yahweh.'"

Thus says Yahweh: "What injustice did your ancestors find in me that they were far from me, and they went after the vanity, and they became vain?

"For from long ago you have broken your yoke, you tore to pieces your bonds. And you said, 'I will not serve!' But on every high hill and under every leafy tree you [were] lying down [as] a prostitute.

How you go about so much changing your way! Also by Egypt you will be put to shame, just as you were put to shame by Assyria.

Like watchers of a field they were against her from all around, because she has rebelled against me," {declares} Yahweh.

I looked at the earth, and behold, it was wasteland and emptiness, and to the heavens, and [they were] without their light.

I looked at the mountains, and behold, they were quaking, and all of the hills were jolted to and fro.

I looked and behold, the fruitful land [was] a desert, and all of its cities were ruined before Yahweh, before the face of {his burning anger}.

They were well-fed lusty horses, they neighed each to the wife of his neighbor.

Have they acted ashamed, for they have committed a detestable thing? Not at all, nor were they ashamed; they did not know to feel humiliated. {Therefore} they will fall among [those who] fall at the time I punish them, they will stumble," says Yahweh.

Were they ashamed, for they had committed a detestable thing? What's worse, they were not ashamed at all, and they did not know to feel humiliated. {Therefore} they will fall among [those who] fall; at the time of their punishment they will stumble," says Yahweh.

{Oh that my head were waters}, and my eyes a fountain of tears, so that I might weep day and night, [for] the slain of the daughter of my people.

Your words were found and I ate them, and your words became to me as jubilation, even as the joy of my heart, for your name is called on me, Yahweh God of hosts.

Then Pashhur struck Jeremiah the prophet and put him in the stocks that [were] in the upper Gate of Benjamin, which [was] by the temple of Yahweh.

I spoke to you {in the times you were secure}, [and] you said, 'I will not listen!' This [was] your way from your youth, for you have not obeyed my voice.

"As I live," {declares} Yahweh, "surely if Coniah, the son of Jehoiakim, the king of Judah, were [the] seal on my right hand, surely from there I would wrench you off.

And I will throw you and your mother who gave birth to you to another country where you were not born, and there you will die.

Yahweh showed me, and look, there were two baskets of figs placed {before} the temple of Yahweh--after Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon had deported Jeconiah the son of Jehoiakim, the king of Judah, with the officials of Judah, and the craftsmen, and the smiths, from Jerusalem and had brought them [to] Babylon.

Then Jeremiah the prophet said to Hananiah the prophet before the eyes of the priests and before the eyes of all the people who were standing in the house of Yahweh,

The prophets who were {before} me and {before} you from ancient [times] prophesied against many countries and against great kingdoms of war, and of disaster, and of plague.

And I gave the deed of the purchase to Baruch the son of Neriah, the son of Mahseiah, {in the presence of} Hanamel, [the son of] my uncle, and {in the presence of} the witnesses who signed the deed of the purchase, {in the presence of} the Judeans who were sitting in the courtyard of the guard.

For the people of Israel and the people of Judah were doing only evil in my eyes from their youth, for the people of Israel [were] only provoking me to anger by the work of their hands," {declares} Yahweh.

And they have turned to me [their] backs and not [their] faces, though {I have taught them over and over again}, but they [were] not listening to accept discipline.

For thus says Yahweh, the God of Israel, concerning the houses of this city and concerning the houses of the kings of Judah, that were torn down [to make a defense] against the siege ramps and against the sword:

The word that came to Jeremiah from Yahweh, when Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, and all his army, with all [the] kingdoms of [the] earth [under] the dominion of his hand, and all the peoples [were] fighting against Jerusalem and against all its cities, {saying},

In peace you will die, and as [there was] burning for your ancestors, the former kings who were {before you}, so they will burn for you, and they will lament for you, "Alas, lord!" For [the] word I have spoken,' {declares} Yahweh." '"