Bible in 90 Days

¹⁹ I will perform a mighty miracle against them, and I will send those who escape,^[a] as missionaries to the nations—to Tarshish, Put, Lud, Meshech, Rosh, Tubal, Javan, and to the lands beyond the sea that have not heard my fame nor seen my glory. There they shall declare my glory to the Gentiles. ²⁰ And they shall bring back all your brethren from every nation as a gift to the Lord, transporting them gently^[b] on horses and in chariots, and in litters, and on mules and camels, to my holy mountain, to Jerusalem, says the Lord. It will be like offerings flowing into the Temple of the Lord at harvesttime, carried in vessels consecrated to the Lord. ²¹ And I will appoint some of those returning to be my priests and Levites, says the Lord.

²² As surely as my new heavens and earth shall remain, so surely shall you always be my people, with a name that shall never disappear. ²³ All mankind shall come to worship me from week to week and month to month. ²⁴ And they shall go out and look at the dead bodies of those who have rebelled against me, for their worm shall never die; their fire shall not be quenched; and they shall be a disgusting sight to all mankind.

1 ^1-2 These are God’s messages to Jeremiah the priest (the son of Hilkiah) who lived in the town of Anathoth in the land of Benjamin. The first of these messages came to him in the thirteenth year of the reign of Amon’s son Josiah, king of Judah. ³ Others came during the reign of Josiah’s son Jehoiakim, king of Judah, and at various other times until July of the eleventh year of the reign of Josiah’s son Zedekiah, king of Judah, when Jerusalem was captured and the people were taken away as slaves.

⁴ The Lord said to me, ⁵ “I knew you before you were formed within your mother’s womb; before you were born I sanctified you and appointed you as my spokesman to the world.”

⁶ “O Lord God,” I said, “I can’t do that! I’m far too young! I’m only a youth!”

⁷ “Don’t say that,” he replied, “for you will go wherever I send you and speak whatever I tell you to. ⁸ And don’t be afraid of the people, for I, the Lord, will be with you and see you through.”

⁹ Then he touched my mouth and said, “See, I have put my words in your mouth! ¹⁰ Today your work begins, to warn the nations and the kingdoms of the world. In accord with my words spoken through your mouth I will tear down some and destroy them, and plant others, nurture them, and make them strong and great.”

¹¹ Then the Lord said to me, “Look, Jeremiah! What do you see?”

And I replied, “I see a whip made from the branch of an almond tree.”

¹² And the Lord replied, “That’s right, and it means that I will surely carry out my threats of punishment.”^[c]

¹³ Then the Lord asked me, “What do you see now?”

And I replied, “I see a pot of boiling water, tipping southward, spilling over Judah.”^[d]

¹⁴ “Yes,” he said, “for terror from the north will boil out upon all the people of this land. ¹⁵ I am calling the armies of the kingdoms of the north to come to Jerusalem and set their thrones at the gates of the city and all along its walls, and in all the other cities of Judah. ¹⁶ This is the way I will punish my people for deserting me and for worshiping other gods—yes, idols they themselves have made! ¹⁷ Get up and dress and go out and tell them whatever I tell you to say. Don’t be afraid of them, or else I will make a fool of you in front of them. ¹⁸ For see, today I have made you impervious to their attacks. They cannot harm you. You are strong like a fortified city that cannot be captured, like an iron pillar and heavy gates of brass. All the kings of Judah, its officers, priests, and people will not be able to prevail against you. ¹⁹ They will try, but they will fail. For I am with you,” says the Lord. “I will deliver you.”

2 Again the Lord spoke to me and said:

² Go and shout this in Jerusalem’s streets: This is what the Lord says! I remember how eager you were to please me as a young bride long ago, how you loved me and followed me even through the barren deserts. ³ In those days Israel was a holy people, the first of my children.^[e] All who harmed them were counted deeply guilty, and great evil fell on anyone who touched them.

^4-5 O Israel, says the Lord, why did your fathers desert me? What sin did they find in me that turned them away and changed them into fools who worship idols? ⁶ They ignore the fact that it was I, the Lord, who brought them safely out of Egypt and led them through the barren wilderness, a land of deserts and rocks, of drought and death, where no one lives or even travels. ⁷ And I brought them into a fruitful land, to eat of its bounty and goodness, but they made it into a land of sin and corruption and turned my inheritance into an evil thing. ⁸ Even their priests cared nothing for the Lord, and their judges ignored me; their rulers turned against me, and their prophets worshiped Baal and wasted their time on nonsense.

⁹ But I will not give you up—I will plead for you to return to me and will keep on pleading; yes, even with your children’s children in the years to come!

^10-11 Look around you and see if you can find another nation anywhere that has traded in its old gods for new ones—even though their gods are nothing. Send to the west to the island of Cyprus; send to the east to the deserts of Kedar. See if anyone there has ever heard so strange a thing as this. And yet my people have given up their glorious God for silly idols! ¹² The heavens are shocked at such a thing and shrink back in horror and dismay. ¹³ For my people have done two evil things: They have forsaken me, the Fountain of living waters; and they have built for themselves broken cisterns that can’t hold water!

¹⁴ Why has Israel become a nation of slaves? Why is she captured and led far away?

¹⁵ I see great armies marching on Jerusalem with mighty shouts^[f] to destroy her and leave her cities in ruins, burned and desolate. ¹⁶ I see the armies of Egypt rising against her, marching from their cities of Memphis and Tahpanhes to utterly destroy Israel’s glory and power. ¹⁷ And you have brought this on yourselves by rebelling against the Lord your God when he wanted to lead you and show you the way!

¹⁸ What have you gained by your alliances with Egypt and with Assyria? ¹⁹ Your own wickedness will punish you. You will see what an evil, bitter thing it is to rebel against the Lord your God, fearlessly forsaking him, says the Lord Almighty. ²⁰ Long ago you shook off my yoke and broke away from my ties. Defiant, you would not obey me. On every hill and under every tree you’ve bowed low before idols.

²¹ How could this happen? How could this be? For when I planted you, I chose my seed so carefully—the very best. Why have you become this degenerate race of evil men? ²² No amount of soap or lye can make you clean. You are stained with guilt that cannot ever be washed away. I see it always before me, the Lord God says. ²³ You say it isn’t so, that you haven’t worshiped idols? How can you say a thing like that? Go and look in any valley in the land! Face the awful sins that you have done, O restless female camel, seeking for a male! ²⁴ You are a wild donkey, sniffing the wind at mating time. (Who can restrain your lust?) Any jack wanting you need not search, for you come running to him! ²⁵ Why don’t you turn from all this weary running after other gods? But you say, “Don’t waste your breath. I’ve fallen in love with these strangers and I can’t stop loving them now!”

^26-27 Like a thief, the only shame that Israel knows is getting caught. Kings, princes, priests, and prophets—all are alike in this. They call a carved-up wooden post their father, and for their mother they have an idol chiseled out from stone. Yet in time of trouble they cry to me to save them! ²⁸ Why don’t you call on these gods you have made? When danger comes, let them go out and save you if they can! For you have as many gods as there are cities in Judah. ²⁹ Don’t come to me—you are all rebels, says the Lord. ³⁰ I have punished your children, but it did them no good; they still will not obey. And you yourselves have killed my prophets as a lion kills its prey.

³¹ O my people, listen to the words of God: Have I been unjust to Israel? Have I been to them a land of darkness and of evil? Why then do my people say, “At last we are free from God; we won’t have anything to do with him again!” ³² How can you disown your God like that?^[g] Can a girl forget her jewels? What bride will seek to hide her wedding dress? Yet for years on end my people have forgotten me—the most precious of their treasures.

³³ How you plot and scheme to win your lovers. The most experienced harlot could learn a lot from you! ³⁴ Your clothing is stained with the blood of the innocent and the poor. Brazenly you murder without a cause. ³⁵ And yet you say, “I haven’t done a thing to anger God. I’m sure he isn’t angry!”^[h] I will punish you severely because you say, “I haven’t sinned!”

³⁶ First here, then there, you flit about, going from one ally to another for their help; but it’s all no good—your new friends in Egypt will forsake you as Assyria did before. ³⁷ You will be left in despair and cover your face with your hands, for the Lord has rejected the ones that you trust. You will not succeed despite their aid.

3 There is a law^[i] that if a man divorces a woman who then remarries, he is not to take her back again, for she has become corrupted. But though you have left me and married many lovers, yet I have invited you to come to me again, the Lord says. ² Is there a single spot in all the land where you haven’t been defiled by your adulteries—your worshiping these other gods?^[j] You sit like a prostitute beside the road waiting for a client! You sit alone like a Bedouin in the desert. You have polluted the land with your vile prostitution. ³ That is why even the springtime rains have failed. For you are a prostitute and completely unashamed. ^4-5 And yet you say to me, “O Father, you have always been my Friend; surely you won’t be angry about such a little thing! Surely you will just forget it?” So you talk and keep right on doing all the evil that you can.

⁶ This message from the Lord came to me during the reign of King Josiah:

Have you seen what Israel does? Like a wanton wife who gives herself to other men at every chance, so Israel has worshiped other gods on every hill, beneath every shady tree. ⁷ I thought that someday she would return to me and once again be mine; but she didn’t come back. And her faithless sister Judah saw the continued rebellion of Israel. ⁸ Yet she paid no attention, even though she saw that I divorced faithless Israel. But now Judah too has left me and given herself to prostitution, for she has gone to other gods to worship them. ⁹ She treated it all so lightly—to her it was nothing at all that she should worship idols made of wood and stone. And so the land was greatly polluted and defiled. ¹⁰ Then, afterwards, this faithless one “returned” to me, but her “sorrow” was only faked, the Lord God says. ¹¹ In fact, faithless Israel is less guilty than treacherous Judah!

¹² Therefore, go and say to Israel, O Israel, my sinful people, come home to me again, for I am merciful; I will not be forever angry with you. ¹³ Only acknowledge your guilt; admit that you rebelled against the Lord your God and committed adultery against him by worshiping idols under every tree; confess that you refused to follow me. ¹⁴ O sinful children, come home, for I am your Master, and I will bring you again to the land of Israel—one from here and two from there, wherever you are scattered. ¹⁵ And I will give you leaders after my own heart, who will guide you with wisdom and understanding.

¹⁶ Then, when your land is once more filled with people, says the Lord, you will no longer wish for “the good old days of long ago” when you possessed the Ark of God’s covenant. Those days will not be missed or even thought about, and the Ark will not be reconstructed, for the Lord himself will be among you. ¹⁷ The whole city of Jerusalem will be known as the throne of the Lord; all nations will come to him there and no longer stubbornly follow their evil desires. ¹⁸ At that time the people of Judah and of Israel will return together from their exile in the north, to the land I gave their fathers as an inheritance forever. ¹⁹ And I thought how wonderful it would be for you to be here among my children. I planned to give you part of this beautiful land, the finest in the world. I looked forward to your calling me “Father” and thought that you would never turn away from me again. ²⁰ But you have betrayed me; you have gone off and given yourself to a host of foreign gods; you have been like a faithless wife who leaves her husband.

²¹ I hear a voice high upon the windswept mountains, crying, crying. It is the sons of Israel who have turned their backs on God and wandered far away. ²² O my rebellious children, come back to me again and I will heal you from your sins.

And they reply, Yes, we will come, for you are the Lord our God. ²³ We are weary of worshiping idols on the hills and of having orgies on the mountains. It is all a farce. Only in the Lord our God can Israel ever find her help and her salvation. ²⁴ From our childhood we have seen everything our fathers had—flocks and herds and sons and daughters—squandered on priests and idols. ²⁵ We lie in shame and in dishonor, for we and our fathers have sinned from childhood against the Lord our God; we have not obeyed him.

4 O Israel, if you will truly return to me and absolutely discard your idols, ² and if you will swear by me alone, the living God, and begin to live good, honest, clean lives, then you will be a testimony to the nations of the world, and they will come to me and glorify my name.

³ The Lord is saying to the men of Judah and Jerusalem, Plow up the hardness of your hearts; otherwise the good seed will be wasted among the thorns. ⁴ Cleanse your minds and hearts,^[k] not just your bodies, or else my anger will burn you to a crisp because of all your sins. And no one will be able to put the fire out.

⁵ Shout to Jerusalem and to all Judea, telling them to sound the alarm throughout the land. “Run for your lives! Flee to the fortified cities!” ⁶ Send a signal from Jerusalem: “Flee now, don’t delay!” For I the Lord am bringing vast destruction on you from the north.^{[l] 7} A lion—a destroyer of nations—stalks from his lair; and he is headed for your land. Your cities will lie in ruin without inhabitant. ⁸ Put on clothes of mourning and weep with broken hearts, for the fierce anger of the Lord has not stopped yet. ⁹ In that day, says the Lord, the king and the princes will tremble in fear; and the priests and the prophets will be stricken with horror.

¹⁰ (Then I said, “But Lord, the people have been deceived by what you said, for you promised great blessings on Jerusalem. Yet the sword is even now poised to strike them dead!”)

^11-12 At that time he will send a burning wind from the desert upon them—not in little gusts but in a roaring blast—and he will pronounce their doom. ¹³ The enemy shall roll down upon us like a storm wind; his chariots are like a whirlwind; his steeds are swifter than eagles. Woe, woe upon us, for we are doomed.

¹⁴ O Jerusalem, cleanse your hearts while there is time. You can yet be saved by casting out your evil thoughts. ¹⁵ From Dan and from Mount Ephraim your doom has been announced. ¹⁶ Warn the other nations that the enemy is coming from a distant land, and they shout against Jerusalem and the cities of Judah. ¹⁷ They surround Jerusalem like shepherds moving in on some wild animal! For my people have rebelled against me, says the Lord. ¹⁸ Your ways have brought this down upon you; it is a bitter dose of your own medicine, striking deep within your hearts.

¹⁹ My heart, my heart—I writhe in pain; my heart pounds within me. I cannot be still because I have heard, O my soul, the blast of the enemies’ trumpets and the enemies’ battle cries. ²⁰ Wave upon wave of destruction rolls over the land, until it lies in utter ruin; suddenly, in a moment, every house is crushed. ²¹ How long must this go on? How long must I see war and death surrounding me?

²² “Until my people leave their foolishness, for they refuse to listen to me; they are dull, retarded children who have no understanding. They are smart enough at doing wrong, but for doing right they have no talent, none at all.”

²³ I looked down upon their land, and as far as I could see in all directions everything was ruins. And all the heavens were dark. ²⁴ I looked at the mountains and saw that they trembled and shook. ²⁵ I looked, and mankind was gone, and the birds of the heavens had fled.

²⁶ The fertile valleys were wilderness, and all the cities were broken down before the presence of the Lord, crushed by his fierce anger. ²⁷ The Lord’s decree of desolation covers all the land.

“Yet,” he says, “there will be a little remnant of my people left. ²⁸ The earth shall mourn, the heavens shall be draped with black, because of my decree against my people; I have made up my mind and will not change it.”

²⁹ All the cities flee in terror at the noise of marching armies coming near. The people hide in the bushes and flee to the mountains. All the cities are abandoned—all have fled in terror. ³⁰ Why do you put on your most beautiful clothing and jewelry and brighten your eyes with mascara? It will do you no good! Your allies despise you and will kill you.

³¹ I have heard great crying like that of a woman giving birth to her first child; it is the cry of my people gasping for breath, pleading for help, prostrate before their murderers.

5 Run up and down through every street in all Jerusalem; search high and low and see if you can find even one person who is fair and honest! Search every square, and if you find just one, I’ll not destroy the city! ² Even under oath, they all lie.

³ O Lord, you are looking for faithfulness. You have tried to get them to be honest, for you have punished them, but they won’t change! You have destroyed them, but they refuse to turn from their sins. They are determined, with faces hard as rock, not to repent.

⁴ Then I said, “But what can we expect from the poor and ignorant? They don’t know the ways of God. How can they obey him?”

⁵ I will go now to their leaders, the men of importance, and speak to them, for they know the ways of the Lord and the judgment that follows sin. But they too had utterly rejected their God.

⁶ So I will send upon them the wild fury of the “lion from the forest”; the “desert wolves” shall pounce upon them, and a “leopard” shall lurk around their cities so that all who go out shall be torn apart. For their sins are very many; their rebellion against me is great.

⁷ How can I pardon you? For even your children have turned away and worship gods that are not gods at all. I fed my people until they were fully satisfied, and their thanks was to commit adultery wholesale and to gang up at the city’s brothels. ⁸ They are well-fed, lusty stallions, each neighing for his neighbor’s mate. ⁹ Shall I not punish them for this? Shall I not send my vengeance on such a nation as this? ¹⁰ Go down the rows of the vineyards and destroy them! But leave a scattered few to live. Strip the branches from each vine, for they are not the Lord’s.

¹¹ For the people of Israel and Judah are full of treachery against me, says the Lord. ¹² They have lied and said, “He won’t bother us! No evil will come upon us! There will be neither famine nor war! ¹³ God’s prophets,” they say, “are windbags full of words with no divine authority. Their claims of doom will fall upon themselves, not us!”

¹⁴ Therefore, this is what the Lord God of Hosts says to his prophets: Because of talk like this, I’ll take your words and prophecies and turn them into raging fire and burn up these people like kindling wood. ¹⁵ See, I will bring a distant nation against you, O Israel, says the Lord. It is a mighty nation, an ancient nation^[m] whose language you don’t understand. ¹⁶ Their weapons are deadly; the men are all mighty. ¹⁷ And they shall eat your harvest and your children’s bread, your flocks of sheep and herds of cattle, yes, and your grapes and figs; and they shall sack your walled cities that you think are safe.

¹⁸ But I will not completely blot you out. So says the Lord.

¹⁹ And when your people ask, “Why is it that the Lord is doing this to us?” then you shall say, “You rejected him and gave yourselves to other gods while in your land; now you must be slaves to foreigners in their lands.”

²⁰ Make this announcement to Judah and to Israel:

²¹ Listen, O foolish, senseless people—you with the eyes that do not see and the ears that do not listen— ²² have you no respect at all for me? the Lord God asks. How can it be that you don’t even tremble in my presence? I set the shorelines of the world by perpetual decrees, so that the oceans, though they toss and roar, can never pass those bounds. Isn’t such a God to be feared and worshiped?

^23-24 But my people have rebellious hearts; they have turned against me and gone off into idolatry. Though I am the one who gives them rain each year in spring and fall and sends the harvesttimes, yet they have no respect or fear for me. ²⁵ And so I have taken away these wondrous blessings from them. This sin has robbed them of all of these good things.

²⁶ Among my people are wicked men who lurk for victims like a hunter hiding in a blind. They set their traps for men. ²⁷ Like a coop full of chickens their homes are full of evil plots. And the result? Now they are great and rich, ²⁸ they are well fed and well groomed, and there is no limit to their wicked deeds. They refuse justice to orphans and the rights of the poor. ²⁹ Should I sit back and act as though nothing is going on? the Lord God asks. Shouldn’t I punish a nation such as this?

³⁰ A horrible thing has happened in this land— ³¹ the priests are ruled by false prophets, and my people like it so! But your doom is certain.

6 Run, people of Benjamin, run for your lives! Flee from Jerusalem! Sound the alarm in Tekoa; send up a smoke signal at Beth-haccherem; warn everyone that a powerful army is on the way from the north, coming to destroy this nation! ² Helpless as a girl, you are beautiful and delicate—and doomed. ³ Evil shepherds shall surround you. They shall set up camp around the city and divide your pastures for their flocks. ⁴ See them prepare for battle. At noon it has begun. All afternoon it rages until the evening shadows fall. ⁵ “Come,” they say. “Let us attack by night and destroy her palaces!”

⁶ For the Lord Almighty has said to them, Cut down her trees for battering rams; smash down the walls of Jerusalem. This is the city to be punished, for she is vile through and through. ⁷ She spouts evil like a fountain! Her streets echo with the sounds of violence; her sickness and wounds are ever before me.

⁸ This is your last warning, O Jerusalem. If you don’t listen, I will empty the land. ⁹ Disaster on disaster shall befall you. Even the few who remain in Israel shall be gleaned again, the Lord Almighty has said; for as a grape-gatherer checks each vine to pick what he has missed, so the remnant of my people shall be destroyed again.

¹⁰ But who will listen when I warn them? Their ears are closed, and they refuse to hear. The word of God has angered them; they don’t want it at all.

¹¹ For all this I am full of the wrath of God against them. I am weary of holding it in. I will pour it out over Jerusalem, even upon the children playing in the streets, upon the gatherings of young men, and on husbands and wives and grandparents. ¹² Their enemies shall live in their homes and take their fields and wives. For I will punish the people of this land, the Lord has said. ¹³ They are swindlers and liars, from the least of them right to the top! Yes, even my prophets and priests! ¹⁴ You can’t heal a wound by saying it’s not there! Yet the priests and prophets give assurances of peace when all is war. ¹⁵ Were my people ashamed when they worshiped idols? No, not at all—they didn’t even blush. Therefore they shall lie among the slain. They shall die beneath my anger.

¹⁶ Yet the Lord pleads with you still: Ask where the good road is, the godly paths you used to walk in, in the days of long ago. Travel there, and you will find rest for your souls. But you reply, “No, that is not the road we want!” ¹⁷ I set watchmen over you who warned you: “Listen for the sound of the trumpet! It will let you know when trouble comes.” But you said, “No! We won’t pay any attention!”

^18-19 This, then, is my decree against my people: (Listen to it, distant lands; listen to it, O my people in Jerusalem; listen to it, all the earth!) I will bring evil upon this people; it will be the fruit of their own sin because they will not listen to me. They reject my law. ²⁰ There is no use now in burning sweet incense from Sheba before me! Keep your expensive perfumes! I cannot accept your offerings; they have no sweet fragrance for me. ²¹ I will make an obstacle course of the pathway of my people; fathers and sons shall be frustrated; neighbors and friends shall collapse together. ²² The Lord God says: See the armies marching from the north—a great nation is rising against you. ²³ They are a cruel, merciless people, fully armed, mounted for war. The noise of their army is like a roaring sea.

²⁴ We have heard the fame of their armies, and we are weak with fright. Fright and pain have gripped us like that of women in travail. ²⁵ Don’t go out to the fields! Don’t travel the roads! For the enemy is everywhere, ready to kill; we are terrorized at every turn.

²⁶ O Jerusalem, pride of my people, put on mourning clothes and sit in ashes; weep bitterly as for an only son. For suddenly the destroying armies will be upon you.

²⁷ Jeremiah, I have made you an assayer of metals that you may test this my people and determine their value. Listen to what they are saying and watch what they are doing. ²⁸ Are they not the worst of rebels, full of evil talk against the Lord? They are insolent as brass, hard and cruel as iron. ²⁹ The bellows blow fiercely; the refining fire grows hotter, but it can never cleanse them, for there is no pureness in them to bring out. Why continue the process longer? All is dross. No matter how hot the fire, they continue in their wicked ways. ³⁰ I must label them “Impure, Rejected Silver,” and I have discarded them.

7 Then the Lord said to Jeremiah:

² Go over to the entrance of the Temple of the Lord and give this message to the people: O Judah, listen to this message from God. Listen to it, all of you who worship here. ³ The Lord, the God of Israel says: Even yet, if you quit your evil ways, I will let you stay in your own land. ⁴ But don’t be fooled by those who lie to you and say that since the Temple of the Lord is here, God will never let Jerusalem be destroyed. ⁵ You may remain under these conditions only: If you stop your wicked thoughts and deeds and are fair to others; ⁶ if you stop exploiting orphans, widows, and foreigners, and stop your murdering; if you stop worshiping idols as you do now to your hurt, ⁷ then, and only then, will I let you stay in this land that I gave to your fathers to keep forever.

⁸ You think that because the Temple is here, you will never suffer? Don’t fool yourselves! ⁹ Do you really think that you can steal, murder, commit adultery, lie, and worship Baal and all of those new gods of yours, ¹⁰ and then come here and stand before me in my Temple and chant, “We are saved!”—only to go right back to all these evil things again? ¹¹ Is my Temple but a den of robbers in your eyes? For I see all the evil going on in there.

¹² Go to Shiloh, the city I first honored with my name, and see what I did to her because of all the wickedness of my people Israel. ^13-14 And now, says the Lord, I will do the same thing here because of all this evil you have done. Again and again I spoke to you about it, rising up early and calling, but you refused to hear or answer. Yes, I will destroy this Temple, as I did in Shiloh—this Temple called by my name, which you trust for help, and this place I gave to you and to your fathers. ¹⁵ And I will send you into exile, just as I did your brothers, the people of Ephraim.

¹⁶ Pray no more for these people, Jeremiah. Neither weep for them nor pray nor beg that I should help them, for I will not listen. ¹⁷ Don’t you see what they are doing throughout the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem? ¹⁸ No wonder my anger is great! Watch how the children gather wood and the fathers build fires, and the women knead dough and make cakes to offer to the Queen of Heaven^[n] and to their other idol-gods! ¹⁹ Am I the one that they are hurting? asks the Lord. Most of all they hurt themselves, to their own shame. ²⁰ So the Lord God says: I will pour out my anger, yes, my fury on this place—people, animals, trees, and plants will be consumed by the unquenchable fire of my anger.

²¹ The Lord, the God of Israel says: Away with your offerings and sacrifices! ²² It wasn’t offerings and sacrifices I wanted from your fathers when I led them out of Egypt. That was not the point of my command. ²³ But what I told them was: Obey me, and I will be your God and you shall be my people; only do as I say, and all shall be well!

²⁴ But they wouldn’t listen; they kept on doing whatever they wanted to, following their own stubborn, evil thoughts. They went backward instead of forward. ²⁵ Ever since the day your fathers left Egypt until now, I have kept on sending them my prophets, day after day. ²⁶ But they wouldn’t listen to them or even try to hear. They are hard and stubborn and rebellious—worse even than their fathers were.

²⁷ Tell them everything that I will do to them, but don’t expect them to listen. Cry out your warnings, but don’t expect them to respond. ²⁸ Say to them: “This is the nation that refuses to obey the Lord its God and refuses to be taught. She continues to live a lie.”

²⁹ O Jerusalem, shave your head in shame and weep alone upon the mountains; for the Lord has rejected and forsaken this people of his wrath. ³⁰ For the people of Judah have sinned before my very eyes, says the Lord. They have set up their idols right in my own Temple, polluting it. ³¹ They have built the altar called Topheth in the valley of Ben-hinnom, and there they burn to death their little sons and daughters as sacrifices to their gods—a deed so horrible I’ve never even thought of it, let alone commanded it to be done. ³² The time is coming, says the Lord, when that valley’s name will be changed from Topheth or Ben-hinnom Valley, to the Valley of Slaughter; for there will be so many slain to bury that there won’t be room enough for all the graves, and they will dump the bodies in that valley.

³³ The bodies of my people shall be food for the birds and animals, and no one shall be left to scare them away. ³⁴ I will end the happy singing and laughter and the joyous voices of the bridegrooms and brides in the streets of Jerusalem and in the cities of Judah. For the land shall lie in desolation.

8 Then, says the Lord, the enemy shall break open the graves of the kings of Judah and of the princes, and the graves of the priests, prophets, and people, ² and dig out their bones and spread them out on the ground before the sun and moon and stars—the gods of my people!—whom they have loved and worshiped. Their bones shall not be gathered up again nor buried but shall be scattered like dung upon the ground. ³ And those of this evil nation who are still left alive shall long to die rather than live where I will scatter them, says the Lord Almighty.

^4-5 Once again give them this message from the Lord: When a person falls, he jumps up again; when he is on the wrong road and discovers his mistake, he goes back to the fork where he made the wrong turn. But these people keep on along their evil path, even though I warn them. ⁶ I listen to their conversation and what do I hear? Is anyone sorry for sin? Does anyone say, “What a terrible thing I have done”? No, all are rushing pell-mell down the path of sin as swiftly as a horse rushing to the battle! ⁷ The stork knows the time of her migration, as does the turtledove, the crane, and the swallow. They all return at God’s appointed time each year; but not my people! They don’t accept the laws of God.

⁸ How can you say, “We understand his laws,” when your teachers have twisted them up to mean a thing I never said? ⁹ These wise teachers of yours will be shamed by exile for this sin, for they have rejected the word of the Lord. Are they then so wise? ¹⁰ I will give their wives and their farms to others; for all of them, great and small, prophet and priest, have one purpose in mind—to get what isn’t theirs. ¹¹ They give useless medicine for my people’s grievous wounds, for they assure them all is well when that isn’t so at all! ¹² Are they ashamed because they worship idols? No, not in the least; they don’t even know how to blush! That is why I will see to it that they lie among the fallen. I will visit them with death. ¹³ Their figs and grapes will disappear, their fruit trees will die, and all the good things I prepared for them will soon be gone.

¹⁴ Then the people will say, “Why should we wait here to die? Come, let us go to the walled cities and perish there. For the Lord our God has decreed our doom and given us a cup of poison to drink because of all our sins. ¹⁵ We expected peace, but no peace came; we looked for health, but there was only terror.”

¹⁶ The noise of war resounds from the northern border.^[o] The whole land trembles at the approach of the terrible army, for the enemy is coming and is devouring the land and everything in it—the cities and people alike. ¹⁷ For I will send these enemy troops among you like poisonous snakes that you cannot charm. No matter what you do, they will bite you and you shall die.

¹⁸ My grief is beyond healing; my heart is broken. ¹⁹ Listen to the weeping of my people all across the land.

“Where is the Lord?” they ask. “Has God deserted us?”

“Oh, why have they angered me with their carved idols and strange evil rites?” the Lord replies.

²⁰ “The harvest is finished; the summer is over, and we are not saved.”

²¹ I weep for the hurt of my people; I stand amazed, silent, dumb with grief. ²² Is there no medicine in Gilead? Is there no physician there? Why doesn’t God do something? Why doesn’t he help?

9 Oh, that my eyes were a fountain of tears; I would weep forever; I would sob day and night for the slain of my people! ² Oh, that I could go away and forget them and live in some wayside shack in the desert, for they are all adulterous, treacherous men.

³ “They bend their tongues like bows to shoot their arrows of untruth. They care nothing for right and go from bad to worse; they care nothing for me,” says the Lord.

⁴ Beware of your neighbor! Beware of your brother! All take advantage of one another and spread their slanderous lies. ⁵ With practiced tongues they fool and defraud each other; they wear themselves out with all their sinning.

⁶ “They pile evil upon evil, lie upon lie, and utterly refuse to come to me,” says the Lord.

⁷ Therefore, the Lord Almighty says this: “See, I will melt them in a crucible of affliction. I will refine them and test them like metal. What else can I do with them? ⁸ For their tongues aim lies like poisoned spears. They speak cleverly to their neighbors while planning to kill them. ⁹ Should not I punish them for such things as this?” asks the Lord. “Shall not my soul be avenged on such a nation as this?”

¹⁰ Sobbing and weeping, I point to their mountains and pastures, for now they are desolate, without a living soul. Gone is the lowing of cattle, gone the birds and wild animals. All have fled.

¹¹ “And I will turn Jerusalem into heaps of ruined houses where only jackals have their dens. The cities of Judah shall be ghost towns, with no one living in them.”

¹² Who is wise enough to understand all this? Where is the Lord’s messenger to explain it? Why is the land a wilderness so that no one dares even to travel through?

¹³ “Because,” the Lord replies, “my people have forsaken my commandments and not obeyed my laws. ¹⁴ Instead, they have done whatever they pleased and worshiped the idols of Baal, as their fathers told them to.” ¹⁵ Therefore, this is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: Look! I will feed them with bitterness and give them poison to drink. ¹⁶ I will scatter them around the world, to be strangers in distant lands; and even there the sword of destruction shall chase them until I have utterly destroyed them.

^17-18 The Lord Almighty says: “Send for the mourners! Quick! Begin your crying! Let the tears flow from your eyes. ¹⁹ Hear Jerusalem weeping in despair. ‘We are ruined! Disaster has befallen us! We must leave our land and homes!’” ²⁰ Listen to the words of God, O women who wail. Teach your daughters to wail and your neighbors too. ²¹ For death has crept in through your windows into your homes. He has killed off the flower of your youth. Children no longer play in the streets; the young men gather no more in the squares.

²² Tell them this, says the Lord: Bodies shall be scattered across the fields like manure, like sheaves after the mower, and no one will bury them.

²³ The Lord says: Let not the wise man bask in his wisdom, nor the mighty man in his might, nor the rich man in his riches. ²⁴ Let them boast in this alone: That they truly know me, and understand that I am the Lord of justice and of righteousness whose love is steadfast; and that I love to be this way.

^25-26 A time is coming, says the Lord, when I will punish all those who are circumcised in body but not in spirit—the Egyptians, Edomites, Ammonites, Moabites, Arabs, and yes, even you people of Judah. For all these pagan nations also circumcise themselves. Unless you circumcise your hearts by loving me, your circumcision is only a heathen rite like theirs, and nothing more.

10 Hear the word of the Lord, O Israel:

^2-3 Don’t act like the people who make horoscopes and try to read their fate and future in the stars! Don’t be frightened by predictions such as theirs, for it is all a pack of lies. Their ways are futile and foolish. They cut down a tree and carve an idol; ⁴ they decorate it with gold and silver and fasten it securely in place with hammer and nails so that it won’t fall over. ⁵ And there stands their god like a helpless scarecrow in a garden! It cannot speak, and it must be carried, for it cannot walk. Don’t be afraid of such a god, for it can neither harm nor help nor do you any good.

⁶ O Lord, there is no other god like you. For you are great, and your name is full of power. ⁷ Who would not fear you, O King of nations? (And that title belongs to you alone!) Among all the wise men of the earth and in all the kingdoms of the world there isn’t anyone like you.

⁸ The wisest of men who worship idols are altogether stupid and foolish. ⁹ They bring beaten sheets of silver from Tarshish and gold from Uphaz and give them to skillful goldsmiths who make their idols; then they clothe these gods in royal purple robes that expert tailors make.

¹⁰ But the Lord is the only true God, the living God, the everlasting King. The whole earth shall tremble at his anger; the world shall hide before his displeasure.

¹¹ Say this to those who worship other gods: Your so-called gods, who have not made the heavens and earth, shall vanish from the earth. ¹² But our God formed the earth by his power and wisdom, and by his intelligence he hung the stars in space and stretched out the heavens. ¹³ It is his voice that echoes in the thunder of the storm clouds. He causes mist to rise upon the earth; he sends the lightning and brings the rain, and from his treasuries he brings the wind.