The Book of Jeremiah

Chapter 1
1 The words of Jeremiah son of Hilkiah, of the priests who were in Anathoth in the land of Benjamin,
2 to whom the word of Yahweh came in the days of Josiah son of Amon, king of Judah, in the thirteenth year of his reign;
3 it came through the days of Jehoiakim son of Josiah, king of Judah, until the finishing of the eleventh year of Zedekiah son of Josiah, king of Judah, that is, until the deportation of Jerusalem in the fifth month:
4 The word of Yahweh came to me, saying,
5 Ere I formed you in the belly, I knew you, And ere you came forth from the womb, I hallowed you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations.
6 Then I answered, Alas, my Lord Yahweh, behold, I do not know how to speak, for I am a youth.
7 Yet Yahweh said to me, Do not say, I am a youth, For to all to whom I shall send you, you shall go, And all that I shall instruct you, you shall speak.
8 Do not fear their presence, For I am with you to rescue you, averring is Yahweh.
9 Then Yahweh put forth His hand and touched my mouth, and Yahweh said to me, Behold, I have put My words in your mouth.
10 See, this day I have given you supervision over nations and over kingdoms, To pluck up and to break down and to destroy and to demolish, To build and to plant.
11 Then the word of Yahweh came to me, saying, What do you see, Jeremiah? And I answered, I see an almond tree-branch.
12 Yahweh said to me, You have done well in seeing, for I am alert over My word, to perform it.
13 Then the word of Yahweh came to me a second time, saying, What do you see? And I answered, I see a steaming pot and its face tipped away from the face of the north.
14 Then Yahweh said to me, From the north an evil shall be unloosed on all the dwellers of the land;
15 For behold, I am calling to all the families of the northward kingdoms, averring is Yahweh, And they will come and set up, each one its throne at the portal of Jerusalem’s gates, Against all her walls round about, And against all the cities of Judah.
16 I will pronounce My judgments on them for all their evil In that they have forsaken Me And have fumed incense to other elohim And have bowed down to works of their hands.
17 As for you, you shall belt your waist; You will arise and speak to them all that I instruct you. Do not be dismayed because of their presence, Lest I make you dismayed before them.
18 As for Me, behold, I have made you today into a fortress city, Into an iron column and a strong bronze wall Against the entire land, Against the kings of Judah, against its chief officials, Against its priests and against the people of the land.
19 They will fight against you, Yet they shall not prevail against you; For I am with you, averring is Yahweh, to rescue you.

Chapter 2
1 The word of Yahweh came to me, saying,
2 Go and call in the ears of Jerusalem, saying, Thus says Yahweh: I remember concerning you, the benignity of your youth, The love of your bridal days, when you followed after Me in the wilderness, In a land not sown.
3 Holy was Israel to Yahweh, The firstfruits of His harvest yield; All who devour him, they shall be held guilty; Evil, it shall come upon them, averring is Yahweh.
4 Hear the word of Yahweh, house of Jacob, And all the families of the house of Israel.
5 Thus says Yahweh, What iniquity did your fathers find in Me, That they have wandered far from Me And have gone after vanity and become vain?
6 They did not ask, Where is Yahweh, Who brought us up from the land of Egypt, Who led us in the wilderness, In a land of gorge and pit, In a land of aridity and blackest shadow, In a land in which no man passes, And no human dwells there?
7 I have brought you to this productive land, To eat its fruit and its goodness, Yet you have entered and defiled My land, And My allotment you have made into an abhorrence.
8 The priests, they did not ask, Where is Yahweh? Those who handle the law, they did not know Me, The shepherds, they transgressed against Me, And the prophets, they prophesied by Baal And went after things that do not benefit.
9 Therefore, I shall contend with you again, averring is Yahweh; Even with the sons of your sons shall I contend.
10 Indeed cross to the coasts of Kittim and see, And send to Kedar, and intensely consider and see; Behold, has it ever happened like this?
11 Has any nation changed its elohim (even though they are not elohim)? Yet My people, they have changed My glory for what does not benefit.
12 Be appalled over this, you heavens, And be horrified, be utterly drained, averring is Yahweh;
13 For My people have committed two evils: Me they have forsaken, the Fountain of living waters, To hew for themselves cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot contain water.
14 Is Israel a servant, Or is he a house-born slave? For what reason has he become plunder?
15 Over him sheltered lions are roaring; They lift up their voice, And they are making his land into a desolation; His cities, they are ravaged, without a dweller.
16 Even the sons of Noph and Tahpanhes, They smash you on the crown of your head.
17 Did you not do this to yourself When you forsook Yahweh your Elohim In the era when He led you in the way?
18 And now, why should you go on the way to Egypt to drink the waters of Shihor? And why should you go on the way to Assyria to drink the waters of the Stream?
19 Let your evil discipline you, And your backslidings, let them reprove you; Know then and see how evil and bitter it is when you forsake Yahweh your Elohim And you have no awe of Me, averring is my Lord Yahweh of hosts.
20 Indeed from the eon you have broken your yoke, You have pulled away your bonds, And you say, I shall not serve. Indeed on every lofty hill And under every flourishing tree, you are sprawling, prostituting.
21 Yet I Myself planted you a yellow muscat vine, all of it reliable seed; Then how have you turned into a degenerate, foreign vine unto Me?
22 Though you should launder yourself with soda And increase soap on yourself, Your depravity would remain inscribed before Me, averring is my Lord Yahweh.
23 How can you say, I am not unclean; After the Baalim I have not followed? See your way in the ravine; Know what you have done! You are a fleet young camel, winding about in her pathways,
24 An onager, taught by the wilderness; In the yearning of her soul she gulps the wind; In her estrus who can turn her back? Anyone seeking her need not faint; In her month they shall find her.
25 Save back your foot from barefoot sores And your throat from thirst. Yet you say, No cause for despair, For I love alien gods, and I shall follow after them.
26 As a thief is ashamed when he is found out, So will the house of Israel be ashamed, They, their kings, their chiefs, And their priests and their prophets,
27 Who say to a tree, My father are you, And to a stone, You yourself gave me birth. For they have turned around the nape of their neck to Me, and not their face; Yet in the era of their evil they say, Do arise and save us!
28 Yet where are your elohim that you made for yourself? Let them arise if they can save you in your era of evil; For your elohim, Judah, have become as the number of your cities.
29 Why do you contend against Me? All of you have transgressed against Me, averring is Yahweh.
30 Futilely have I smitten your sons; They have not taken admonition; Your sword has devoured your prophets like a lion bringing ruin.
31 (Generation, all of you, discern the word of Yahweh.) Have I become a wilderness to Israel Or a land of the gloom of Yah? For what reason do My people say, We hold sway; We shall not come again to You?
32 Can a virgin forget her ornaments or a bride her ribbons? Yet My people, they have forgotten Me days that are without number.
33 How good you make your way to seek love; Wherefore, you even teach the evil women your ways.
34 Moreover, on your hems is found the blood of the souls of needy innocents; You did not come upon them burrowing, for it is on all these.
35 You say, I am innocent; yea, His anger has turned away from me. Behold, I am judging you because you say, I have not sinned.
36 How very often you go about altering your way! You shall be put to shame by Egypt also Just as you were put to shame by Assyria.
37 Moreover, from this place you shall go forth with your hands on your head; For Yahweh has rejected those in whom you placed trust (and you shall not prosper by them),

Chapter 3
1 Saying, If a man should dismiss his wife, And she goes away from him and becomes another man’s, Should he return to her again? Would not that land be polluted, yea polluted? Yet you have committed prostitution with many associates, And would you return to Me? averring is Yahweh.
2 Lift your eyes to the ridges and see; Where have you not been ravished? On the pathways you have sat waiting for them like an Arabian in the wilderness, And you pollute the land with your prostitutions and your evil.
3 Hence the showers were withheld, And the latter rain, it did not come; Yet yours has been the forehead of a prostituting woman; You have refused to be put to blush.
4 Did you not call to Me henceforth: My Father, You the Mentor of my youth,
5 Shall He hold resentment for the eon Or keep on permanently? This is the way you have spoken, Yet you do all the evil you can.
6 Yahweh said to me in the days of Josiah the king: Have you seen what backsliding Israel has done? She went on every lofty mountain and under every flourishing tree and committed prostitution there.
7 Yet I said: After she has done all these things she shall return to Me, but she has not returned. And her treacherous sister Judah has seen this.
8 She has seen also that due to all these causes, when backsliding Israel committed adultery, I sent her off and gave her the scroll of her divorce. Yet treacherous Judah, her sister, did not fear, and she also went forth and committed prostitution.
9 And it came to be, because her prostitutions seemed so slight that she polluted the land and committed adultery with stone and wood.
10 Yet even in spite of all this, her treacherous sister Judah did not return to Me with all her heart, but rather with falsity, averring is Yahweh.
11 So Yahweh said to me, Backsliding Israel has shown her soul more righteous than treacherous Judah.
12 Go and proclaim these words to the north and say: Return, backsliding Israel, averring is Yahweh; I shall not cast My face down upon you, for I am benign, averring is Yahweh; I shall not hold resentment for the eon.
13 Only acknowledge your depravity, that you have transgressed against Yahweh your Elohim and have dispersed your efforts among aliens, under every flourishing tree, and you have not hearkened to My voice, averring is Yahweh.
14 Return, backsliding sons, averring is Yahweh, for I Myself possess you; I will take you, one from a city and two from a family, and I will bring you to Zion.
15 Then I will give you shepherds according to My own heart, and they will graze you with knowledge and intelligence.
16 When it comes to be that you increase and are fruitful in the land, in those days, averring is Yahweh, they shall no longer say, The coffer of the covenant of Yahweh; it shall not ascend on their heart, nor shall they remember it, nor shall they miss it, nor shall another one be made again.
17 In that era they shall call Jerusalem the throne of Yahweh, and all the nations will be expectant toward her, for the Name of Yahweh at Jerusalem, and they shall no longer walk after the obduracy of their evil heart.
18 In those days the house of Judah shall walk with the house of Israel, and they shall enter together from the land of the north to the land which I allotted to your fathers.
19 I Myself said, Oh how I would set you firmly as sons and give you the coveted land, the stateliest allotment of the nations; and I said, You shall call Me: My Father, and you shall not turn away from following Me.
20 However, like a woman who is treacherous with her associate, so you have been treacherous with Me, house of Israel, averring is Yahweh.
21 A sound is heard on the ridges, Supplicating lamentations of the sons of Israel, For they have made their way depraved; They have forgotten Yahweh their Elohim.
22 Return, backsliding sons; I shall heal your backslidings! Behold us; we will arrive before You, For You are Yahweh our Elohim!
23 Surely falsehood comes from the hills, Clamor from the mountains; Surely in Yahweh our Elohim is Israel’s salvation.
24 Yet the shameful thing, it has devoured the labor of our fathers from our youth, Their flocks and their herds, Their sons and their daughters.
25 Let us lie down in our shame, And let our mortification cover us, For against Yahweh our Elohim have we sinned, We and our fathers, from our youth until this day, And we have not hearkened to the voice of Yahweh our Elohim.

Chapter 4
1 If you return, Israel, averring is Yahweh, return to Me, And if you take away your abominations from My presence And do not wander away,
2 And you swear, As Yahweh lives, in truth, in right judgment and in righteousness, Then nations shall bless themselves in Him, And in Him shall they boast.
3 For thus says Yahweh to the man of Judah And to the dwellers of Jerusalem: Till for yourselves fallow ground, And do not sow among thorns.
4 Be circumcised to Yahweh, And take away the foreskin of your heart, Man of Judah and dwellers of Jerusalem, Lest My fury should go forth like fire And consume, with none to quench it, because of your evil actions.
5 Tell it in Judah, And in Jerusalem announce it and say, Blow the trumpet in the land, Proclaim; do it fully and say: Gather yourselves, and let us come to the fortress cities.
6 Lift up a banner: To Zion; Take to strong shelter; do not stand still, For evil I am bringing from the north, and a great breaking.
7 A lion has come up from his thicket, And a ruiner of nations, he has decamped, Has gone forth from his place to make your land a desolation; Your cities, they shall crumble because there will be no dweller.
8 On this account gird yourselves with sackcloth; Wail and howl; For the heat of Yahweh’s anger has not turned away from us.
9 And it will come to be in that day, averring is Yahweh, The heart of the king shall perish, And the heart of the chief officials, And the priests will be appalled, And the prophets, they shall be stunned.
10 Then I said, Alas, my Lord Yahweh, Surely You have lured, yea lured this people and Jerusalem, saying, Peace, it shall come to you, yet a sword has touched unto the very soul.
11 In that era it shall be said concerning this people and concerning Jerusalem: A glazing wind from the ridges in the wilderness is the way of the daughter of My people, Not serving to winnow nor to purify;
12 A fuller wind than this shall come for Me; Now even I Myself shall pronounce judgments against them.
13 Behold, like clouds he shall ascend, And like a sweeping whirlwind are his chariots; Fleeter than vultures are his horses. Woe to us, for we are devastated!
14 Launder your heart from evil, Jerusalem, that you may be saved! How long shall your lawless devisings lodge within you?
15 Indeed a voice is telling it from Dan, And is announcing sorrow from the hill country of Ephraim.
16 Remind the nations: Come this way! Announce it over Jerusalem: Besiegers are coming from the far off land, And they shall lift up their voice against the cities of Judah;
17 Like those guarding a field, they stay around her, round about, For against Me has she rebelled, averring is Yahweh.
18 Your way of life and your actions, they have brought these things on you; This evil of yours, indeed the consequences are bitter, Indeed it touches unto your very heart!
19 O my internal, my internal writhing! I cannot help churning! O the sidewalls of my heart! My heart is clamoring within me! I cannot be silent, For my soul hears the sound of the trumpet, the shout of war.
20 Breaking on top of breaking is heralded; Indeed the entire land is devastated! Suddenly my tents are devastated, In a moment, my tent-sheets!
21 How long must I see the banner, Must I hear the sound of the trumpet?
22 Indeed foolish are My people; Me, they do not know; Frivolous sons are they, And they have no understanding; Wise are they in doing evil, Yet how to do good they do not know.
23 I saw the earth, and behold, it was a chaos and vacant, And the heavens, and they had no light.
24 I saw the mountains, and behold, they were quaking, And all the hills, they rocked.
25 I saw, and behold, there was no humanity, And every flier of the heavens, they had bolted away.
26 I saw, and behold, the crop land was a wilderness And all its cities, they were broken down because of Yahweh’s presence, Because of the heat of His anger.
27 For thus says Yahweh: A desolation shall the entire earth become, (Though I shall not make a full end to it).
28 On this account the earth shall mourn, And the heavens be somber above; For I have spoken, I have resolved, And I will neither regret nor turn back from it.
29 From the sound of the horseman and the archer, the entire countryside is running away; They enter into caves, And they hide in thickets, And they ascend into caverns; Every city is forsaken, And there is no one dwelling in them.
30 And you, who will be devastated, what are you doing That you clothe yourself in scarlet, That you ornament yourself with ornaments of gold, That you amplify your eyes with pigment? It is for futility that you make yourself lovely; Paramours reject you; They seek your soul.
31 A sound like one in travail I hear, Distress like a woman bearing her firstborn, The sound of the daughter of Zion, Who is gasping for breath, while spreading out her palms: Woe to me, for my soul is faint before the killers!

Chapter 5
1 Go to and fro in the streets of Jerusalem, And see, I pray, and know, And seek in her squares; If you find a man, If there is one executing right judgment, one seeking faithfulness, Then I shall pardon her.
2 Even though they say, As Yahweh lives, They surely swear falsely.
3 O Yahweh, Your eyes, do they not look for faithfulness? You smote them, yet they did not travail; You finished them; They refused to take admonition; They made their faces more unyielding than a crag; They refused to return.
4 Yet I myself said, Yea, they are poor people; They are foolish, For they do not know the way of Yahweh, The right judgment of their Elohim.
5 Let me go myself to the great men, And let me speak to them; For they should know the way of Yahweh, The right judgment of their Elohim. Nevertheless they alike had broken the yoke; They too had pulled away the bonds.
6 Therefore a lion from the wildwood smites them; A wolf of the plains, it devastates them; A leopard is alert over their cities: Anyone going forth from them, he shall be torn to pieces. For multitudinous are their transgressions! Plentiful are their backslidings!
7 Wherein can I pardon you for this? Your sons, they have forsaken Me, And they swear by non-elohim; Though I am surfeiting them, Yet they still commit adultery, And in a house of prostitutes they slash themselves.
8 They are rutting horses, wandering early; They are neighing, each one after his associate’s wife.
9 On account of these things should I not check them? averring is Yahweh, And should My soul not avenge itself on a nation such as this?
10 Go up on her leveled terraces and bring ruin, Yet do not make a full end; Take away her vine-branches, for they are not Yahweh’s.
11 For they have been treacherous, yea treacherous to Me, The house of Israel and the house of Judah, averring is Yahweh.
12 They have disavowed Yahweh, And they say, Not He! Evil shall not come upon us, And, We shall not see sword and famine;
13 And, The prophets, they shall become wind, And, The word is not in them; Let thus and thus be done to them.
14 Wherefore, thus says Yahweh, Elohim of hosts: Because you report this word, Behold, I will make My words in your mouth into fire, And this people into wood, and it will devour them.
15 Behold, I will bring upon you a nation from afar, house of Israel, averring is Yahweh; It is a perennial nation; It is a nation from the eon, A nation whose tongue you do not know, And what it speaks, you cannot make out.
16 Its quiver is like an open tomb. They are all masters.
17 It will devour your harvest and your bread; It shall devour your sons and your daughters; It shall devour your flock and your herd; It shall devour your vine and your fig tree; It shall make destitute your fortress cities In which you are trusting with the sword.
18 Yet even in those days, averring is Yahweh, I shall not make a full end of you.
19 And it will come to pass, that they shall say, For what reason has Yahweh our Elohim done all these things to us? Then you will say to them, Just as you forsook Me and served foreign elohim in your land, so shall you serve aliens in a land not yours.
20 Tell this in the house of Jacob, And announce it in Judah, saying:
21 Hear this, now, you people, frivolous and mindless, Who have eyes yet are not seeing, Who have ears yet are not hearing!
22 Are you not fearing Me? averring is Yahweh; Should you not travail in My presence, I, Who placed the sand as the boundary for the sea, An eonian statute, and it shall not pass beyond it? Though its waters reel, yet they shall not prevail, And its billows clamor, yet they shall not pass over it.
23 Yet for this people there is a stubborn and rebellious heart; They have defected and continue to go away.
24 And they do not say in their heart: Now let us fear Yahweh our Elohim, Who gives the downpour, the former rain and the latter rain in its season; The weeks, these of the statutes for harvest, He safeguards for us.
25 Your depravities, they have turned these things aside, And your sins, they have withheld the good from you.
26 Indeed wicked ones are found among My people; Each one lies in wait like camouflaged trappers; They set ruinous snares; they seize men.
27 Like a crate full of fowl, so their houses are full of deceit; Therefore they have grown great and are enriched.
28 They are stout; they are glossy; Moreover, they surpass in matters of evil; They do not adjudicate rightful adjudication, The rightful adjudication of the orphan, that they may prosper, And they do not judge the right judgment of the needy.
29 On account of these things should I not check them? averring is Yahweh; Should My soul not avenge itself on a nation such as this?
30 An appalling and horrible thing has happened in the land:
31 The prophets, they prophesy falsehood, And the priests, they hold sway by their own means, And My people, they love it so; Yet what shall you do at its end?

Chapter 6
1 Take yourselves to strong shelter, sons of Benjamin; Flee from within Jerusalem, And in Tekoa blow the trumpet, And on Beth-haccherem lift up the beacon, For evil, it gazes from the north, and a great breaking.
2 I will still the homestead, the delicate one, The daughter of Zion.
3 Against her come shepherds and their droves; They pitch tents around about her; They graze, each one at his hand.
4 Hallow a battle against her! Arise and let us go up at noon! Woe to us, for the day fades, For the shadows of evening are stretched out.
5 Arise and let us go up at night! And let us wreck her citadels!
6 For thus says Yahweh of hosts: Cut down trees, And construct an earthwork against Jerusalem; She is the city of falsehood; All within her is extortion.
7 As a cistern keeps cool its waters, so she keeps cooly fresh her evil; Violence and devastation are heard in her; Before My face continually are illness and smiting.
8 Be admonished, Jerusalem, Lest My soul should be strained from you, Lest I should make you a desolation, a land that is not indwelt.
9 Thus says Yahweh of hosts: Clean glean, yea clean glean, as you would a vine, the remnant of Israel; Bring your hand back like a grape picker over the tendrils.
10 Against whom must I speak and testify that they may hearken? Behold, uncircumcised is their ear, and they cannot pay attention; Behold, the word of Yahweh, it has become for them a reproach, And they do not delight in it.
11 Yet of the fury of Yahweh I am full; I am tired with containing it. Pour it out on the infant in the street, And on the intimate group of choice youths alike; Indeed both husband with wife shall be seized, The elder with the one full of days.
12 Their houses will be turned about to others, Fields and wives alike, For I shall stretch out My hand against the dwellers of the land, averring is Yahweh;
13 For from their smallest unto their greatest, everyone is greedy with greed, And from prophet unto priest, everyone is practicing falsehood;
14 They heal the brokenness of My people in an offhand way, Saying: Peace, peace, when there is no peace.
15 They have acted shamefully, For they have committed an abhorrence; However they are not ashamed, nay ashamed; They do not even know how to blush; Therefore they shall fall among the fallen; In the era when I check them, they shall stumble, Yahweh has said.
16 Thus says Yahweh: Stand on the roads and see; Ask about the eonian tracks, where this way to good is, And go in it, and find respite for your soul. Yet they say, We shall not go.
17 Also I set up watchmen over you: Pay attention to the sound of the trumpet! Yet they say, We shall not pay attention.
18 Therefore hear, nations, And know, crowd, what is coming against them.
19 Hear, earth! Behold, I am bringing evil on this people, The fruit of their own devisings; For they do not pay attention to My words, And My law, they reject it.
20 Why is this, that frankincense from Sheba is coming to Me, And the goodly aromatic reed from a land afar? Your ascent offerings are not acceptable, And your sacrifices are not congenial to Me.
21 Therefore, thus says Yahweh: Behold, I shall put stumbling blocks before this people, And they will stumble on them; Fathers and sons alike, Neighbor and his associate, they shall perish.
22 Thus says Yahweh: Behold, a people is coming from the north land, And a great nation is roused from the remote parts of the earth.
23 Bow and scimitar they hold fast; They are cruel and show no compassion; Their voice clamors like the sea, And on horses they ride, Arrayed like a man for battle, against you, daughter of Zion.
24 We have heard a report of it; Our hands fall slack; Distress holds us fast, Travail as a woman giving birth.
25 Do not go forth to the field, And in the road do not walk, For the enemy has a sword; Shrinking fear is round about.
26 Daughter of my people, gird on sackcloth, And wallow in ashes; The mourning for an only son make for yourself, The wailing of bitterness; For suddenly the devastator shall come upon us.
27 I have made you an assayer of My people a fortress So that you may know and assay their way.
28 They all are the stubborn of the stubborn, Going about defaming, Bronze and iron, all of them; Ruiners are they.
29 The bellows have become red hot from the fire; The lead is completely removed; Futilely has the refiner refined, And the evildoers have not been drawn off.
30 Call them rejected silver, For Yahweh has rejected them.

Chapter 7
1 The word which came to Jeremiah from Yahweh, saying:
2 Stand in the gate of Yahweh’s house and proclaim there this word, and say, Hear the word of Yahweh, all you of Judah who enter through these gates to worship Yahweh.
3 Thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: Amend your ways and your actions, and I will cause you to tabernacle in this place.
4 Do not put your trust in false words, saying, These buildings are the temple of Yahweh, the temple of Yahweh, the temple of Yahweh.
5 For if you amend, yea amend your ways and your actions, if you execute, yea execute right judgment between a man and his associate,
6 and you do not exploit the sojourner, the orphan or the widow, and you do not shed innocent blood in this place, and you do not go after other elohim to your evil,
7 then I will cause you to tabernacle in this place, in the land that I gave to your fathers from the eon and unto the eon.
8 Behold, you are putting your trust in false words to no benefit.
9 Do you think to steal, murder and commit adultery and swear falsely and fume incense to Baal and go after other elohim whom you have not known,
10 then you come and stand before Me in this house, over which My Name is called, and you say, We have been rescued in order to commit all these abhorrences?
11 Has this house over which My Name is called become a burglars’ cave in your eyes? Behold, I Myself also see it, averring is Yahweh.
12 Indeed go now to My place which was in Shiloh, where I caused My Name to tabernacle formerly, and see what I did to it in view of the evil of My people Israel.
13 And now, because you have done all these deeds, averring is Yahweh, though I have been speaking to you, rising early and speaking persistently, yet you do not hearken, and though I call you, yet you do not answer,
14 I will do to the house over which My Name is called, in which you are trusting, and to the place which I have given to you and to your fathers, just as I did to Shiloh.
15 I will fling you from My presence, just as I have flung all your brothers, all the seed of Ephraim.
16 As for you, do not pray in behalf of this people, and do not lift up in their behalf appeal or prayer, and do not intercede with Me, for I will not hear you.
17 Do you not see what they are doing in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem?
18 The sons are picking up sticks, the fathers are blazing up the fire, and the wives are kneading dough to make biscuits for the queen of the heavens, and to libate libations to other elohim in order to provoke Me to vexation.
19 Is it I they provoke to vexation? averring is Yahweh. Is it not themselves that their own faces may know shame?
20 Therefore, thus says my Lord Yahweh: Behold, My anger and My fury will be poured forth against this place, on the human and on the beast, on the tree of the field and on the fruit of the ground, and it will blaze up and shall not be quenched.
21 Thus says Yahweh of hosts, the Elohim of Israel: Add your ascent offerings to your sacrifices, and eat the flesh!
22 For in the day I brought them forth from the land of Egypt I did not speak to your fathers and did not instruct them concerning matters of ascent offerings and sacrifices;
23 but rather this was the matter I instructed them, saying, Hearken to My voice, and I will be your Elohim, and you, you shall be My people. Walk in all the way that I instruct you, that it may be well for you.
24 Yet they would not hearken nor stretch out their ear; they have been walking in their own counsels, in the obduracy of their evil heart, and they have become backward rather than forward.
25 From the day that your fathers went forth from the land of Egypt until this day, I have been sending to you all My servants, the prophets, day by day, rising early, and sending persistently.
26 Yet they would not hearken to Me nor stretch out their ear; they keep stiffening the nape of their neck; they do more evil than their fathers.
27 When you speak to them all these words, they shall not hearken to you. When you call to them, they shall not answer you.
28 Then you will say to them: This is the nation that would not hearken to the voice of Yahweh its Elohim and would not take admonition. Faithfulness has perished, And it has been cut off from their mouth.
29 Shear off the hair of your sequestration and fling it away; Lift up a dirge on the ridges, For Yahweh has rejected And shall abandon the generation of His rage.
30 For the sons of Judah have done what is evil in My eyes, averring is Yahweh. They have placed their abominations in the house over which My Name is called, to defile it.
31 They have built the high-place of Topheth which is in the ravine of the son of Hinnom, to burn their sons and their daughters in fire such as I did not instruct, nor did it come up on My heart.
32 Wherefore, behold, the days are coming, averring is Yahweh, when it shall no longer be called Topheth or the ravine of the son of Hinnom, but rather the ravine of killing, for they will entomb in Topheth because there is no other place.
33 Then the carcasses of this people will become food for the flyer of the heavens and for the beast of the earth, and there will be no one causing them to tremble.
34 And I will eradicate from the cities of Judah and from the streets of Jerusalem the sound of elation and the sound of rejoicing, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, for the land shall become a waste.

Chapter 8
1 In that era, averring is Yahweh, they shall bring forth the bones of the kings of Judah and the bones of its chief officials and the bones of the priests and the bones of the prophets and the bones of the dwellers of Jerusalem, from their tombs.
2 They will spread them out to the sun and to the moon and to all the host of the heavens which they loved and which they served and which they went after and of which they inquired and to which they bowed down; they shall not be gathered nor entombed; they shall be for manure on the surface of the ground.
3 And death will be chosen over life by all the remnant that remains from this evil family in all the remaining places where I have driven them away, averring is Yahweh of hosts.
4 You will say to them, Thus says Yahweh: Shall people fall and not rise again? If one turns away, shall he not turn back?
5 For what reason does this people, Jerusalem, turn away with a permanent backsliding? They hold fast to deceit; They refuse to turn back.
6 I have attended, and I hear; No such word do they speak. There is no man regretting his evil, Saying, What have I done? Everyone has turned about to their running Like a horse charging into the battle.
7 Even the stork in the heavens knows her appointed seasons, And the turtledove and the swift and the thrush keep the time of their coming, Yet My people do not know the ordinance of Yahweh.
8 How can you say, We are wise, And the law of Yahweh is with us? Surely, behold, the false pen of the scribes has made a falsehood.
9 The wise will be put to shame; They will be dismayed and seized; Behold, the word of Yahweh have they rejected, So what wisdom do they have?
10 Therefore I shall give their wives to others, Their fields to new tenants; For from the smallest unto the greatest, everyone is greedy with greed; From prophet unto priest, everyone is practicing falsehood.
11 They heal the brokenness of the daughter of My people in an offhand way, Saying: Peace, peace, when there is no peace.
12 They have acted shamefully, For they have committed an abhorrence; However, they are not ashamed, nay ashamed; They do not even know how to blush; Therefore they shall fall among the fallen; In the era of their visitation, they shall stumble, Yahweh has said.
13 I shall gather them for termination, averring is Yahweh; There will be no grapes on the vine, And there will be no figs on the fig tree, And the leaf, it will decay; I shall also give to them those who shall overcome them.
14 Why are we sitting by? Be gathered; And let us come to the fortress cities, And let us be stilled there; For Yahweh our Elohim, He has set us to be stilled, And has given us poisoned water to drink, For we have sinned against Yahweh.
15 We expected peace, yet no good has come, A time of healing, yet behold, fright!
16 From Dan is heard the snorting of his horses; From the sound of the neighing of his sturdy beasts the entire land quakes; They come and devour the land and its fullness, The city and those dwelling in it.
17 For behold, I will send serpents among you, Vipers for which there is no snake-charm, And they will bite you, averring is Yahweh.
18 Incurable affliction is on me; My heart is sick within me.
19 Behold, the voice of the imploring of the daughter of my people from a land afar: Is Yahweh not in Zion? Or is her King no longer in her? For what reason have they provoked Me to vexation with their carvings, With foreign vanities?
20 The harvest has passed; The summer has ended; Yet we have not been saved.
21 By the brokenness of the daughter of my people, I am broken; I am somber; Desolation, it holds me fast.
22 Is there no balm in Gilead? Or is there no healer there? For what reason has wholeness not ascended on the daughter of my people?

Chapter 9
1 O that my head were water And my eye a fountain of tears! Then I would lament by day and night over the slain of the daughter of my people.
2 O that I had in the wilderness a lodging for a traveler! Then I would forsake my people and go away from them. For they all are adulterers, A mob of treacherous men.
3 And they have positioned their tongue, their bow of falsehood, And not for faithfulness are they masterful in the land; For from evil to evil they go forth, And they do not know Me, averring is Yahweh.
4 Each man, beware of his associate, And do not put trust in any brother, For every brother circumvents, yea circumvents, And every associate goes about as a defamer.
5 Each deludes his associate, And they do not speak the truth; They teach their tongue to speak falsehood; While doing depravity they are too tired to turn about.
6 Adding fraud to fraud, deceit to deceit, They refuse to know Me, averring is Yahweh.
7 Therefore, thus says Yahweh of hosts: Behold, I shall refine them and test them, For how else should I act in view of the daughter of My people?
8 A lethal arrow is their tongue; Each speaks deceit in his mouth. One may speak peace to his associate, Yet within his heart he is setting an ambush for him.
9 On account of these things, shall I not check them? averring is Yahweh; Or against a nation like this, shall not My soul be avenged?
10 Over the hillside pastures I shall lift up lamentation and plaint, And over the oases of the wilderness, a dirge; For they have been ravaged, without a man passing, And they have not heard the sound of cattle; From the flyer of the heavens unto the beast, they have bolted away; They have gone.
11 I will make Jerusalem into rubble mounds, the habitation of wild jackals, And the cities of Judah shall I make a desolation, without a dweller.
12 Who is the wise man who can understand this, And to whom has the mouth of Yahweh spoken, that he may tell it, On what account the land perishes And is ravaged like a wilderness without anyone passing?
13 And Yahweh said: Because they have forsaken My law which I set before them, And have not hearkened to My voice nor walked in it,
14 Yet are walking after the obduracy of their heart And after the Baalim of which their fathers had taught them,
15 Therefore, thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: Behold I shall feed them, this people, absinth, And I will give them poisoned water to drink.
16 I will scatter them among nations Which neither they themselves nor their fathers have known, And I will send the sword after them until I have finished them.
17 Thus says Yahweh of hosts: Consider and call the dirge-women, and let them come, And send for the wise women, and let them come;
18 Let them hasten and lift up a plaint over us, That our eyes may descend with tears And our eyelids may flow with water.
19 For the sound of a plaint is heard from Zion: How devastated we are! We are utterly ashamed! For we must forsake the land because they have flung down our tabernacles.
20 Hear, women, the word of Yahweh, And let your ear take in the word of His mouth; Teach to your daughters a plaint, And each woman to her associate a dirge.
21 For death has ascended through our windows; It has entered our citadels, To cut off the infant from the streets, The choice youths from the squares.
22 Speak! Thus is the averring of Yahweh: The carcass of each person will fall like manure on the face of the field, And like a sheaf left after the reaper when there is no one to gather it.
23 Thus says Yahweh: Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, And let not the masterful man boast in his mastery; Let not the rich man boast in his riches,
24 But rather let the boaster boast in this: To act intelligently and to know Me, That I am Yahweh, working benignity, Right judgment and justice on the earth, For in these I delight, averring is Yahweh.
25 Behold, days are coming, averring is Yahweh, when I will take note of everyone who is circumcised only as to the foreskin:
26 of Egypt and of Judah and of Edom and of the sons of Ammon and of Moab, and of all dwellers in the wilderness who cut away the edge of their hair. For all these nations are uncircumcised, and all the house of Israel is uncircumcised in heart.

Chapter 10
1 Hear the word which Yahweh has spoken concerning you, house of Israel!
2 Thus says Yahweh: The way of the nations, do not learn, And by the signs of the heavens, do not be dismayed, Though the nations are being dismayed by them.
3 Indeed concerning the statutes of the peoples, it all is vanity, For one cuts it down, a tree from the wildwood, The work of an artificer’s hands with an adz;
4 With silver and with gold he makes it lovely; With nails and with hammers they fasten it, so that it cannot quaver.
5 They are like a scarecrow in a cucumber patch, and they cannot speak; They must be borne, yea borne, for they cannot march; Do not fear them, for they cannot do evil, And also to do good is not in them.
6 There is no one like You, O Yahweh; Great are You, And great is Your Name in mastery.
7 Who would not fear You, O King of the nations? For it befits You; Indeed among all the wise of the nations And among all their kings, there is none like You.
8 At the same time they are irrational and stupid; The idol’s admonition is but vanities; It is wood,
9 Stamped silver that is brought from Tarshish, And gold from Uphaz, The work of an artificer and the hands of a goldsmith; Blue wool and purple is their clothing; The work of the shrewd are they all.
10 Yet Yahweh is Elohim in truth; He is the living Elohim and the eonian King; At His wrath the earth quakes, And the nations cannot endure His indignation.
11 You shall say this to them: The elohim that did not make the heavens and the earth, These shall perish from the earth and from under the heavens.
12 Yahweh is the Maker of the earth by His vigor, The Establisher of the habitance by His wisdom, And by His understanding He stretched out the heavens.
13 When He sounds forth His voice, there is a rumble of waters in the heavens, And He brings up vapors from the end of the earth; He makes lightening bolts for the rain And brings forth wind from His treasuries.
14 Every human is proved irrational, without knowledge; Every goldsmith is put to shame by his carving, For his molten image is falsehood, And there is no spirit in them.
15 Vanity are they, a work of aberrations; In the era of their visitation they shall perish.
16 Not like these is the Portion of Jacob, For the Former of all is He, And Israel is the tribe of His allotment; Yahweh of hosts is His Name.
17 Gather up your baggage from the land, You who are dwelling under siege!
18 For thus says Yahweh: Behold, I shall sling out the dwellers of the land at this time, And I will constrict them so that they may be wrung out.
19 Woe unto me for my brokenness; My smiting is most ill, Yet I myself say: Yea, this is my illness, And I must bear it.
20 My tent, it is devastated, And all my tent cords, they are pulled away; My sons, they have gone forth from me and are no more; There is no one any more stretching out my tent Or setting up my tent sheets.
21 For the shepherds are proved irrational, And of Yahweh they have not inquired; Therefore they do not proceed effectively, And all their pasturage is scattered.
22 The sound of a report! Behold, it comes! And a great quaking from the north land! To make the cities of Judah a desolation, A habitation of wild jackals.
23 I know, O Yahweh, that it is not for a human to choose his way; It is not for a man to walk and to establish his step.
24 Discipline me, O Yahweh, though with judgment; Let it not be in Your anger lest You should decrease me to nothing.
25 Pour out Your fury on the nations that do not know You, And on the families that do not call in Your Name. For they have devoured Jacob; They have devoured him and consumed him, And they have desolated his homestead.

Chapter 11
1 The word which came to Jeremiah from Yahweh, saying:
2 Hear the words of this covenant, and speak them to the men of Judah and to the dwellers of Jerusalem.
3 Now you will say to them, Thus says Yahweh, Elohim of Israel: Cursed is the man who is not hearkening to the words of this covenant,
4 which I instructed your fathers in the day I brought them forth from the land of Egypt, from the iron crucible, saying: Hearken to My voice and keep these words according to all that I shall instruct you. Then you will be My people, and I shall be your Elohim,
5 in order to carry out the oath which I Myself swore to your fathers, to give them a land gushing with milk and honey, as at this day. Then I answered and said, Amen, Yahweh.
6 Yahweh also said to me: Proclaim all these words in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem, saying, Hear the words of this covenant, and do them,
7 for I have testified, yea testified to your fathers from the day I brought them up from the land of Egypt until this day, rising early and testifying persistently, saying, Hearken to My voice.
8 Yet they have not hearkened nor stretched out their ear, and they are walking, each one, in the obduracy of their evil heart. So I am bringing upon them all the words of this covenant which I instructed them to do, yet they have not done.
9 Then Yahweh said to me: A conspiracy is found among the men of Judah and among the dwellers of Jerusalem.
10 They have returned to the depravities of their first fathers who refused to hearken to My words. They themselves also have gone after other elohim to serve them. The house of Israel and the house of Judah have annulled My covenant which I contracted with their fathers.
11 Therefore, thus says Yahweh: Behold, I shall bring on them evil from which they shall not be able to go forth. They will cry out to Me, yet I shall not hearken to them.
12 And the cities of Judah and the dwellers of Jerusalem will go and cry out to the elohim to whom they have been fuming incense, yet they shall not save, nay save them in the era of their evil.
13 Indeed as the number of your cities so have your elohim become, Judah; and as the number of streets in Jerusalem, so have you established altars to the shameful thing, altars to fume incense to Baal.
14 As for you, do not pray in behalf of this people, and do not lift up in their behalf appeal or prayer; for I will not hearken at the time when they call to Me about their evil.
15 What right has My beloved in My house, when she is executing her evil scheme? The benefit of plump animals and the flesh of the sanctuary has passed away from you; When you engage in evil, then you are joyous.
16 A flourishing olive tree, lovely with shapely fruit, Yahweh had called your name; But with the sound of a great din, He will ravage its leaves with fire, And its branches will be smashed.
17 Yahweh of hosts Who planted you has decreed evil against you owing to the evil of the house of Israel and the house of Judah, which they have done for themselves to provoke Me to vexation by fuming incense to Baal.
18 Yahweh has informed me, and I know it; Then You showed me their actions:
19 I was like a domestic he-lamb that is fetched to slaughter; I did not know that against me they had devised evil devisings: Let us ruin the tree with its sap, And let us cut him off from the land of the living So that his name shall not be remembered any more.
20 Now, O Yahweh of hosts, righteous Judge, Tester of the innermost being and the heart, Let me see Your vengeance upon them, For to You have I confided my cause.
21 Therefore, thus has Yahweh said concerning the men of Anathoth who are seeking your soul, saying, If you do not prophesy in the name of Yahweh, then you shall not die at our hand.
22 Therefore, thus has Yahweh of hosts said: Behold, I shall check them; The choice youths, they shall die by the sword; Their sons and their daughters, they shall die by famine.
23 And no remnant shall remain for them; For I shall bring evil to the men of Anathoth, The year of their visitation.

Chapter 12
1 You are righteous, O Yahweh, when I contend with You; Nevertheless I shall speak of judgments with You. For what reason does the way of the wicked prosper? Why are all those who are treacherous with treachery at ease?
2 You have planted them; Moreover, they take root; They advance; Moreover, they yield fruit. You are near in their mouth, Yet far from their innermost being.
3 But You, O Yahweh, You know me; You examine me and have tested how my heart is toward You; Pull them away like a flockling to slaughter, And sanctify them for the day of killing.
4 How long shall the land mourn, And the herbage of every field dry up? Because of the evil of those who dwell in it, Both beasts and flyer are swept off, For they say, He cannot see our hereafter.
5 When you have run with footmen, and they tire you, how shall you compete with horses? And as you are trusting in a land of peace, how shall you do in the jungle of the Jordan?
6 For even your brothers and your father’s house, Even they themselves are treacherous with you; Even they themselves call after you fulsomely; Do not put faith in them when they speak goodly words to you.
7 I have forsaken My house; I have abandoned My allotment; I have given the beloved of My soul into the palm of her enemies.
8 My allotment has become to Me like a lion in the wildwood; She has lifted up her voice against Me; Therefore I hate her.
9 Does the hyena pounce on My allotment for Me? Are birds of prey around her? Go! gather, all you wild animals of the field! Come hither to eat!
10 Many shepherds have ruined My vineyard; They have trampled My portion; They have made My coveted portion into a wilderness of desolation;
11 They have turned her into a desolation; She mourns before Me, a desolation; All the land is desolate, But there is no one taking it to heart.
12 On all the ridges in the wilderness devastators have come, For the sword of Yahweh devours from one end of the land unto the other end of the land; There will be no peace for all flesh.
13 They have sown wheat and reaped thorns; They have travailed but have not benefitted, And they are ashamed of their harvest yields, because of the hot anger of Yahweh.
14 Thus says Yahweh: Concerning all My evil neighbors who encroach on the allotment which I allotted to My people Israel, behold, I shall pluck them up off their ground, and I shall pluck up the house of Judah from their midst.
15 Then it will come to pass after I have plucked them up that I will again show compassion to them and will restore them, each one to his allotment, and each one to his land.
16 And if it comes to pass that they learn, yea learn the ways of My people, to swear by My Name: As Yahweh lives, just as they taught My people to swear by Baal, then they will be built in the midst of My people.
17 Yet if they do not hearken, then I will pluck up that nation, pluck up and destroy, averring is Yahweh.

Chapter 13
1 Thus says Yahweh to me: Go and buy for yourself a flaxen belt, and place it around your waist, but do not insert it in water.
2 So I bought the belt according to the word of Yahweh, and I placed it around my waist.
3 Then the word of Yahweh came to me a second time, saying:
4 Take the belt that you bought, that is around your waist, and rise, go to the Euphrates, and bury it there in a rift of a crag.
5 So I went and buried it at the Euphrates just as Yahweh had instructed me.
6 Then it came to be at the end of many days that Yahweh said to me: Rise, go to the Euphrates, and take from there the belt that I instructed you to bury it there.
7 So I went to the Euphrates and delved, and I took the belt from the place where I had buried it. Yet behold, the belt was ruined; it was not fit for anything.
8 The word of Yahweh came to me saying:
9 Thus says Yahweh: Even thus shall I ruin the pride of Judah and the vast pride of Jerusalem.
10 This evil people, these refusers to hearken to My words, who walk in the obduracy of their heart and go after other elohim to serve them and to bow down to them, they shall become like this belt that is not fit for anything.
11 For just as the belt clings to a man’s waist, so I have caused all the house of Israel and all the house of Judah to cling to Me, averring is Yahweh, to become Mine, for a people and for a name, and for praise and for beauty, yet they would not hearken.
12 Now you will say to them this word: Thus says Yahweh, Elohim of Israel: Every crock shall be filled with wine. And when they say to you, Do we not know, yea know, that every crock shall be filled with wine?
13 then you will say to them, Thus says Yahweh: Behold, I shall fill all the dwellers of this land and the kings who sit for David on his throne and the priests and the prophets and all the dwellers of Jerusalem with drunkenness.
14 And I will shatter them each one against his brother, the fathers and the sons alike, averring is Yahweh. I shall not take pity nor commiserate nor show compassion to keep from ruining them.
15 Hearken and give ear; Do not be haughty, for Yahweh has spoken.
16 Give glory to Yahweh your Elohim, ere He brings darkness, And ere your feet trip on the mountains in the twilight, When you expect light, yet He makes it blackest shadow and sets down murkiness.
17 But if you do not hearken to it, My soul shall lament in concealment because of your pride; And my eye shall be tearful, yea tearful, Yea it shall descend with tears, For the drove of Yahweh is captured.
18 Say to the king and to the queen-mother: Abase yourselves! be seated low! For your beautiful crown has descended from your heads.
19 The cities of the Negeb, they are closed off, and there is no one to open them; Judah is deported, all of her; She is deported in totality.
20 Lift up your eyes, Jerusalem, and see those who are coming from the north; Where is the drove which was given to you, your beautiful flock?
21 What shall you say when He visits you, And you yourselves had taught them as mentors to be head over you? Shall not cramps take hold of you like a woman giving birth?
22 And when you say in your heart: For what reason have these things befallen me? It is because of your great depravity that your skirts are exposed, your heels violated.
23 Shall a Cushite transform his skin, or a leopard its spots? Then you yourselves also shall be able to do good, who are taught to do evil.
24 I shall scatter them like straw, passed along by the wilderness wind.
25 This is your lot, your measured assignment from Me, averring is Yahweh, You who forgot Me and trusted in falsehood.
26 So I Myself also have stripped off your skirts over your face, That your dishonor may be seen.
27 Your adulteries and your neighings, The lewdness of your prostitutions, on the hills and in the field, I have seen your abominations! Woe to you, Jerusalem! you are not clean! How long will it yet go on?

Chapter 14
1 The word of Yahweh which came to Jeremiah concerning the matter of the dearths:
2 Judah mourns, and her gateways waste away; They are somber down to the earth, And the hue of Jerusalem ascends.
3 Their nobles, they send their menials for water; They come to the pools yet find no water; Their vessels return empty; They are ashamed and mortified, And they hood their heads.
4 In her yield, the ground is dismayed, For the downpour has not come on the earth; The farmworkers are ashamed and hood their heads.
5 Indeed even the hind bears in the field Only to forsake its fawn because there is no vegetation,
6 And the onagers, they stand on the ridges; They snuff up the wind like wild jackals; Their eyes fail, for there is no herbage.
7 As for our depravities, even though they assert against us, O Yahweh, act on account of Your Name; For our backslidings are many; It is against You that we have sinned.
8 O Expectation of Israel, O Yahweh, Its Saviour in the era of distress, Why are You like a sojourner in the land, And like a traveler who turns aside to lodge but a night?
9 Why have You become like a man in a stupor, Like a master who is not able to save? Yet You are in our midst, O Yahweh, And Your Name is called over us; O do not leave us!
10 Thus Yahweh said concerning this people: So they have loved to rove; They have not kept back their feet; Hence Yahweh, He does not accept them; Now He shall remember their depravity, And He shall check their sins.
11 And Yahweh said to me: Do not pray for any good in behalf of this people.
12 Though they fast, I will not hearken to their appeal, and though they offer up ascent offering and approach present, I will not accept them. For by sword and by famine and by plague I will finish them.
13 Then I said, Alas, my Lord Yahweh, behold, the prophets are saying to them: You shall not see the sword, And famine shall not come upon you, For I shall give you true peace in this place.
14 Yet Yahweh said to me, It is falsehood that the prophets are prophesying in My Name. I did not send them nor instruct them, and I did not speak to them. It is a false vision and a useless divination and the deceit of their heart that they are prophesying to you.
15 Therefore, thus says Yahweh: Concerning the prophets who are prophesying in My Name though I Myself did not send them, and who are saying, Sword and famine shall not come on this land, by the sword and by famine shall these prophets be finished.
16 And the people to whom they are prophesying, they shall be flung into the streets of Jerusalem because of the famine and the sword, and there will be no one to entomb them them, their wives, their sons and their daughters and I will pour out upon them their evil.
17 You will say to them this word: Let my eyes run down with tears night and day; Let them not be stilled, For with a great brokenness is broken the virgin daughter of my people, With a very ill smiting.
18 If I go forth to the field, then behold, those slain by the sword! And if I enter the city, then behold, those ailing from the famine! Indeed both prophet and priest go as merchants to a land they have not known.
19 Have You rejected, yea rejected Judah? Does Your soul loathe Zion? For what reason have You smitten us, and there is no healing for us? We expected peace, yet no good has come, And a time of healing, yet behold, fright!
20 We acknowledge, O Yahweh, our wickedness, The depravity of our fathers; Indeed we have sinned against You!
21 O do not spurn, on account of Your Name; O do not disgrace the throne of Your glory; Remember; do not annul Your covenant with us.
22 Are there any among the vain idols of the nations bringing downpours? Or can the heavens themselves give showers? Is it not You, O Yahweh our Elohim? So we are expectant in You, For You Yourself have made all these.

Chapter 15
1 Then Yahweh said to me, Even if Moses or Samuel should stand before Me, My soul would not go out to this people. Dismiss them from My presence, and let them go forth.
2 And it will occur that they ask you, Whither shall we go forth? Then you will answer them, Thus says Yahweh: Those who are for death, to death, And who are for the sword, to the sword, And who are for famine, to famine, And who are for captivity, to captivity.
3 So I will visit on them four families of doom, averring is Yahweh: the sword to kill, the dogs for pulling in pieces, fowls of the heavens and beasts of the earth to devour and to massacre.
4 I will make them a stirring horror to all the kingdoms of the earth, owing to Manasseh son of Hezekiah king of Judah, because of what he did in Jerusalem.
5 Indeed who shall take pity on you, Jerusalem? And who shall bemoan over you? And who shall withdraw to ask for your well-being?
6 It is you yourself who abandoned Me, averring is Yahweh; You are going backward; So I shall stretch out My hand against you and lay you in ruins; I am tired of regretting.
7 I shall winnow them with a winnowing-fork in the gateways of the land; I will bereave; I will destroy My people; They have not returned from their ways.
8 Their widows will be more plentiful to Me than the sand of the seas; I will bring against them, upon each mother of a choice youth, a devastator at noon; I will cast down suddenly upon her rousing agitation and panics.
9 She who gave birth to seven sons wastes away; Her soul expires; Her sun has set while it was still day; She is ashamed and abashed; I shall give their remnant to the sword before their enemies, averring is Yahweh.
10 Woe to me, my mother, that you ever bore me, A man of disputing and a man of quarreling for the entire land; I have not lent, and they have not lent to me; All of them are maledicting me.
11 Yahweh answered: Assuredly I will make you upright for good; Assuredly I will intercede for you in an era of evil and in an era of distress because of the enemy.
12 Shall iron smash iron from the north, or copper?
13 Your estate and your treasures shall I give as plunder (Not for a price or because of all your sins in all your boundaries).
14 And I will expel your enemies to a land you do not know, For fire will be kindled in My anger; Over all of you shall it be kept aglow.
15 You Yourself know, O Yahweh; Remember me and look after me, And avenge me on my persecutors; O do not, even in the slowness of Your anger, take me away; Know that I bear reproach on Your account.
16 Your words were found, and I have been devouring them; Thus Your word becomes to me the elation and the rejoicing of my heart; For Your Name is called over me, O Yahweh, Elohim of hosts. _2291
17 I have not sat down in the intimate group of sportmakers that I be joyous. Because of Your hand I have sat down alone, For You have filled me with menace.
18 Why has my pain become permanent, And my smiting mortal, so that it refuses to be healed? Why have You become, yea become to me like a failing spring, Like waters that cannot be relied on?
19 Therefore, thus says Yahweh: If you turn back, I shall restore you; You shall stand before Me; And if you bring forth what is precious rather than prodigal, You shall become as My mouth. It is they who must return to you, And not you who must return to them.
20 And I will make you to this people into a fortressed bronze wall; Though they fight against you, they shall not prevail over you, For I am with you, to save you and to rescue you, averring is Yahweh.
21 I will rescue you from the hand of evil ones And ransom you from the palm of terrifiers.

Chapter 16
1 The word of Yahweh came to me, saying:
2 You shall not take a wife for yourself, And there shall not be sons and daughters for you in this place.
3 For thus says Yahweh: Concerning the sons, And concerning the daughters born in this place, And concerning their mothers who bore them, And concerning their fathers who begot them in this land,
4 They shall die deaths of great travail; They shall not be bewailed, Nor shall they be entombed; They shall become manure on the surface of the ground, They shall be consumed by sword and by famine, And their carcasses will become food for the flyer of the heavens And for the beast of the earth.
5 For thus says Yahweh: Do not enter a house of communal rites; Do not go to wail, and do not bemoan over them; For I have gathered back My peace from this people (averring is Yahweh), The benignity and the compassions.
6 And they will die, the great and the small, in this land; They shall not be entombed, And men shall not wail for them; No one shall slash himself nor tonsure himself for them.
7 Men shall not break bread for the mourner, to comfort him for the dead; And they shall not give him the cup of consolation to drink for his father or for his mother.
8 You shall not enter the house of feasting To sit with them to eat and to drink.
9 For thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: Behold, I shall eradicate from this place Before your eyes and in your days, The sound of elation and the sound of rejoicing, The voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride.
10 When it comes to be that you tell this people all these words, and they say to you, On what grounds has Yahweh spoken against us all this great evil? What is our depravity? And what is our sin that we have sinned against Yahweh our Elohim?
11 then you will say to them: Because your fathers forsook Me, averring is Yahweh, and they walked after other elohim and served them and worshipped them. They forsook Me and did not keep My law.
12 As for you, you have done more evil in your deeds than your fathers. Behold, you are walking, each one after the obduracy of his evil heart, so as not to hearken to Me.
13 So I will cast you forth from this land onto a land which you have not known, either you or your fathers; and you will serve other elohim there, by day and night, where I shall not grant grace to you.
14 Therefore, behold, the days are coming, averring is Yahweh, when it shall not be said any longer, As Yahweh lives, Who brought the sons of Israel up from the land of Egypt,
15 but rather, As Yahweh lives, Who brought the sons of Israel up from the land of the north and from all the lands where He had driven them away. For I will restore them onto their ground which I gave to their fathers.
16 Behold I shall send for many fishermen, averring is Yahweh, And they will fish for them; Then afterward I shall send for many hunters, And they will hunt them out From every mountain and from every hill, And from the rifts of the crags.
17 For My eyes are on all their ways; They are not concealed from before Me, And their depravity is not secluded from in front of My eyes.
18 I will first repay double for their depravity and their sin Because they have profaned My land with the carcasses of their abominations; And with their abhorrences they have filled My allotment.
19 O Yahweh, my Strength and my Stronghold, My Haven in the day of distress, To You the nations shall come from the limits of the earth, And they shall say: Yea, our fathers allotted falsehood, Vanity and things that were without benefit in them.
20 Can a human make for himself, elohim ? They are not elohim!
21 Therefore, behold, I shall inform them, This once I shall inform them of My hand and My mastery, And they will know that My Name is Yahweh.

Chapter 17
1 The sin of Judah is written with an iron pen, Incised with a corundum nib On the tablet of their heart, And about the horns of their altars;
2 As a memorial against them are their altars and their Asherah poles, By the flourishing tree, upon the lofty hills,
3 The mountain ranges and in the field. Your estate and all your treasures, as plunder shall I give away, Your high-places, because of sin, in all your boundaries.
4 So you will release your grip from your allotment which I have given to you, And I will cause you to serve your enemies in a land which you have not known; For you have kindled a fire in My anger; It shall be kept aglow until the eon.
5 Thus says Yahweh: Cursed is the master who trusts in humanity, And who makes flesh his arm, And whose heart withdraws from Yahweh;
6 He will become like a dwarf juniper in the Arabah And shall not see it when goodness comes; So he will tabernacle in the hot places of the wilderness, A land of salty waste that is not indwelt.
7 Blessed is the master who trusts in Yahweh So that Yahweh comes to be his trust.
8 He will become like a tree transplanted by the water, That sends forth its roots by a canal; It shall not fear when the bright warmth comes; Its leaf remains flourishing; And it shall not be anxious in a year of dearth, Nor suspend from yielding fruit.
9 The heart is crooked above all things, And it is mortally ill; Who can know it?
10 I am Yahweh Who investigates the heart, Who tests the innermost being, So as to give to each one according to his ways, According to the fruit of his actions.
11 Like a partridge that broods over chicks it has not begotten, So is one making riches with injustice; In the middle of his days it shall forsake him, And at his end he shall be proved a failure.
12 A glorious throne, exalted from the first, is the place of our sanctuary.
13 O Expectation of Israel, O Yahweh, May all who forsake You be ashamed. May those who withdraw from Me be written in the earth; For they have forsaken the Fountain of living waters, even Yahweh.
14 Heal me, O Yahweh, that I may be healed; Save me, that I may be saved; For You are my Praise.
15 Behold, they are saying to me: Where is the word of Yahweh? Let it now come to pass.
16 As for me, I have not rushed from being a shepherd in Your service, And I have not yearned for the fatal day; You Yourself know the utterance of my lips; It has been before Your presence.
17 Do not become a cause of dismay to me; You are my Refuge in the day of evil.
18 Let my persecutors be ashamed; Let me not be ashamed, not I; Let them be dismayed; Let me not be dismayed, not I. Bring on them the day of evil, And break them with double breaking.
19 Thus says Yahweh to me: Go and stand in the gate of the sons of the people, through which the kings of Judah enter, and through which they go forth, and in all the gates of Jerusalem,
20 and say to them, Hear the word of Yahweh, you kings of Judah, and all Judah, and all dwellers of Jerusalem, who enter through these gates.
21 Thus says Yahweh: Beware, in view of your souls; you must not bear any load on the sabbath day, or bring it through the gates of Jerusalem.
22 You must not bring forth any load from your houses on the sabbath day nor do any work, for you will hallow the sabbath day just as I instructed your fathers.
23 Yet they would not hearken nor stretch out their ear; they kept stiffening the nape of their neck so as not to hearken and so as not to take admonition.
24 Now it will come to be if you hearken, yea hearken to Me, averring is Yahweh, so as not to bring a load through the gates of this city on the sabbath day, and you hallow the sabbath day so as not to do any work in it,
25 then kings who sit on David’s throne will enter through the gates of this city with their chief officials, riding in chariots and on horses, they and their chiefs, each man of Judah and the dwellers of Jerusalem, and this city will be indwelt for the eon.
26 They will come from the cities of Judah, from round about Jerusalem, from the land of Benjamin, from the low foothills, from the hill country and from the Negeb, bringing ascent offering and sacrifice, approach present and frankincense, and bringing acclamation to the house of Yahweh.
27 Yet if you do not hearken to Me to hallow the sabbath day so as not to bear a load or come with it through the gates of Jerusalem on the sabbath day, then I will ravage its gates with fire, and it will devour the citadels of Jerusalem and shall not be quenched.

Chapter 18
1 The word which came to Jeremiah from Yahweh, saying:
2 Rise and go down to the house of the potter, and there I shall announce to you My words.
3 So I went down to the house of the potter, and behold, he was making a work on the wheel stones.
4 Yet the vessel which he was making with clay was ruined in the hand of the potter, and he turned back and made it into another vessel, just as it seemed upright in the eyes of the potter to make.
5 Then the word of Yahweh came to me, saying:
6 Can I not do to you, house of Israel, as this potter? averring is Yahweh; behold, like clay in the hand of the potter, so are you in My hand, house of Israel.
7 The moment I speak concerning a nation or concerning a kingdom, to pluck up and to break down and to destroy,
8 and that nation concerning which I have spoken turns back from its evil, then I will regret the evil that I had designed to do against it.
9 And the moment I speak concerning a nation or concerning a kingdom, to build it up and to plant it,
10 and it does evil in My eyes so as not to hearken to My voice, then I will regret the good of which I had spoken, to do good to it.
11 And now, speak to each man of Judah and to the dwellers of Jerusalem, saying: Thus says Yahweh, Behold, I am forming evil against you And designing against you a design. Turn back, now, each man from his evil way, And amend your ways and your actions.
12 Yet they say, A cause for despair, for we shall go after our devices; each man in the obduracy of his evil heart, so shall we act.
13 Therefore, thus says Yahweh: Ask now among the nations, Who has heard things like these? A very horrible thing has she done, the virgin Israel.
14 Is a field forsaken by the chert stone, Lebanon by snow? Or can the cool, flowing waters of alien places be absorbed?
15 But My people have forgotten Me; They fume incense to a mere idol, And they stumble in their ways, the eonian trails, To walk the tracks of a way not heaped up,
16 To make their land a desolation, an eonian hissing; Everyone passing by it is appalled and shakes his head.
17 Like the east wind, I shall scatter them before the enemy; The nape of the neck and not the face shall I show them in the day of their calamity.
18 Yet they say: Come and let us devise devisings against Jeremiah, for the law shall never perish from the priest, or counsel from the wise, or the word from the prophet. Come and let us smite him with the tongue, and let us not pay attention to any of his words.
19 O Yahweh, do attend to me, And hear the voice of my antagonists.
20 Should evil be repayment for good? Yet they have dug a pit for my soul. Remember my standing before You To speak good concerning them, To turn back Your fury from them.
21 Therefore, give their sons to famine, And topple them into the hands of the sword; Let their wives be bereaved and widowed, And let their men be killed by the death plague, Their choice youths smitten by the sword in battle.
22 Let an outcry be heard from their houses, When You bring a raiding party suddenly on them; For they have dug a pit to seize me, And have buried snares for my feet.
23 Yet You, O Yahweh, You know all their intrigue against me for death; O do not shelter over their depravity, And their sin, O do not wipe it out from before You; Let them be stumbled before You; In the era of Your anger, deal with them.

Chapter 19
1 Thus says Yahweh: Go and buy a potter’s earthenware bottle, and take some of the elders of the people and of the elders of the priests.
2 Go forth to the ravine of the son of Hinnom, which is at the portal of the Artisan’s Gate, and proclaim there the words that I shall speak to you.
3 You will say, Hear the word of Yahweh, kings of Judah, and dwellers of Jerusalem. Thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: Behold, I shall bring such evil on this place that anyone hearing about it, his ears shall tingle.
4 Because they have forsaken Me and are making this place foreign and are fuming incense in it to other elohim that they have not known, they or their fathers or the kings of Judah, and they have filled this place with the blood of innocents,
5 and because they have built the high-places of Baal to burn their sons with fire as ascent offerings to Baal, which I did not instruct nor even speak of, nor did it come up on My heart,
6 therefore, behold the days are coming, averring is Yahweh, when this place shall no longer be called Topheth or the ravine of the son of Hinnom, but rather the ravine of killing.
7 I will void the counsel of Judah and Jerusalem in this place, and I will make them fall by the sword before their enemies and by the hand of those seeking their soul; and I will give their carcasses as food for the flyer of the heavens and for the beast of the earth.
8 I will make this city an object of astonishment and a hissing; everyone passing by it shall be appalled and shall hiss at all its smitings.
9 I will feed them the flesh of their sons and the flesh of their daughters, and each one shall eat the flesh of his associate, in the siege and in the constraint which their enemies and those seeking their soul shall inflict upon them.
10 And you will break the bottle before the eyes of the men who are walking with you,
11 and say to them, Thus says Yahweh of hosts: In this way I shall break this people and this city just as one breaks a potter’s vessel which cannot be mended again. And they shall entomb in Topheth until there is no place to entomb.
12 So shall I do to this place, averring is Yahweh, and to its dwellers, so as to make this city like Topheth.
13 The houses of Jerusalem and the houses of the kings of Judah will become unclean like the place Topheth, even all the houses upon whose housetops they have fumed incense to all the host of the heavens, and libated libations to other elohim.
14 Then Jeremiah came back from Topheth where Yahweh had sent him to prophesy, and he stood in the court of the house of Yahweh and said to all the people,
15 Thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: Behold, I shall bring on this city and on all its daughter cities all the evil that I have spoken against it, for they have stiffened the nape of their neck so as not to hear My words.

Chapter 20
1 When Pashhur son of Immer, the priest, he who was main supervisor in the house of Yahweh, heard Jeremiah prophesying these things,
2 then Pashhur smote Jeremiah the prophet and put him in the stocks which were in the Upper Benjamin Gate in the house of Yahweh.
3 Yet it came to pass on the morrow when Pashhur brought Jeremiah forth from the stocks that Jeremiah said to him, Yahweh has called your name not Pashhur, but rather Magor-missabib.
4 For thus says Yahweh: Behold, I shall make you a shrinking fear to yourself and to all in friendship with you, And they will fall by the sword of their enemies, while your eyes are seeing it; I shall give all Judah into the king of Babylon’s hand, And he will deport them to Babylon or smite them with the sword.
5 I will give away all the assets of this city, And all the fruit of its labor, And all its precious possessions, And all the treasures of the kings of Judah; I shall give them into the hand of their enemies, And they will plunder them; They will take them and bring them to Babylon.
6 As for you, Pashhur and all the dwellers of your house, You shall go away into captivity; Into Babylon shall you enter, and there shall you die; There shall you be entombed, you and all in friendship with you, To whom you prophesied with falsehood.
7 You have enticed me, O Yahweh, and I have been enticed; You have held me fast and are prevailing; I have become an object of sport the entire day; Everyone is deriding me.
8 For as often as I am speaking I am crying out; Violence and devastation, am I calling! Indeed the word of Yahweh becomes for me a source of reproach and of scoffing the entire day.
9 When I say, I shall not be mindful of Him, And I shall not speak any more in His Name, Then it is in my heart like a consuming fire, Restrained in my bones; I am tired containing it, Indeed I cannot.
10 I have heard the muttering of the many: Magor-missabib! Denounce! Let us denounce him! Every mortal who should seek my peace is keeping watch for me to make a false step: Perhaps he can be enticed, and we shall prevail over him; Then we shall take our vengeance upon him!
11 Yet Yahweh is with me like a terrifying master of war; Therefore, my persecutors, they shall stumble; They shall not prevail; They will be utterly ashamed that they cannot proceed effectively, With an eonian mortification that shall not be forgotten.
12 O Yahweh of hosts, Tester of the righteous, Examiner of the innermost being and heart, Let me see Your vengeance on them, For to You have I confided my cause.
13 Sing to Yahweh! Praise Yahweh! For He rescues the soul of the needy one from the hand of evildoers.
14 Cursed be the day in which I was born; The day on which my mother bore me, let it never become blessed.
15 Cursed be the man who bore tidings to my father, Saying: A son is born to you! A male rejoiced, yea rejoiced him.
16 May that man become like the cities which Yahweh overturned and regretted not; May he hear the outcry in the morning and the shouting at noontide,
17 Because he did not put me to death in the womb, So that my mother might become for me my tomb, And her womb remain pregnant for the eon.
18 Why this, that from the womb I came forth to see misery and affliction, And that my days should end in shame?

Chapter 21
1 The word that came to Jeremiah from Yahweh, when king Zedekiah sent to him Pashhur son of Malchijah, and Zephaniah son of Maaseiah, the priest, saying:
2 Inquire, now, of Yahweh on our behalf, for Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon is fighting against us. Perhaps Yahweh shall deal with us according to all His marvelous works, so that he shall go up from us.
3 Yet Jeremiah said to them, Thus shall you say to Zedekiah,
4 Thus says Yahweh, Elohim of Israel: Behold, I shall turn around the weapons of war that are in your hand, with which you are fighting the king of Babylon and the Chaldeans who are besieging you outside the wall, and I will gather them into the midst of this city.
5 And I Myself shall fight against you with an outstretched hand and a steadfast arm, in anger, in fury and in great wrath.
6 I will smite the dwellers of this city, both human and beast; with a great plague shall they die.
7 And afterward, averring is Yahweh, I shall give Zedekiah king of Judah, and his officials, and the people who remain in this city from the plague, from the sword and from the famine, into the hand of Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon, and into the hand of their enemies and into the hand of those seeking their soul. He will smite them with the edge of the sword; he shall not commiserate over them nor take pity nor show compassion.
8 And you shall say to this people, Thus says Yahweh: Behold, I am setting before you the way of life and the way of death:
9 Whoever stays a dweller in this city, he shall die by the sword and by the famine and by the plague, yet whoever goes forth and casts his lot with the Chaldeans, who are besieging you, he shall live; his soul will remain for him as loot.
10 For I have set My face against this city for evil and not for good, averring is Yahweh. Into the hand of the king of Babylon shall it be given, and he will burn it with fire.
11 And to the royal house of Judah: Hear the word of Yahweh;
12 House of David, thus says Yahweh: Adjudicate right judgment each morning, And rescue the pillaged one from the hand of the exploiter, Lest My fury should go forth like fire And consume, with none to quench it, In view of your evil actions.
13 Behold, I am against you, Dweller over the vale, Rock over the tableland, averring is Yahweh, You who say: Who can settle down upon us? And who can come into our habitations?
14 I will check you according to the fruit of your actions, averring is Yahweh; I will ravage her wildwood with fire, And it will devour all her surroundings.

Chapter 22
1 Thus says Yahweh: Go down to the house of the king of Judah and speak there this word.
2 You will say, Hear the word of Yahweh, king of Judah, sitting on the throne of David, you and your officials and your people who enter through these gates.
3 Thus says Yahweh: Execute right judgment and justice, and rescue the pillaged one from the hand of the exploiter. The sojourner, the orphan and the widow, do not tyrannize, and do not treat violently; do not shed innocent blood in this place.
4 For if you do, yea do this word, then kings who sit for David on his throne will enter through the gates of this house, riding in chariots and on horses, he and his officials and his people.
5 Yet if you do not hearken to these words, by Myself have I sworn, averring is Yahweh, that this house shall become a waste.
6 For thus says Yahweh concerning the house of the king of Judah: Though you are Gilead to Me, the summit of Lebanon, Assuredly I shall make you a wilderness, cities that are not indwelt.
7 I will hallow ruiners against you, each with his implements, And they will cut down your choice cedars and cast them on the fire.
8 When many nations pass by this city, and they say each one to his associate, On what grounds has Yahweh done thus to this great city?
9 then they will reply, Because they forsook the covenant of Yahweh their Elohim, and they worshiped other elohim and served them.
10 Do not lament for the dead one, And do not bemoan him; Lament, yea lament for him who has gone away, For he shall not return again Or again see the land of his kindred.
11 For thus says Yahweh concerning Shallum son of Josiah, king of Judah, who was made king in place of his father Josiah, but who went forth from this place: He shall not return there again.
12 For in the place where they deported him, there shall he die, and he shall not see this land again.
13 Woe to him who builds his house without justice, And his upper chambers without right judgment, Who forces service on his associate gratuitously, And does not give him his wages,
14 Who is saying, I shall build a spacious house for myself, With ventilated upper chambers; And who amplifies his windows for himself, Ceiled with cedar and painted with ocher.
15 Are you made king because you compete in cedar? Your father, did he not eat and drink, Yet also execute right judgment and justice? Then it was well for him.
16 He adjudicated the rightful adjudication of the humble one and the needy one; Then it was well. Did that not show knowledge of Me? averring is Yahweh.
17 But your eyes and your heart are set on nothing save on your own gain, On shedding the blood of the innocent, On extortion and on committing incursion.
18 Therefore, thus says Yahweh concerning Jehoiakim son of Josiah, king of Judah: They shall not wail for him, Woe, my brother, and woe, sister! They shall not wail for him, Woe, lord, and woe, his splendor!
19 He shall be entombed with a donkey’s entombment, Pulled in pieces And flung beyond the gates of Jerusalem.
20 Go up to the Lebanon and cry, In Bashan lift up your voice, And cry from Abarim; For all your lovers have been broken.
21 I spoke to you in your ease; You said, I shall not hearken; This is your way from your youth, For you have not hearkened to My voice.
22 The wind shall graze all your shepherds, And your lovers, they shall go into captivity; Indeed, then you shall be ashamed And mortified because of all your evil.
23 Dweller in Lebanon, Nester in the cedars, How much grace will you be shown when cramps come upon you, Travail like that of a woman giving birth?
24 As I live, averring is Yahweh, indeed Coniah son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, shall assuredly not become the signet ring on My right hand. Indeed I shall draw you off from there, Coniah.
25 I will give you into the hand of those who seek your soul, and into the hand of those from whose face you shrink, and into the hand of Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon, and into the hand of the Chaldeans.
26 I will cast you forth, and your mother who bore you, to another land where you were not born, and you shall die there.
27 And to the land where they lift their souls to return, there they shall not return.
28 Is this man Coniah a fetish, despised and shattered, Or a vessel in which there is no delight? For what reason are he and his seed cast forth And flung to a land which they do not know?
29 Land! land! land! Hear the word of Yahweh!
30 Thus says Yahweh: Write this man heirless, A master who shall not prosper in his days, For no man from his seed shall prosper So as to sit on the throne of David Or rule again in Judah.

Chapter 23
1 Woe to the shepherds who destroy, And who scatter the flock of My pasture, averring is Yahweh.
2 Therefore, thus says Yahweh, Elohim of Israel, concerning the shepherds who are shepherding My people: You yourselves have scattered My flock And driven them away, And you have not looked after them; Behold, I shall visit you with your evil actions, averring is Yahweh.
3 And I Myself shall convene the remnant of My flock From all the lands where I have driven them away; I will restore them to their homestead, And they will be fruitful and increase.
4 I will set up shepherds over them, And they will shepherd them; They shall not fear any longer nor be dismayed, And none shall be missing, averring is Yahweh.
5 Behold, the days are coming, averring is Yahweh, When I will set up for David a Righteous Sprout, A King Who will reign and proceed effectively, Who will establish right judgment and justice in the land.
6 In His days Judah shall be saved, And Israel, it shall tabernacle in serenity, And this is His Name by which one shall call Him: Yahweh, our Righteousness.
7 Therefore, behold, the days are coming, averring is Yahweh, when they shall not say any longer, As Yahweh lives, Who brought the sons of Israel up from the land of Egypt,
8 but rather, As Yahweh lives, Who brought up and Who brought out the seed of the house of Israel from the land of the north and from all the lands where I had driven them away; and they will dwell on their own ground.
9 As to the prophets: My heart is broken within me; All my bones are tremulous; I have become like a drunken man And like a master when wine overcomes him, In view of Yahweh, And in view of His holy words.
10 For the land is full of adulterers; Indeed in view of the imprecation, the land mourns; The oases of the wilderness have dried up. Their running has become evil, And their mastery not proper:
11 Indeed both prophet and priest, they are polluted; Even in My house I find their evil, averring is Yahweh.
12 Therefore their way shall become to them like slick spots; They shall be tripped up in the gloom, And they will fall in it; For I shall bring evil upon them, the year of their visitation, averring is Yahweh.
13 Among the prophets of Samaria I see impropriety; They prophesy by Baal, And they lead My people Israel astray.
14 But among the prophets of Jerusalem I see a horrible thing: Adultery and walking in falsehood. They reinforce the hands of evildoers So that no one turns back from his evil; To Me they have become like Sodom, all of them, And its dwellers like Gomorrah.
15 Therefore, thus says Yahweh of hosts concerning the prophets: Behold, I shall feed them absinth, And I will give them poisoned water to drink, For from the prophets of Jerusalem pollution has gone forth to the entire land.
16 Thus says Yahweh of hosts: Do not hearken to the words of the prophets who are prophesying to you; They place vain hopes in you; A vision of their own heart are they speaking, Not from the mouth of Yahweh,
17 Who say, yea say to those who spurn Me: Yahweh says, Peace shall come to you! And to everyone walking in the obduracy of his own heart they say: Evil shall not come upon you!
18 For who has stood in the deliberation of Yahweh And has seen and hearkened to His word? Who has attended to His word and has hearkened?
19 Behold, the tempest of Yahweh, His fury has gone forth, Even a whirling tempest; It shall whirl down upon the heads of the wicked.
20 The anger of Yahweh shall not turn back until He executes And until He carries out the plans of His heart; In the days hereafter you shall comprehend it with understanding.
21 I did not send these prophets, yet they ran! I did not speak to them, yet they prophesied!
22 If they had stood in My deliberation, Then they would be announcing My words to My people, And they would be turning them back from their evil way, And from their evil actions.
23 Am I Elohim nearby, averring is Yahweh, And not Elohim afar?
24 Can a man be concealed in places of concealment and I not see him? averring is Yahweh; Do I not fill the heavens and the earth? averring is Yahweh.
25 I have heard what the prophets say, who prophesy falsehood in My Name, saying: I have dreamed! I have dreamed!
26 How long? Can the heart of the prophets who prophesy falsehood, even the prophets with deceit in their heart, turn back,
27 who design to make My people forget My Name by their dreams which they recount, each one to his associate, just as their fathers forgot My Name for Baal?
28 The prophet to whom there comes a dream, let him recount a dream, Yet one to whom there comes My word, let him speak My word of truth; What has crushed straw to do with cereal grain? averring is Yahweh.
29 Is not My word a scorching like fire, averring is Yahweh, And like a sledgehammer which shatters a crag?
30 Therefore behold, I am against the prophets, averring is Yahweh, who steal My words, each one from his associate.
31 Behold, I am against the prophets, averring is Yahweh, who take up their own tongue and aver a watchword.
32 Behold, I am against those who prophesy dreams of falsehood, averring is Yahweh, and who recount them and lead My people astray with their falsehoods and with their reckless talk. I Myself did not send them nor instruct them, and they do not benefit, nay benefit this people, averring is Yahweh.
33 And when this people or a prophet or a priest asks you, saying: What is the load of Yahweh? you will say to them, You are the load. I will abandon you, averring is Yahweh.
34 As for the prophet or the priest or one of the people who is saying: The load of Yahweh, I will check that man and his household.
35 Thus shall you say, each one to his associate and each to his brother: What has Yahweh answered? or, What has Yahweh spoken?
36 You shall not mention the load of Yahweh again, for that load is for the man entrusted with His word; you have overturned the words of the living Elohim, Yahweh of hosts, our Elohim.
37 Thus shall you say to the prophet, What has Yahweh answered you? or, What has Yahweh spoken?
38 Yet if you should say: The load of Yahweh, therefore thus says Yahweh, Because you said this word: The load of Yahweh, when I sent word to you saying: You shall not say: The load of Yahweh,
39 therefore behold Me, I will lift you up, yea lift up and abandon you and the city which I gave to you and to your fathers, from My presence.
40 And I will bestow upon you an eonian reproach and an eonian mortification which shall not be forgotten.

Chapter 24
1 Yahweh showed me, and behold, two panniers of figs set before the temple of Yahweh after Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon had deported Jeconiah son of Jehoiakim king of Judah, the chief officials of Judah, the craftsmen and the metalworkers from Jerusalem, and he had brought them to Babylon.
2 One pannier had very good figs like first-ripe figs, yet the other pannier had very bad figs which could not be eaten for badness.
3 Yahweh said to me, What are you seeing, Jeremiah? And I replied, Figs! The good figs are very good, and the bad are very bad so that they cannot be eaten for badness.
4 Then the word of Yahweh came to me, saying:
5 Thus says Yahweh, Elohim of Israel, Like these good figs, so shall I recognize for their good the deportees of Judah, whom I have sent from this place to the land of the Chaldeans.
6 I will set My eye on them for their good and restore them to this land and build them up, and I shall not pull down; I will plant them, and I shall not pluck up.
7 I will give them a heart to know Me, that I am Yahweh, and they will be My people, and I Myself shall be their Elohim, for they shall return to Me with all their heart.
8 Yet like the bad figs which could not be eaten for badness, (for thus says Yahweh:) so shall I treat Zedekiah king of Judah and his chief officials and the remnant of Jerusalem who remain in this land and who dwell in the land of Egypt.
9 I will make them an evil, stirring horror to all the kingdoms of the earth, a reproach and a proverb, a byword and a malediction in all the places where I shall drive them away.
10 And I will send against them the sword, the famine and the plague until they are finished off the ground which I gave to them and to their fathers.

Chapter 25
1 The word which came to Jeremiah concerning all the people of Judah in the fourth year of Jehoiakim son of Josiah, king of Judah (it was the first year of Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon),
2 which Jeremiah the prophet spoke to all the people of Judah and to all the dwellers of Jerusalem, saying:
3 From the thirteenth year of Josiah son of Amon, king of Judah, until this day, this twenty-third year, the word of Yahweh has come to me, and I have spoken it to you, rising early and speaking, yet you would not hearken.
4 And though Yahweh has sent to you all His servants the prophets, rising early and sending, yet you would not hearken, and you would not stretch out your ear to hearken
5 when they said: Turn back, now, each one from his evil way, and from your evil actions, and dwell on the ground that Yahweh has given to you and to your fathers from the eon and unto the eon.
6 Do not walk after other elohim to serve them and to bow down to them; do not provoke Me to vexation with the work of your hands, and I shall not bring evil upon you.
7 Yet you would not hearken to Me, averring is Yahweh, so that you might provoke Me to vexation with the work of your hands, to your own evil.
8 Therefore thus says Yahweh of hosts: Because you do not hearken to My words,
9 behold, I will send and take all the families of the north, averring is Yahweh, and Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon, My servant, and I will bring them against this land, against its dwellers and against all these nations round about. I will doom them and make them a desolation and a hissing and an eonian waste.
10 I will destroy from them the sound of elation and the sound of rejoicing, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, the sound of the millstones and the light of the lamp.
11 All this land will become a waste, a desolation, and these nations will serve the king of Babylon seventy years.
12 Then when the seventy years are fulfilled, I shall check the king of Babylon and that nation, averring is Yahweh, and the land of the Chaldeans for their depravity, and I will change it into eonian desolations.
13 I will bring upon that land all My words which I have spoken against it, all that is written in this scroll which Jeremiah prophesied against all the nations.
14 For many nations and great kings, even they will force service on them, and so I will repay them according to their deeds and according to the work of their hands.
15 For thus says Yahweh Elohim of Israel to me: Take this cup of wine (that of fury) from My hand, and give it to all the nations to drink, to whom I am sending you.
16 When they drink, then they will reel and rave because of the sword that I am sending among them.
17 So I took the cup from the hand of Yahweh, and I gave it to all the nations to drink, to whom Yahweh had sent me:
18 Jerusalem and the cities of Judah and her kings and her chief officials, to make them a waste, a desolation, a hissing and a malediction, as at this day,
19 Pharaoh king of Egypt and his courtiers, his chief officials and all his people,
20 all the mixed multitude and all the kings of the land of Uz, and all the kings of the land of the Philistines, Ashkelon, Gaza and Ekron, and the remnant of Ashdod,
21 Edom and Moab and the sons of Ammon,
22 all the kings of Tyre and all the kings of Sidon, and the kings of the coastland which is across the sea,
23 Dedan, Tema and Buz, and all who cut away the edge of their hair,
24 all the kings of Arabia and all the kings of the mixed multitude who tabernacle in the wilderness,
25 all the kings of Zimri, all the kings of Elam and all the kings of the Medes,
26 all the kings of the north, the near and the far, each after his brother, and all the kingdoms of the earth that are on the surface of the ground, and the king of Sheshak, he shall drink after them.
27 You will say to them, Thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: Drink and be drunk and vomit, and fall so that you cannot rise, because of the sword that I am sending among you.
28 And it will come to be when they refuse to take the cup from your hand to drink, then you will say to them, Thus says Yahweh of hosts: You shall drink, yea drink;
29 for behold, in the city over which My Name is called, I am starting to bring evil, and you, shall you be exempted, yea exempted? You shall not be exempted! For I am calling a sword on all the dwellers of the earth, averring is Yahweh of hosts.
30 As for you, you shall prophesy to them all these words, and you will say to them: Yahweh shall roar from the height, And from His holy habitation He shall give forth His voice; He shall roar, yea roar over His homestead; He shall answer with a vintage-shout like the grape treaders to all the dwellers of the earth.
31 The tumult will come unto the end of the earth, For Yahweh has an indictment against the nations; He shall enter judgment upon all flesh; The wicked, He will deliver them to the sword, averring is Yahweh.
32 Thus says Yahweh of hosts: Behold, evil is going forth from nation to nation, And a great tempest is being roused from the remote parts of the earth.
33 Those slain by Yahweh will be in that day from one end of the earth unto the other end of the earth; They shall not be bewailed nor gathered nor entombed; They shall become manure on the surface of the ground.
34 Howl, you shepherds, and cry out; Grovel, you nobles of the flock; For your days are fulfilled for slaughter and for your scattering, And you will fall like coveted rams.
35 Flight will perish from the shepherds And deliverance from the nobles of the flock.
36 Hear the sound of the shepherds’ cry, And the howling of the nobles of the flock; For Yahweh is devastating their pasture,
37 And the peaceful oases are stilled In view of the heat of Yahweh’s anger.
38 He has left His covert like a sheltered lion, For their land has become a desolation In view of the tyrannizing sword And in view of the heat of His anger.

Chapter 26
1 In the beginning of the kingship of Jehoiakim son of Josiah, king of Judah, came this word from Yahweh, saying,
2 Thus says Yahweh: Stand in the court of the house of Yahweh and speak to all those of the cities of Judah, who are coming to worship in the house of Yahweh, all the words that I instruct you to speak to them. Do not subtract a word.
3 Perhaps they shall hearken and turn back, each one from his evil way. Then I will regret the evil that I had designed to do against them in view of their evil actions.
4 And you will say to them, Thus says Yahweh: If you shall not hearken to Me to walk in My law which I set before you,
5 to hearken to the words of My servants the prophets whom I am sending to you, rising early and sending, yet you will not hearken,
6 then I will make this house like Shiloh, and I shall make this city a malediction to all the nations of the earth.
7 Now the priests and the prophets and all the people heard Jeremiah speaking these words in the house of Yahweh.
8 Yet it came to be as soon as Jeremiah finished speaking all that Yahweh had instructed him to speak to all the people, that the priests and the prophets and all the people grasped him, saying: You shall die, yea die.
9 For what reason do you prophesy in the Name of Yahweh, saying: This house shall become like Shiloh, and this city shall be deserted without a dweller? Then all the people assembled around Jeremiah in the house of Yahweh.
10 When the chief officials of Judah heard these words they went up from the king’s house to the house of Yahweh and sat at the portal of the new gate of the house of Yahweh.
11 And the priests and the prophets spoke to the chief officials and to all the people, saying: The judgment of death for this man! For he prophesied against this city just as you have heard with your own ears.
12 Then Jeremiah spoke to all the chief officials and to all the people, saying: Yahweh sent me to prophesy against this house and against this city all the words which you have heard.
13 So now amend your ways and your actions, and hearken to the voice of Yahweh your Elohim so that Yahweh may regret the evil that He has spoken against you.
14 As for me, behold, I am in your hand; do to me as seems good and upright in your eyes.
15 However, you shall know, yea know that if you put me to death you are bringing innocent blood on yourselves and on this city and on its dwellers, for in truth, Yahweh has sent me to you to speak all these words in your ears.
16 Then the chief officials and all the people said to the priests and to the prophets, There will be no judgment of death for this man, for in the Name of Yahweh our Elohim he has spoken to us.
17 Also some men from the elders of the land arose and they spoke to all the assembly of the people, saying:
18 There was Micah of Moresheth who prophesied in the days of Hezekiah king of Judah, and he spoke to all the people of Judah, saying, Thus says Yahweh of hosts: Zion shall be plowed like a field, And Jerusalem shall become rubbish heaps, And the mountain of the house for high-places of a grove.
19 Did Hezekiah king of Judah or anyone of Judah put him to death, yea death? Did he not fear Yahweh and beseech the face of Yahweh, so that Yahweh regretted the evil that He had spoken against them? Now we would be doing great evil against our souls.
20 But again there was a man who prophesied in the Name of Yahweh, Uriah son of Shemaiah from Kiriath-jearim, and he prophesied against this city and against this land in terms like all the words of Jeremiah.
21 When king Jehoiakim and all his masterful men and all the chief officials heard his words, then the king sought to put him to death. Yet Uriah heard and was fearful, and he fled away and entered Egypt.
22 But king Jehoiakim sent men to Egypt, Elnathan son of Achbor and men with him to Egypt,
23 and they brought forth Uriah from Egypt and brought him to king Jehoiakim. And he smote him with the sword and flung his carcass into the burying ground of the sons of the people.
24 However, the hand of Ahikam son of Shaphan came to be with Jeremiah so that he not be given up into the hand of the people to put him to death.

Chapter 27
1 In the beginning of the kingship of Zedekiah son of Josiah, king of Judah, came this word to Jeremiah from Yahweh, saying
2 (thus says Yahweh to me): Make for yourself bonds and yoke-bars, and put them on your neck.
3 Then send them to the king of Edom, to the king of Moab, to the king of the sons of Ammon, to the king of Tyre and to the king of Sidon, by the hand of their messengers coming to Jerusalem to Zedekiah king of Judah.
4 Instruct them for their lords, saying, Thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel; thus shall you say to your lords:
5 I Myself made the earth, humanity and beast that is on the surface of the earth, by My great vigor and by My outstretched arm, and I give it to whom it seems upright in My eyes.
6 And now I Myself give all these lands into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, My servant, and even the animal of the field I give to him to serve him.
7 All nations will serve him and his son and his son’s son, until the era of his own land comes, even it, when many nations and great kings will force service by it.
8 Yet it will be that the nation and the kingdom that is not serving him, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and that is not putting its neck under the yoke of the king of Babylon, I shall visit that nation with sword and with famine and with plague, averring is Yahweh, until I am finished with them by his hand.
9 As for you, do not hearken to your prophets, to your diviners or to your dream interpreters, to your cloud consulters or to your enchanters, who are those speaking to you, saying, You shall not serve the king of Babylon.
10 For they are prophesying a falsehood to you with the result that you will be removed far from your ground; for I will drive you away, and you will perish.
11 Yet the nation that brings its neck under the yoke of the king of Babylon and serves him, I will leave it on its own ground, averring is Yahweh, to serve it and dwell on it.
12 To Zedekiah king of Judah I also spoke according to all these words saying: Bring your necks under the yoke of the king of Babylon, and serve him and his people, and so live.
13 Why should you die, you and your people, by sword, by famine and by plague, just as Yahweh speaks to the nation that is not serving the king of Babylon?
14 Do not hearken to the words of the prophets who are speaking to you, saying: You shall not serve the king of Babylon; for it is a falsehood they are prophesying to you.
15 For I did not send them, averring is Yahweh, yet they are prophesying falsely in My Name, with the result that I will drive you away, and you will perish, you and the prophets who are prophesying to you.
16 Also to the priests and to all this people I spoke saying, Thus says Yahweh: Do not hearken to the words of your prophets who are prophesying to you, saying, Behold, the furnishings of the house of Yahweh will be restored from Babylon quickly now. Indeed they are prophesying a falsehood to you.
17 Do not hearken to them. Serve the king of Babylon, and live. Why should this city become a waste?
18 If they are prophets, and if the word of Yahweh is with them, let them intercede now with Yahweh of hosts, so that none of the furnishing left in the house of Yahweh and in the house of the king of Judah and in Jerusalem will be brought to Babylon.
19 For thus says Yahweh of hosts concerning the columns and the sea and the bases and the rest of the furnishings left in this city,
20 which Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon did not take when he deported Jeconiah son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, from Jerusalem to Babylon with all the notables of Judah and Jerusalem,
21 indeed thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel, concerning the furnishings left in the house of Yahweh and the house of the king of Judah and Jerusalem:
22 To Babylon shall they be brought, and they shall remain there until the day I visit them, averring is Yahweh. Then I will bring them up and restore them to this place.

Chapter 28
1 And it came to be in that year in the beginning of the kingship of Zedekiah king of Judah, in the fourth year, in the fifth month, that Hananiah son of Azzur, the prophet, who was from Gibeon, spoke to me in the house of Yahweh before the eyes of the priests and all the people, saying,
2 Thus speaks Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel, saying: I will break the yoke of the king of Babylon.
3 In another two full years I shall restore to this place all the furnishings of the house of Yahweh which Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon took from this place and brought to Babylon.
4 And Jeconiah son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, and all the deportees of Judah being brought to Babylon I shall restore to this place, averring is Yahweh. For I shall break the yoke of the king of Babylon.
5 Then Jeremiah the prophet replied 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,
6 and Jeremiah the prophet said, Amen! May Yahweh do so! May Yahweh confirm your words that you have prophesied, to restore the furnishings of the house of Yahweh and all the deportation from Babylon to this place.
7 Nevertheless hear now this word that I am speaking in your ears and in the ears of all the people:
8 The prophets who were before me and before you from the eon prophesied against many lands and great kingdoms, war and evil and plague.
9 The prophet who is prophesying peace when the prophet’s word comes to pass, the prophet shall be known as one whom Yahweh has sent in truth.
10 Yet Hananiah the prophet took the yoke-bar off the neck of Jeremiah the prophet and broke it.
11 And Hananiah spoke before the eyes of all the people, saying, Thus says Yahweh: In this way shall I break the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, in another two full years, off the neck of all the nations. Then Jeremiah the prophet went on his way.
12 The word of Yahweh came to Jeremiah after Hananiah the prophet broke the yoke-bar off the neck of Jeremiah the prophet, saying:
13 Go and speak to Hananiah, saying, Thus says Yahweh: You have broken yoke-bars of wood, yet I shall make yoke-bars of iron in their stead.
14 For thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: I put a yoke of iron on the neck of all these nations, to serve Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and they will serve him, and even the animal of the field I give to him.
15 Then Jeremiah the prophet said to Hananiah the prophet, Hear now, Hananiah, Yahweh did not send you, and you lead this people to trust in a falsehood.
16 Therefore thus says Yahweh: Behold, I shall send you off the surface of the ground! You shall die this year, for you have preached stubbornness against Yahweh!
17 And Hananiah the prophet died that year in the seventh month.

Chapter 29
1 These are the words of the scroll which Jeremiah the prophet sent from Jerusalem to the rest of the elders of the deportation, to the priests and the prophets, and to all the people whom Nebuchadnezzar had deported from Jerusalem to Babylon
2 (after Jeconiah the king, the queen-mother, the court officials, the chief officials of Judah and Jerusalem, the craftsmen and the metalworkers had gone forth from Jerusalem)
3 by the hand of Elasah son of Shaphan, and Gemariah son of Hilkiah, whom Zedekiah king of Judah sent to Babylon to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon; it said:
4 Thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel, to all the deportation which I deported from Jerusalem to Babylon:
5 Build houses and dwell in them; and plant gardens and eat their fruit.
6 Take wives and beget sons and daughters, and take wives for your sons, and give your daughters to husbands that they may bear sons and daughters. Increase there, and do not decrease.
7 Seek after the well-being of the city where I have deported you, and pray to Yahweh in its behalf, for in its well-being shall be well-being for you.
8 For thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: Let them not lure you, your prophets who are among you, and your diviners. And do not hearken to your dream interpreters whom you direct to interpret dreams.
9 For with falsity they are prophesying to you in My Name; I have not sent them, averring is Yahweh.
10 For thus says Yahweh: When at My bidding, seventy years are fulfilled for Babylon, I shall visit you and will carry out My good word for you, to restore you to this place.
11 For I Myself know the designs that I am designing for you, averring is Yahweh, designs for your well-being and not for evil, to give you a hereafter and an expectation.
12 When you call Me and you come and pray to Me, I will hearken to you.
13 When you seek Me, you will find Me, for you shall seek after Me with all your heart,
14 and I will be found by you, averring is Yahweh. And I will reverse your captivity, and will convene you from all the nations and from all the places where I drove you away, averring is Yahweh, and I will restore you to the place from which I deported you.
15 Because you say, Yahweh raises up for us prophets in Babylon
16 Indeed thus says Yahweh concerning the king who sits on the throne of David, and concerning all the people who dwell in this city, your brothers who did not go forth with you in the deportation,
17 thus says Yahweh of hosts: Behold, I am sending among them the sword, the famine and the plague, and I will make them like loathsome figs that are so bad they cannot be eaten.
18 I will pursue after them with sword, with famine and with plague, and I will make them a stirring horror to all kingdoms of the earth, an execration and an appalling object and a hissing and a reproach among all the nations where I drive them away,
19 inasmuch as they have not hearkened to My words, averring is Yahweh, which I sent to them by My servants the prophets, rising early and sending. You also have not hearkened, averring is Yahweh.
20 Now you, hear the word of Yahweh, all you of the deportation whom I sent from Jerusalem to Babylon.
21 Thus says Yahweh of hosts, the Elohim of Israel, concerning Ahab son of Kolaiah and Zedekiah son of Maaseiah who are prophesying to you a falsehood in My Name: Behold, I am giving them into the hand of Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon, and he will smite them before your eyes.
22 And a malediction shall be derived from them for all the deportees of Judah who are in Babylon, saying: Yahweh shall make you like Zedekiah and like Ahab whom the king of Babylon burned up in fire!
23 It is because they committed decadence in Israel; they committed adultery with the wives of their associates and spoke the word of falsehood in My Name, which I did not instruct them, and I am the One knowing and am witness, averring is Yahweh.
24 And concerning Shemaiah the dreamer you shall speak, saying,
25 Thus speaks Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel, saying: Because you have sent scrolls in your own name to all the people who are in Jerusalem, and to Zephaniah son of Maaseiah the priest, and to all the priests, saying:
26 Yahweh has appointed you priest instead of Jehoiada the priest, to become supervisors in the house of Yahweh over any man who is mad and feigns himself a prophet that you might give him over to the stocks and to the pillory.
27 Now why have you not rebuked Jeremiah of Anathoth, who is prophesying to you?
28 Indeed on this account he has sent to us in Babylon, saying, It shall be a long while! Build houses and dwell in them, and plant gardens and eat their fruit!
29 And Zephaniah the priest read this scroll in the ears of Jeremiah the prophet.
30 So the word of Yahweh came to Jeremiah, saying:
31 Send to all the deportation, saying, Thus says Yahweh concerning Shemaiah the dreamer: Because Shemaiah has prophesied to you though I did not send him, and he caused you to trust in a falsehood,
32 therefore thus says Yahweh, Behold, I shall call Shemaiah the dreamer to account, and his seed. Not a man shall remain for him dwelling in the midst of this people; not one shall see the good I shall do for My people, averring is Yahweh, for he has preached stubbornness against Yahweh.

Chapter 30
1 The word that came to Jeremiah from Yahweh, saying:
2 Thus speaks Yahweh, Elohim of Israel, saying, Write for yourself on a scroll all the words that I speak to you.
3 For behold, the days are coming, averring is Yahweh, when I will reverse the captivity of My people Israel and Judah, says Yahweh, and I will restore them to the land that I gave to their fathers; and they will tenant it.
4 These are the words that Yahweh spoke concerning Israel and Judah:
5 For thus says Yahweh: We hear a voice of trembling, of alarm without peace.
6 Ask now and see: Can a male give birth? For what reason do I see every master with his hands on his loins like a woman giving birth, And every face is turned to a deathly pallor?
7 Woe, for that day is great! There is none like it! It is a season of distress for Jacob, Yet he shall be saved out of it.
8 It will come to be in that day, averring is Yahweh of hosts, I shall break his yoke off your neck, And I shall pull away your bonds; Aliens shall no longer force service on him,
9 And they will serve Yahweh their Elohim And David their king, whom I shall raise up for them.
10 And you, do not fear, My servant Jacob, averring is Yahweh, And do not be dismayed, Israel, For behold, I shall save you from afar, And your seed from the land of their captivity, And Jacob will return and be given quietness And be tranquil with no one making him tremble.
11 For I am with you, averring is Yahweh, to save you; Indeed I shall make an end of all the nations where I have scattered you; Nevertheless I shall not make an end of you, Though I discipline you for judgment And am not holding you innocent, nay innocent.
12 For thus says Yahweh: Mortal for you is your brokenness; Most ill is your smiting;
13 There is no one to advocate adjudication for your malady; Remedies for recovery, there are none for you.
14 All your lovers have forgotten you; They are not seeking after you; For I have smitten you with the smiting of an enemy, With the discipline of a cruel one, on account of your great depravity, For your sins are plentiful.
15 Why are you crying out over your brokenness, your mortal pain? On account of your great depravity, for your sins are plentiful, I do these things to you.
16 Yet all who devour you shall be devoured, And all your foes, all of them, shall go into captivity; Those who rob you will become robbed, And all who plunder you, I shall give for plunder.
17 But I shall cause wholeness to ascend for you, And I shall heal you from your smitings, averring is Yahweh; For they call you an outcast, saying, Zion is she; no one seeks after her!
18 Thus says Yahweh: Behold, I shall reverse the captivity of Jacob’s tents, And on his tabernacles I shall have compassion; The city will be rebuilt on its ruin-mound, And the citadel shall sit on its customary place.
19 From them will come forth acclamation and the sound of mirth; I will increase them, and they shall not decrease; I will glorify them, and they shall not be discredited.
20 His sons will become as in former days, And his congregation shall be established before Me, And I will call all his oppressors to account.
21 His noble one will be from him, And his ruler shall come forth from among his own, And I will bring him near that he may come close to Me, For who is he who would give his heart as surety to come close to Me? averring is Yahweh.
22 You will become My people, And I Myself shall become your Elohim.
23 Behold, the tempest of Yahweh, His fury has gone forth, a swirling tempest; It shall whirl down upon the heads of the wicked.
24 The hot anger of Yahweh shall not turn back until He executes And until He carries out the plans of His heart; In the days hereafter you shall comprehend it.

Chapter 31
1 In that era, averring is Yahweh, I shall become Elohim to all the families of Israel, And they shall become My people.
2 Thus says Yahweh: The people, survivors of the sword, found grace in the wilderness; When Israel journeyed to find his respite.
3 From afar, Yahweh appeared to him. I love you with an eonian love; Therefore I draw you with benignity.
4 I shall build you again, And you will be rebuilt, virgin Israel; Again you shall ornament your tambourines, And you will go forth in the chorus of merrymakers;
5 Again you shall plant vineyards on the hillsides of Samaria; Those who plant will plant and bring them to general use.
6 For there will be a day when the field-keepers will call on Mount Ephraim: Rise, and let us go up to Zion, to Yahweh our Elohim.
7 For thus says Yahweh: Be jubilant with rejoicing for Jacob, And make a noise over the head of the nations; Announce, praise and say, Yahweh has saved His people, the remnant of Israel.
8 Behold, I shall bring them from the land of the north, And will convene them from the remote parts of the earth; Among them the blind and the lame, The pregnant and one in childbirth together, A great assembled force, they shall return here.
9 They shall come with lamentation, Yet I shall escort them with consolations; I shall conduct them to wadis of water By a straight way in which they shall not stumble; For I am a Father to Israel, And Ephraim, he is My firstborn.
10 Hear the word of Yahweh, nations, And tell it in the coastlands afar, and say: He who winnowed Israel shall convene him, And He will guard him as a shepherd his drove.
11 For Yahweh ransoms Jacob, And He redeems him from the hand of one too unyielding for him.
12 They will come and be jubilant on Zion’s heights, And they will beam over the bounty of Yahweh, Over the grain and over grape juice and over clarified oil, And over the young of the flock and the herd; Their soul will become like a well-watered garden, And they shall not continue to pine any longer.
13 Then the virgin shall rejoice in the chorus, And the choice young men and elders shall be exhilarated; I will turn their mourning into elation, And comfort them and make them rejoice from their affliction.
14 I will satiate the soul of the priests with richness, And My people shall be satisfied with My bounty, averring is Yahweh.
15 Thus says Yahweh: A sound in Ramah is heard, A plaint and bitter lamentation, Rachel lamenting over her sons; She refuses to be comforted over her sons, for they are not.
16 Thus says Yahweh: Withhold your voice from lamentation, And your eyes from tears, For there is a reward for your effort, averring is Yahweh, When they will return from the land of the enemy;
17 And there is expectation for your posterity, averring is Yahweh, When your sons will return to their territory.
18 I have heard, yea heard Ephraim bemoaning himself: You have disciplined me, and I am disciplined like a calf not yet taught; Restore me, and let me return, For You are Yahweh, my Elohim.
19 Indeed after my captivity, I repented, And after I was informed, I slapped my thigh in grief; I am ashamed and mortified indeed, For I bear the reproach of my youth.
20 Is Ephraim My precious son? Is he a child of bliss? For as often as I speak against him, I remember, yea remember him still; Therefore My internal parts clamor for him; I have compassion, yea compassion on him, averring is Yahweh.
21 Set up for yourself cairns; Make for yourself signposts; Set your heart on the highway, the way you went along; Return, virgin of Israel; Return to these cities of yours.
22 How long will you make yourself elusive, backsliding daughter? For Yahweh has created a new thing on the earth: A female shall surround a master.
23 Thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: Again they shall say this word in the land of Judah and in its cities when I reverse their captivity, May Yahweh bless you, homestead of righteousness, The holy mountain.
24 And they will dwell in it, Judah and all its cities together, Farmworkers and they who journey with the drove.
25 For I will satiate the faint soul, And every soul that pines I will fill.
26 At this I awoke and observed, And my sleep had been congenial to me.
27 Behold, the days are coming, averring is Yahweh, when I will sow the house of Israel and the house of Judah with the seed of mankind and the seed of beasts.
28 And it will come to be just as I was alert over them to pluck up and to break down, to demolish and to destroy and to smash, so I shall be alert over them to build and to plant, averring is Yahweh.
29 In those days they shall no longer say, The fathers ate unripe grapes, and the children’s teeth become blunted.
30 But rather each man shall die in his own depravity; every man who is eating unripe grapes, his own teeth shall become blunted.
31 Behold, the days are coming, averring is Yahweh, when I will contract a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah.
32 Not like the covenant which I contracted with their fathers in the day I held fast onto their hand to bring them forth from the land of Egypt, which covenant of Mine they themselves annulled while I was Possessor over them, averring is Yahweh.
33 For this is the covenant which I shall contract with the house of Israel after those days, averring is Yahweh: I will put My law within them, And I shall write it on their heart; I will become their Elohim, And they shall become My people.
34 No longer shall they teach, each man his associate, And each man his brother, saying: Know Yahweh! For they all shall know Me, From the smallest of them to the greatest of them, averring is Yahweh; For I shall pardon their depravity, And I shall not remember their sin any longer.
35 Thus says Yahweh, Who provides the sun for light by day, the statutes of the moon and stars for light by night, Who splits apart the sea so that its billows clamor, Yahweh of hosts is His Name:
36 If these statutes should be removed from before Me, averring is Yahweh, then the seed of Israel shall cease to be a nation before Me for all the days.
37 Thus says Yahweh: If the heavens above could be measured, and the foundations of the earth below could be investigated, then I Myself shall reject all the seed of Israel on account of all that they do, averring is Yahweh.
38 Behold, the days are coming, averring is Yahweh, when the city will be rebuilt for Yahweh, from the Tower of Hananel to the Corner Gate,
39 and the measuring tape will go forth further in front of it to the hill of Gareb and go around toward Goath.
40 And the entire vale of the corpses and greasy ash and all the terraces above Wadi Kidron unto the corner of the Horse Gate eastward shall be holy to Yahweh; it shall not be plucked up nor demolished again for the eon.

Chapter 32
1 The word which came to Jeremiah from Yahweh in the tenth year of Zedekiah king of Judah; it was the eighteenth year of Nebuchadrezzar.
2 Then the army of the king of Babylon besieged Jerusalem. And Jeremiah the prophet was detained in the jail court that was in the house of the king of Judah
3 where Zedekiah king of Judah had detained him, saying, For what reason have you prophesied, saying, Thus says Yahweh: Behold, I am giving this city into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he will seize it;
4 and Zedekiah king of Judah shall not escape from the hand of the Chaldeans, for he shall be given, yea given into the hand of the king of Babylon, and his own mouth will speak to the mouth of that one, and his own eyes shall see the eyes of that one;
5 he shall conduct Zedekiah to Babylon, and there he shall remain until I visit him, averring is Yahweh; though you are fighting the Chaldeans, you shall not prosper?
6 Then Jeremiah said, The word of Yahweh came to me, saying:
7 Behold, Hanamel son of Shallum your uncle shall come to you, saying, Buy for yourself my field which is in Anathoth, for you have the customary right of redemption to buy it.
8 Now Hanamel son of my uncle came to me, just as Yahweh had given word, to the jail court, and he said to me, Buy, pray, my field which is in Anathoth in the land of Benjamin, for you have the customary right of tenancy, and the redemption is yours; buy it for yourself. Then I knew that it was Yahweh’s word.
9 So I bought the field which was in Anathoth from Hanamel son of my uncle, and I weighed out the silver for him, seventeen shekels of silver.
10 I wrote it up in a scroll, sealed it and had it witnessed by witnesses, and I weighed out the silver on scales.
11 Then I took the scroll of acquisition, the sealed one according to the instruction and the statutes, and the revealed one,
12 and I gave the acquisition scroll to Baruch son of Neriah, the son of Mahseiah, before the eyes of Hanamel son of my uncle, and before the eyes of the witnesses who had subscribed to the scroll of acquisition, and before the eyes of all the Jews who were sitting in the jail court.
13 Then I instructed Baruch before their eyes, saying,
14 Thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: Take these scrolls, this scroll of acquisition, the sealed one, and this revealed scroll, and put them in an earthenware vessel, that they may last many days.
15 For thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: Houses, fields and vineyards shall again be acquired in this land.
16 After I had given the scroll of acquisition to Baruch son of Neriah, I prayed to Yahweh, saying,
17 Alas, my Lord Yahweh! Behold, You Yourself made the heavens and the earth by Your great vigor and by Your outstretched arm; Nothing at all is too marvelous for You,
18 showing benignity to thousands, yet repaying the depravity of the fathers into the bosom of their sons after them, the El, the Great, the Masterful (Yahweh of hosts is His Name),
19 great in counsel and grand in action, You Whose eyes are unclosed before all the ways of the sons of humanity, to give to each according to his ways and according to the fruit of his actions,
20 You Who have set signs and miracles in the land of Egypt, until this day, both in Israel and among mankind, so that You are making a Name for Yourself as at this day.
21 You brought forth Your people, Israel, from the land of Egypt with signs and miracles and with a steadfast hand, with an outstretched arm and with great fear-inspiring deeds.
22 You gave them this land which You swore to their fathers to give them, a land gushing with milk and honey,
23 and they entered and tenanted it. Yet they did not hearken to Your voice, and in Your law they did not walk; all that You instructed them to do, they did not do. And so You caused all this evil to befall them.
24 Behold, the earthworks have come to the city to seize it. And because of sword and famine and plague the city is given into the hand of the Chaldeans who are fighting against it. What You have spoken has come to be, as behold, You are seeing!
25 Yet You Yourself have said to me, O my Lord Yahweh: Buy for yourself the field with silver, and have it witnessed by witnesses, though the city is given into the hand of the Chaldeans!
26 Then the word of Yahweh came to Jeremiah, saying:
27 Behold, I am Yahweh, Elohim of all flesh. Is anything too marvelous for Me?
28 Therefore, thus says Yahweh, Behold, I am giving this city into the hand of the Chaldeans and into the hand of Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon, and he will seize it.
29 The Chaldeans who are fighting against this city will enter and ravage this city with fire; they will burn it and the houses on whose housetops they fumed incense to Baal and libated libations to other elohim that they might provoke Me to vexation.
30 For the sons of Israel and the sons of Judah have been only doing evil in My eyes from their youth; indeed the sons of Israel have been only provoking Me to vexation with the deeds of their hands, averring is Yahweh.
31 For this city has roused in Me My anger and My fury from the day on which they built it until this day to put it away from My presence,
32 because of all the evil of the sons of Israel and the sons of Judah that they have done to provoke Me to vexation, they, their kings, their chief officials, their priests and their prophets, even the men of Judah and the dwellers of Jerusalem.
33 They are turning around the nape of their neck to Me and not their face, though I taught them, rising early and taught them again, yet there are none of them hearkening to take admonition.
34 They placed their abominations in the house over which My Name is called, to defile it.
35 And they built the high-places of Baal which are in the ravine of the son of Hinnom, to have their sons and their daughters pass through fire for Molech (which I did not instruct them, nor did it come up on My heart), to do this abhorrence that it may cause Judah to sin.
36 Now therefore thus says Yahweh, Elohim of Israel, as to this city of which you are saying, It is given into the hand of the king of Babylon by sword and by famine and by plague:
37 Behold, I shall convene them from all the lands where I have driven them away in My anger and in My fury and in great wrath, and I will restore them to this place and make them to dwell in serenity.
38 They will become My people, and I shall become their Elohim.
39 I will give them one heart and one way to fear Me all their days, for good to them and to their sons after them.
40 I will contract with them an eonian covenant, from whom I shall not turn back; I will do good to them. And I shall bestow the fear of Me in their heart so as not to go away from Me.
41 I will be elated over them to do good to them, and I will plant them in this land in truth with all My heart and with all My soul.
42 For thus says Yahweh: Just as I brought on this people all this great evil, so I shall bring on them all the good which I am speaking concerning them.
43 So the field shall be bought in this land of which you are saying, It is a desolation without human or beast; it has been given into the hand of the Chaldeans.
44 They shall buy fields with silver and will write it up in a scroll and seal it and have it witnessed by witnesses in the land of Benjamin, in that round about Jerusalem, in the cities of Judah, in the cities of the hill country, in the cities of the low foothills and in the cities of the Negeb. For I shall reverse their captivity, averring is Yahweh.

Chapter 33
1 The word of Yahweh came to Jeremiah a second time, when he was still retained in the jail court, saying,
2 Thus says Yahweh Who is making it, Yahweh Who is forming it to establish it, Yahweh is His Name:
3 Call to Me, and I shall answer you, And I shall tell you of great things, And of unsearchable things which you have not known.
4 For thus says Yahweh Elohim of Israel concerning the houses of this city, and concerning the houses of the kings of Judah which were broken down for the earthworks and the ramparts,
5 while men came to fight against the Chaldeans, and to fill them with human corpses (whom I smote in My anger and in My fury and from whom I concealed My face, from this city, because of all their evil):
6 Behold, I shall bring up wholeness and health for it, and I will heal them and reveal to them the sweet-smell of peace and truth.
7 And I will reverse the captivity of Judah and the captivity of Israel and rebuild them as they were at first.
8 I will cleanse them from all their depravity in which they sinned against Me, and I will pardon all their depravities by which they sinned against Me and by which they transgressed against Me.
9 And it will become for Me a name of elation, for praise and for beauty to all the nations of the earth, who shall hear of all the good that I am doing for them, and they will be in awe and be astounded over all the good and over all the peace that I am giving to it.
10 Thus says Yahweh: Again shall be heard in this place (of which you are saying, It is deserted, without human and without beast, in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem that are desolate without human and without dwellers and without beast)
11 the sound of elation and the sound of rejoicing, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, the voice of those saying: Acclaim Yahweh of hosts, For Yahweh is good, For His benignity is for the eon! as they bring acclamation offerings to the house of Yahweh. For I shall reverse the captivity of the land as they were at first, says Yahweh.
12 Thus says Yahweh of hosts: Again there shall come to be in this place that is deserted without human or even beast, and in all its cities, a homestead for shepherds reclining their flock.
13 In the cities of the hill country, in the cities of the low foothills, in the cities of the Negeb, in the land of Benjamin, in that round about Jerusalem, and in the cities of Judah, the flock again shall pass under the hands of the one who counts them, says Yahweh.
14 Behold, the days are coming, averring is Yahweh, when I will carry out the good word which I have spoken concerning the house of Israel and concerning the house of Judah:
15 In those days and in that era I shall make sprout for David a Sprout of righteousness, Who will establish right judgment and justice in the land.
16 In those days shall Judah be saved, And Jerusalem shall tabernacle in serenity, And this is what one shall call it: Yahweh, our Righteousness.
17 For thus says Yahweh: There shall not be cut off a man of David’s line from sitting on the throne of the house of Israel.
18 As for the Levitical priests there shall not be cut off a man from before Me who offers up the ascent offering and fumes the approach present and offers sacrifices for all the days.
19 The word of Yahweh came to Jeremiah, saying,
20 Thus says Yahweh: If you could annul My covenant with the day and My covenant with the night so that daytime and night fail to come about in their proper time,
21 then also My covenant could be annulled with David My servant, so that he should not come to have a son reigning on his throne, and that with the Levites, the priests, My ministers.
22 As the host of the heavens cannot be numbered, and the sand of the sea cannot be measured, so I shall increase the seed of David My servant, and the Levites who minister to Me.
23 The word of Yahweh came to Jeremiah, saying:
24 Have you not observed what this people have spoken, saying, The two families whom Yahweh has chosen, He is rejecting them? They are spurning My people so they no longer are a nation before them.
25 Thus says Yahweh: If My covenant with day and night does not stand, if I did not set the statutes of the heavens and the earth,
26 then shall I also reject the seed of Jacob and David My servant from taking of his seed rulers for the seed of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Indeed I shall reverse their captivity; I will have compassion on them.

Chapter 34
1 The word which came to Jeremiah from Yahweh when Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon and all his army and all the kingdoms of the earth under the rule of his hand with all the peoples were fighting against Jerusalem and against all its daughter cities, saying,
2 Thus says Yahweh Elohim of Israel: Go and speak to Zedekiah king of Judah, and you will say to him, Thus says Yahweh: Behold, I shall give this city into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he will burn it with fire.
3 As for you, you shall not escape from his hand, for you shall be apprehended, yea apprehended and shall be given into his hand, and your eyes shall see the eyes of the king of Babylon, and his mouth shall speak with your mouth; and you shall be brought to Babylon.
4 However, hear the word of Yahweh, Zedekiah king of Judah; thus says Yahweh concerning you: You shall not die by the sword;
5 in peace you shall die; and as funeral burnings were made for your fathers the former kings who were before you, so shall they burn for you, and they shall bewail you, Woe, lord! For I Myself speak this word, averring is Yahweh.
6 Then Jeremiah the prophet spoke to Zedekiah the king of Judah all these words in Jerusalem,
7 while the army of the king of Babylon was fighting against Jerusalem and against all the cities of Judah which were left, Lachish and Azekah, for they were the fortress cities that remained among the cities of Judah.
8 The word which came to Jeremiah from Yahweh after king Zedekiah contracted a covenant with all the people who were in Jerusalem, to proclaim to them liberty,
9 that each man send his servant and each man his maidservant, who is a Hebrew or a Hebrewess, free so as not to force service on them, any man on his Jewish brother.
10 So they hearkened, all the chief officials and all the people who had entered in the covenant that each send his servant and each his maidservant free so as not to force service on them any longer; they hearkened and dismissed them.
11 Yet afterward they turned about, and they caused the servants and the maidservants to return whom they had sent free, and they brought them into bondage as servants and as maidservants.
12 Then the word of Yahweh came to Jeremiah from Yahweh, saying,
13 Thus says Yahweh Elohim of Israel: I Myself contracted a covenant with your fathers in the day I brought them forth from the land of Egypt, from the house of servants, saying,
14 At the end of seven years you shall dismiss each man his brother Hebrew who has sold himself to you and has served you six years, and you shall dismiss him from you free. Yet your fathers did not hearken to Me, nor did they stretch out their ear.
15 And you for your part turned about for awhile, and you were doing what is upright in My eyes by proclaiming liberty, each man to his associate, and you contracted a covenant before Me in the house over which My Name is called.
16 Yet now you are turning about and are profaning My Name and are causing to return, each man his servant and each man his maidservant whose souls you had dismissed free, and you are bringing them into bondage to become your servants and maidservants.
17 Therefore thus says Yahweh: You yourselves have not hearkened to Me by proclaiming liberty, each man to his brother and each man to his associate. Behold, I shall proclaim to you liberty, averring is Yahweh, to the sword, to the plague and to the famine. And I will make you a stirring horror to all the kingdoms of the earth.
18 I will make the men, the trespassers of My covenant, who do not carry out the words of the covenant which they contracted before Me, like the calf which they cut in two and passed between its sundered parts,
19 the chief officials of Judah and the chief officials of Jerusalem, the court officials and the priests and all the people of the land who passed between the sundered parts of the calf.
20 I will give them into the hand of their enemies and into the hand of those seeking their soul, and their carcasses will be food for the flyer of the heavens and for the beast of the earth.
21 And Zedekiah king of Judah and his chief officials I shall give into the hand of their enemies and into the hand of those seeking their soul and into the hand of the army of the king of Babylon which has moved away from you.
22 Behold, I shall give instruction, averring is Yahweh, and I will bring them back to this city. They will fight against it and seize it and burn it with fire, and the cities of Judah I shall make a desolation without dweller.

Chapter 35
1 The word which came to Jeremiah from Yahweh in the days of Jehoiakim son of Josiah, king of Judah, saying:
2 Go to the house of the Rechabites, and you will speak to them and bring them to the house of Yahweh to one of the rooms, and give them wine to drink.
3 So I took Jaazaniah son of Jeremiah, son of Habazziniah, and his brothers and all his sons, all the house of the Rechabites,
4 and I brought them to the house of Yahweh, to the room of the sons of Hanan son of Igdaliah, the man of Elohim, which was beside the room of the chief officials above the room of Maaseiah son of Shallum, the keeper of the threshold.
5 Then I placed before the sons of the house of the Rechabites beakers full of wine and cups, and I said to them, Drink some wine.
6 Yet they said, We do not drink wine, for Jonadab son of Rechab our father instructed us, saying, You shall not drink wine, you or your sons, until the eon.
7 You shall not build houses, nor shall you sow seed, nor shall you plant vineyards, nor shall one belong to you; for you shall dwell in tents all your days that you may live many days on the surface of the ground where you are sojourners.
8 And we have hearkened to the voice of Jonadab son of Rechab our father as to all that he instructed us, by no means to drink wine all our days, we, our wives, our sons and our daughters,
9 and by no means to build houses for us to dwell in, and vineyard and field and seed have not belonged to us.
10 But we have dwelt in tents and have hearkened and done according to all that Jonadab our father instructed us.
11 Yet it came to be when Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon came up to the land, we said, Come, we shall enter Jerusalem away from the presence of the army of the Chaldeans and from the presence of the army of the Syrian, and we shall dwell in Jerusalem.
12 Then the word of Yahweh came to Jeremiah, saying,
13 Thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: Go, and you will say to each one of Judah and to the dwellers of Jerusalem, Shall you not take admonition to hearken to My words? averring is Yahweh.
14 It has been carried out, the words of Jonadab son of Rechab who instructed his sons by no means to drink wine; they have not drunk it unto this day, for they have hearkened to their father’s instruction. Yet I Myself have spoken to you, rising early and speaking, yet you would not hearken to Me.
15 I sent to you all My servants the prophets, rising early and sending, saying: Turn back now, each man from his evil way, and amend your actions, and do not go after other elohim to serve them, and dwell on the ground which I gave to you and to your fathers. Yet you have not stretched out your ear, and you have not hearkened to Me.
16 Indeed the sons of Jonadab son of Rechab have carried out the instructions of their father which he instructed them, yet this people have not hearkened to Me!
17 Therefore, thus says Yahweh Elohim of hosts, Elohim of Israel: Behold, I shall bring on Judah and on all the dwellers of Jerusalem all the evil that I have spoken concerning them because I have spoken to them, and they have not hearkened; and I called to them, and they did not answer.
18 Yet to the house of the Rechabites, Jeremiah said, Thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: Because you have hearkened to the instruction of Jonadab your father, and you are observing all his instructions and are doing according to all that he instructed you,
19 therefore thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: There shall not be cut off from Jonadab son of Rechab a man standing before Me all the days.

Chapter 36
1 It occurred in the fourth year of Jehoiakim son of Josiah, king of Judah, that this word came to Jeremiah from Yahweh, saying:
2 Take for yourself the roll of a scroll, and write on it all the words that I have spoken to you concerning Israel, concerning Judah and concerning all the nations from the day I spoke to you in the days of Josiah until this day.
3 Perhaps the house of Judah shall hear of all the evil that I am designing to do to them, so that they may turn back, each from his evil way, and I will pardon their depravity and their sin.
4 So Jeremiah called Baruch son of Neriah, and Baruch wrote at the bidding of Jeremiah all the words of Yahweh which He had spoken to him, on the roll of a scroll.
5 Then Jeremiah instructed Baruch, saying, I am under restraint; I cannot enter the house of Yahweh.
6 So you must enter and read from the scroll which you have written at my bidding, the words of Yahweh, in the ears of the people in the house of Yahweh on a day of fasting. And also you shall read them in the ears of all of Judah who come from their cities.
7 Perhaps their supplication shall fall before Yahweh, and they shall turn back, each from his evil way, for great is the anger and the fury which Yahweh has spoken as to this people.
8 And Baruch son of Neriah did according to all that Jeremiah the prophet had instructed him, to read from the scroll the words of Yahweh in the house of Yahweh.
9 So it came to be in the fifth year of Jehoiakim son of Josiah, king of Judah, in the ninth month, all the people in Jerusalem and all the people who came from the cities of Judah into Jerusalem proclaimed a fast before Yahweh.
10 And Baruch read from the scroll the words of Jeremiah in the house of Yahweh, in the room of Gemariah son of Shaphan, the scribe, in the upper court at the portal of the new gate of the house of Yahweh, in the ears of all the people.
11 When Micaiah son of Gemariah son of Shaphan, heard all the words of Yahweh from the scroll,
12 he went down to the house of the king, to the room of the scribe, and behold, there all the chief officials were seated, Elishama the scribe, Delaiah son of Shemaiah, Elnathan son of Achbor, Gemariah son of Shaphan, Zedekiah son of Hananiah and all the other chief officials.
13 And Micaiah told them all the words which he had heard when Baruch read from the scroll in the ears of the people.
14 Then all the chief officials sent Jehudi son of Nethaniah, son of Shelemiah, son of Cushi, to say to Baruch, The scroll from which you read in the ears of the people, take it in your hand and come. So Baruch son of Neriah took the scroll in his hand and came to them.
15 They said to him, Be seated, please, and read it in our ears. So Baruch read it in their ears.
16 And it came to be when they heard all the words they were afraid, each before his associate, and they said to Baruch, We must tell, yea tell the king all these words.
17 They also asked Baruch, saying, Please tell us; how did you write all these words? At his bidding?
18 And Baruch said to them, At his bidding; he dictated to me all these words, and I wrote on the scroll with ink.
19 Then the chief officials said to Baruch, Go, be concealed, you and Jeremiah. Let not anyone know where you are!
20 Then they entered before the king in the court, yet they committed the scroll to the room of Elishama the scribe; and they told all the words in the ears of the king.
21 So the king sent Jehudi to procure the scroll; and he took it from the room of Elishama the scribe, and Jehudi read it in the ears of the king and in the ears of all the chief officials who were standing beyond the king.
22 Since it was the ninth month, the king was seated in the winter house, and a fire was blazing up on the brazier before him.
23 And it came to be as Jehudi read three or four scroll columns he would tear it with the scribe’s razor and fling it into the fire which was on the brazier until the entire scroll had come to end in the fire which was on the brazier.
24 Yet they were not afraid, nor did they tear their garments, neither the king nor all his officials who were hearing all these words.
25 Moreover Elnathan, Delaiah and Gemariah interceded with the king that he not burn the scroll, yet he did not hearken to them.
26 Then the king instructed Jerahmeel the king’s son, Saraiah son of Azriel and Shelemiah son of Abdeel to take hold of Baruch the scribe and Jeremiah the prophet. But Yahweh had concealed them.
27 The word of Yahweh came to Jeremiah after the king had burned the scroll, the words which Baruch had written at the bidding of Jeremiah, saying:
28 Do it again; take another scroll for yourself, and write on it all the former words which were on the first scroll that Jehoiakim king of Judah burned.
29 And concerning Jehoiakim king of Judah you shall say, Thus says Yahweh: You yourself burned this scroll, asking, For what reason have you written on it saying the king of Babylon shall come, yea come, and he will lay this land in ruins and eradicate from it human and beast?
30 Therefore thus says Yahweh concerning Jehoiakim king of Judah: He shall not come to have one staying on the throne of David, and his carcass shall be flung to the scorching heat of day and to the ice of night.
31 I will visit him and his seed and his officials for their depravity, and I will bring on them and on the dwellers of Jerusalem and on the men of Judah all the evil of which I have spoken to them, yet they did not hearken.
32 So Jeremiah took another scroll, and he gave it to Baruch son of Neriah, the scribe. And at the bidding of Jeremiah he wrote on it all the words of the scroll that Jehoiakim king of Judah had burned in the fire. And further there were added to them many words like them.

Chapter 37
1 Now king Zedekiah son of Josiah, whom Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon made king in the land of Judah, reigned instead of Coniah son of Jehoiakim.
2 Neither he nor his officials nor the people of the land hearkened to the words of Yahweh which He spoke by means of Jeremiah the prophet.
3 Yet king Zedekiah sent Jehucal son of Shelemiah, and Zephaniah son of Maaseiah the priest to Jeremiah the prophet, saying, Please pray in behalf of us to Yahweh our Elohim. (
4 Jeremiah was still entering and going forth in the midst of the people, for they had not yet put him in the house of detention.
5 Meanwhile the army of Pharaoh had gone forth from Egypt, and the Chaldeans who were besieging Jerusalem heard the report of them, and they went up from Jerusalem.)
6 Then the word of Yahweh came to Jeremiah the prophet, saying,
7 Thus says Yahweh Elohim of Israel: Thus shall you say to the king of Judah who has sent you to Me to inquire of Me, Behold, the army of Pharaoh which is marching forth to help you will return to its own land, Egypt.
8 And the Chaldeans will return and fight against this city; they will seize it and burn it with fire.
9 Thus says Yahweh: Do not lure your souls, saying, The Chaldeans shall go, yea go from us; for they shall not go.
10 Indeed if you smote the whole army of the Chaldeans which is fighting against you, and only men who have been stabbed remained of them, each in his tent, they would rise and burn this city with fire.
11 Now it came to be when the army of the Chaldeans went up from Jerusalem because of the army of Pharaoh
12 that Jeremiah was going forth from Jerusalem to go to the land of Benjamin to obtain his portion there in the midst of the people.
13 Yet when he was at the Gate of Benjamin, the headman of the checkpoint was there ( his name was Irijah son of Shelemiah son of Hananiah), and he apprehended Jeremiah the prophet, saying, You are falling in with the Chaldeans.
14 Jeremiah replied, That is false! I am not falling in with the Chaldeans! Yet he did not hearken to him, and Irijah apprehended Jeremiah and brought him to the chief officials.
15 And the chief officials were wrathful over Jeremiah, and they smote him and put him in a prison house, the house of Jonathan the scribe, for they had made it into a house of detention.
16 Thus Jeremiah came into the house of the cistern and into the cells, and Jeremiah remained there many days.
17 Then king Zedekiah sent and took him aside, and the king asked him secretly in his house, and said: Is there a word from Yahweh? Jeremiah answered, There is; and he said, You shall be given into the hand of the king of Babylon.
18 Jeremiah also said to king Zedekiah, How have I sinned against you or your officials or this people that you have put me into a house of detention?
19 Where are your prophets who prophesied to you saying, The king of Babylon shall not come against you and against this land?
20 And now please hear, my lord the king; please let my supplication fall before you, and do not return me to the house of Jonathan the scribe, that I might not die there.
21 So king Zedekiah gave instruction, and they committed Jeremiah to the jail court and gave him a loaf of bread each day from the street of the bakers until all the bread of the city came to end. And Jeremiah remained there in the jail court.

Chapter 38
1 Now Shephatiah son of Mattan, Gedaliah son of Pashhur, Jucal son of Shelemiah and Pashhur son of Malchijah heard the words that Jeremiah was speaking to all the people, saying,
2 Thus says Yahweh: He who stays in this city shall die by sword, by famine and by plague. Yet he who goes forth to the Chaldeans shall live, and he will have his soul which remains as loot, and he will live.
3 Thus says Yahweh: This city shall be given, yea given into the hand of the king of Babylon’s army, and he will seize it.
4 Then the chief officials said to the king, Now let this man be put to death, for the reason that he has slackened the hands of the men of war who remain in this city and the hands of all the people by speaking to them such words as these; indeed as for this man, he is not seeking after well-being for this people, but rather evil.
5 And king Zedekiah said, Behold, he is in your hand, for the king will not prevail over you in the matter.
6 So they took Jeremiah and flung him into the cistern of Malchijah the king’s son, which was in the jail court, and they sent Jeremiah down with rope lines. Now there was no water in the cistern, only mud, and Jeremiah was sinking into the mud.
7 Yet Ebed-melech the Cushite, a man who was a eunuch, heard (for he was in the king’s house) that they had put Jeremiah into the cistern. Now the king was sitting in the Gate of Benjamin,
8 and Ebed-melech went forth from the king’s house and spoke to the king, saying,
9 My lord the king, these men do evil in all that they have done to Jeremiah the prophet whom they have flung into the cistern that he might die because of it in view of the famine, for there is no more bread in the city.
10 Then the king instructed Ebed-melech the Cushite, saying, Take under your hand from this place three men, and bring Jeremiah the prophet up from the cistern ere he dies.
11 So Ebed-melech took the men under his hand, entered the king’s house and went to a place beneath the storehouse; and he took from there worn-out rags and worn-out scraps and sent them down to Jeremiah in the cistern by rope lines.
12 Then Ebed-melech the Cushite said to Jeremiah, Please place these worn-out rags and scraps under your armpits, under the rope lines. Jeremiah did so,
13 and they drew Jeremiah forth with the rope lines and brought him up from the cistern; and Jeremiah dwelt in the jail court.
14 Then king Zedekiah sent and took Jeremiah the prophet to himself at the third entry of the house of Yahweh. And the king said to Jeremiah, I am asking you something; do not suppress anything from me.
15 Jeremiah said to Zedekiah, In case I tell you, you would put me to death, yea to death, would you not? And in case I counsel you, you would not hearken to me.
16 Yet king Zedekiah swore to Jeremiah in secret, saying: As Yahweh lives, Who gives this soul to us, I shall assuredly not put you to death, and I shall assuredly not give you into the hand of these men who are seeking your soul.
17 Then Jeremiah said to Zedekiah, Thus says Yahweh Elohim of hosts, Elohim of Israel: If you shall go forth, yea go forth to the chief officials of the king of Babylon, your soul will live, and this city shall not be burned with fire, and you will live, you and your household.
18 Yet if you do not go forth to the chief officials of the king of Babylon, this city will be given into the hand of the Chaldeans, and they will burn it with fire, and as for you, you shall not escape from their hand.
19 Yet king Zedekiah said to Jeremiah, I am anxious about the Jews who have fallen in with the Chaldeans lest they should give me into their hand and they abuse me.
20 But Jeremiah said, They shall not give you up. Hearken now to the voice of Yahweh, to what I am speaking to you, and it shall be well for you, and your soul shall live.
21 Yet if you remain a refuser to go forth, this is the word which Yahweh has shown me:
22 Behold, all the women who remain in the house of the king of Judah shall be brought forth to the chief officials of the king of Babylon, and they shall say: They allured you and prevailed over you, These men speaking of your well-being; Your foot now is sunk in the morass; They are turned away back from you.
23 And all your wives and your sons shall be brought forth to the Chaldeans, and you yourself shall not escape from their hand, for you shall be apprehended by the hand of the king of Babylon, and this city shall be burned with fire.
24 Then Zedekiah said to Jeremiah, Do not let anyone know about these words, and you shall not die.
25 Yet in case the chief officials hear that I spoke with you, and they come to you and say to you: Now do tell us what you spoke to the king; do not suppress it from us, and we shall not put you to death; and what did the king speak to you?
26 then you will say to them: I was casting my supplication before the king by no means to turn me back to the house of Jonathan to die there.
27 And all the chief officials did come to Jeremiah and questioned him; and he told them all these words that the king had instructed. So they turned in silence from him, for the conversation had not been heard.
28 And Jeremiah dwelt in the jail court until the day that Jerusalem was seized. Now it came to be as follows that Jerusalem was seized:

Chapter 39
1 In the ninth year of Zedekiah king of Judah, in the tenth month, Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon and all his army came to Jerusalem and besieged it.
2 In the eleventh year of Zedekiah, in the fourth month, on the ninth of the month, the city was broken into.
3 And all the chief officials of the king of Babylon came and took their seat in the middle gateway: Nergal-sharezer, Samgar-nebo, Sarsechim the Rab-saris, Nergal-sharezer the Rab-mag, and all the remainder of the chief officials of the king of Babylon.
4 It came to be when Zedekiah king of Judah and all the men of war saw them that they fled away and went forth by night from the city by way of the king’s garden through the gateway between the two walls, and they went forth by way of the Arabah.
5 Yet the army of the Chaldeans pursued after them and overtook Zedekiah in the plains of Jericho where they took him and brought him up to Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon at Riblah in the land of Hamath, and he pronounced judgments on him.
6 Then the king of Babylon slew the sons of Zedekiah in Riblah before his eyes. The king of Babylon also slew all the notables of Judah.
7 Then he blinded the eyes of Zedekiah and bound him with two bronze fetters to bring him to Babylon.
8 Also the Chaldeans burned the house of the king and the houses of the people with fire, and they broke down the walls of Jerusalem.
9 As for the rest of the people who were remaining in the city and those who had fallen away, who fell to him, and the rest of the people who remained, Nebuzaradan the grandee of the imperial guard deported them to Babylon.
10 Yet some of the poorest people, who had nothing for themselves whatsoever, Nebuzaradan the grandee of the imperial guard let remain in the land of Judah, and he assigned to them vineyards and farmland in that day.
11 Now Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon had given instruction concerning Jeremiah into the hand of Nebuzaradan the grandee of the imperial guard, saying,
12 Take him and keep your eyes on him, and do not do anything evil to him, but rather in accord with what he speaks to you, so do for him.
13 Hence Nebuzaradan the grandee of the imperial guard sent, also Nebushasban the Rab-saris and Nergal-sharezer the Rab-mag and all the grandees of the king of Babylon,
14 and they sent and took Jeremiah from the jail court, and they gave him over to Gedaliah son of Ahikam son of Shaphan to bring him forth to the house where he could dwell in the midst of the people.
15 The word of Yahweh had come to Jeremiah while he was still under restraint in the jail court, saying:
16 Go and you will say to Ebed-melech the Cushite, saying, Thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: Behold, I shall bring to pass My words concerning this city for evil and not for good; and they will come to pass before you in that day.
17 Yet I will rescue you in that day, averring is Yahweh, and you shall not be given into the hand of the men before whom you shrink.
18 For I shall give you escape, yea escape, and you shall not fall by the sword, and your soul will come to be as loot for you, for you have trusted in Me, averring is Yahweh.

Chapter 40
1 The word which came to Jeremiah from Yahweh after Nebuzaradan the grandee of the imperial guard let him go at Ramah: When he took him up he was bound with manacles in the midst of all the deportees of Jerusalem and Judah who were being deported to Babylon.
2 The grandee of the imperial guard took Jeremiah and said to him, Yahweh your Elohim pronounced this evil against this place,
3 and He brought it to pass. Yahweh did it just as He said; for you sinned against Yahweh and did not hearken to His voice, and so this thing has happened to you.
4 Now behold, I unloose you today from the manacles that are on your hands. If it is good in your eyes to come with me to Babylon, come, and I shall keep my eye on you, yet if it is evil in your eyes to come with me to Babylon, then forbear. See, all the land is before you. Wherever seems good and upright in your eyes to go, then go there,
5 yet he still did not turn back or turn back to Gedaliah son of Ahikam son of Shaphan whom the king of Babylon has given supervision in the land of Judah, and dwell with him in the midst of the people, or wherever seems upright in your eyes to go, then go. And the grandee of the imperial guard gave him rations and carried-goods and sent him away.
6 So Jeremiah came to Gedaliah son of Ahikam at Mizpah and dwelt with him in the midst of the people who remained in the land.
7 When all the chief officials of the armed units that were in the field, they and their men, heard that the king of Babylon had given supervision in the land to Gedaliah son of Ahikam, and that he had given him supervision over the men and women and little ones of the poor in the land who were not deported to Babylon,
8 they came to Gedaliah at Mizpah: Ishmael son of Nethaniah, Johanan and Jonathan sons of Kareah, Seraiah son of Tanhumeth, the sons of Ephai the Netophathite, and Jaazaniah son of the Maacathite, they and their men.
9 Then Gedaliah son of Ahikam son of Shaphan adjured them and their men, saying, Do not fear to serve the Chaldeans. Dwell in the land and serve the king of Babylon, and it shall be well with you.
10 As for me, behold, I am staying in Mizpah to stand before the Chaldeans who are coming to us. Now you, gather wine, summer fruit and oil, and put them in your vessels, and dwell in your cities which you have taken possession of.
11 Also all the Jews who were in Moab, among the sons of Ammon and in Edom and who were in all the other lands heard that the king of Babylon had left a remnant for Judah and that he had given supervision over them to Gedaliah son of Ahikam son of Shaphan.
12 So all these Jews returned from all the places where they were driven away, and they came to the land of Judah to Gedaliah at Mizpah and gathered very much wine and summer fruit.
13 Now Johanan son of Kareah and all the chief officials of the armed units that were in the field came to Gedaliah at Mizpah
14 and said to him: Do you know, yea know, that Baalis king of the sons of Ammon has sent Ishmael son of Nethaniah to smite your soul? Yet Gedaliah son of Ahikam would not believe them.
15 Then Johanan son of Kareah spoke to Gedaliah in secret at Mizpah, saying, Now let me go and smite Ishmael son of Nethaniah, and no one shall know. Why should he smite your soul so that all Judah which is convened to you would be scattered, and the remnant of Judah perish?
16 Yet Gedaliah son of Ahikam said to Johanan son of Kareah: Do not do this thing, for you are speaking falsehood concerning Ishmael.

Chapter 41
1 It occurred in the seventh month that Ishmael son of Nethaniah son of Elishama who was of royal seed and one of the king’s grandees, and ten men with him, came to Gedaliah son of Ahikam at Mizpah. And they ate bread there together at Mizpah.
2 Yet Ishmael son of Nethaniah and the ten men who were with him rose and smote Gedaliah son of Ahikam son of Shaphan with a sword and put him to death whom the king of Babylon had given supervision in the land.
3 Then Ishmael smote all the Jews who were with him, with Gedaliah at Mizpah, as well as the Chaldeans who were found there, the men of war.
4 Now it came to be on the second day after Gedaliah was put to death while no one knew,
5 that men came from Shechem, from Shiloh and from Samaria, eighty men with shaven beards and torn garments, and slashing themselves, with approach presents and frankincense in their hands to bring to the house of Yahweh.
6 And Ishmael son of Nethaniah went forth from Mizpah to meet them, going along walking and lamenting, and it came to be when he encountered them he said to them, Come to Gedaliah son of Ahikam.
7 Then it came about as they entered into the midst of the city that Ishmael son of Nethaniah slew them and threw them into the midst of the cistern, he and the men who were with him.
8 Yet ten men were found among them who said to Ishmael, Do not put us to death, for we have buried goods in the fields, wheat, barley, oil and honey. So he desisted and did not put them to death in the midst of their brothers.
9 The cistern where Ishmael flung all the corpses of the men whom he smote was a great cistern; it was that which king Asa had made because of Baasha king of Israel; it was the one Ishmael son of Nethaniah filled with the slain.
10 Then Ishmael took captive all the remnant of the people who were in Mizpah, the daughters of the king and all the people who remained in Mizpah over whom Nebuzaradan grandee of the imperial guard had given supervision to Gedaliah son of Ahikam. Ishmael son of Nethaniah took them captive and went to pass over to the sons of Ammon.
11 When Johanan son of Kareah and all the chief officials of the armed units who were with him heard of all the evil which Ishmael son of Nethaniah had done,
12 they took all their men and went to fight against Ishmael son of Nethaniah; and they found him by the great water pool at Gibeon.
13 And it came to be when all the people who were with Ishmael saw Johanan son of Kareah and all the chief officials of the armed units who were with him, they rejoiced.
14 So all the people whom Ishmael had captured from Mizpah turned around, and they returned and went about to Johanan son of Kareah.
15 Yet Ishmael son of Nethaniah escaped with eight men from the face of Johanan, and he went to the sons of Ammon.
16 Then Johanan son of Kareah and all the chief officials of the armed units who were with him took all the remnant of the people whom Ishmael son of Nethaniah had taken captive from Mizpah after he had smitten Gedaliah son of Ahikam, masters, the men of war, women, little ones and eunuchs, whom he had restored from Gibeon.
17 They went about and stayed at Geruth Chimham which was beside Bethlehem so as to go and enter Egypt
18 because of the Chaldeans; for they were fearful because of them, since Ishmael son of Nethaniah had smitten Gedaliah son of Ahikam whom the king of Babylon had given supervision in the land.

Chapter 42
1 Now all the chief officials of the armed units, Johanan son of Kareah, Jezaniah son of Hoshaiah and all the people from the smallest unto the greatest came close
2 and said to Jeremiah the prophet, Please let our supplication fall before you, and pray on our behalf to Yahweh your Elohim on behalf of all this remnant, for we are left as a little remnant out of many, just as your eyes are seeing concerning us.
3 And let Yahweh your Elohim tell us the way in which we should go and the thing which we should do.
4 Then Jeremiah the prophet said to them: I have heard; behold, I shall pray to Yahweh your Elohim according to your words, and it will be that every word that Yahweh shall answer you I shall tell you. I shall not withhold a word from you.
5 They then said to Jeremiah, May Yahweh be a true and faithful witness against us if we should not do according to all the word that Yahweh your Elohim sends you for us.
6 Whether good or evil, we shall hearken to the voice of Yahweh our Elohim to Whom we are sending you, so that it may be well with us. Indeed we shall hearken to the voice of Yahweh our Elohim.
7 It came to be at the end of ten days that the word of Yahweh came to Jeremiah.
8 So he called to Johanan son of Kareah and all the chief officials of the armed units who were with him and all the people from the smallest unto the greatest,
9 and he said to them, Thus says Yahweh Elohim of Israel to Whom you sent me to cast your supplication before Him:
10 If you shall dwell, yea dwell in this land, then I will build you up and shall not pull down, and I will plant you and shall not pluck up, for I regret the evil which I have done to you.
11 Do not be fearful because of the king of Babylon, of whom you are in fear. Because of him do not be fearful of him, averring is Yahweh, for I am with you to save you, and to rescue you from his hand.
12 I shall grant you compassions that he may have compassion on you and restore you to your ground.
13 Yet if you are saying, We shall not dwell in this land, so that you not hearken to the voice of Yahweh your Elohim,
14 saying, No, for we shall enter the land of Egypt, where we shall not see war or hear the sound of the trumpet, where we shall not famish for bread; and there we shall dwell,
15 then now hear, therefore, the word of Yahweh, remnant of Judah; thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: If you shall set, yea set your faces to enter Egypt, and you enter to sojourn there,
16 the sword of which you are fearful will come, and it shall overtake you there in the land of Egypt, and the famine of which you are anxious shall follow hard after you there in Egypt, and there you shall die.
17 It shall be that all the men who set their faces to enter Egypt to sojourn there shall die by sword, by famine and by plague, and not one of them shall be a survivor or a delivered one from the presence of the evil which I shall bring upon them.
18 For thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: Just as My anger and My fury have been poured out on the dwellers of Jerusalem, so shall My fury be poured out on you when you enter Egypt; you will become an execration and an appalling object and a malediction and a reproach, and you shall not see this place again.
19 Yahweh has spoken concerning you. Remnant of Judah, do not enter Egypt. You do know, yea know, for I testify among you today
20 that you stray with your souls, for you yourselves sent me to Yahweh your Elohim, saying, Pray on our behalf to Yahweh our Elohim, and according to all that Yahweh our Elohim shall say, so tell us, and we will do it!
21 Hence I am telling you today, yet you do not hearken to the voice of Yahweh your Elohim and to all that He sends me to tell you.
22 So now you know, yea know that you shall die by sword, by famine and by plague in that place where you desire to enter to sojourn.

Chapter 43
1 Yet it came to be when Jeremiah finished speaking to all the people all the words of Yahweh their Elohim which Yahweh their Elohim had sent him for them, all these words,
2 Azariah son of Hoshaiah and Johanan son of Kareah and all the other arrogant and rebellious men said to Jeremiah: You are speaking falsehood! Yahweh our Elohim did not send you, saying, You shall not enter Egypt to sojourn there.
3 Indeed Baruch son of Neriah is inciting you against us in order to give us into the hand of the Chaldeans, to put us to death or to deport us to Babylon.
4 So Johanan son of Kareah and all the chief officials of the armed units and all the people did not hearken to the voice of Yahweh to stay in the land of Judah.
5 Instead Johanan son of Kareah and all the chief officials of the armed units took all the remnant of Judah who had returned from all the nations where they had been driven away, to sojourn in the land of Egypt,
6 the masters, the women, the little ones, the daughters of the king and every soul whom Nebuzaradan grandee of the imperial guard had left with Gedaliah son of Ahikam son of Shaphan, as well as Jeremiah the prophet and Baruch son of Neriah.
7 And they entered the land of Egypt, for they did not hearken to the voice of Yahweh, and they came as far as Tahpanhes.
8 Then the word of Yahweh came to Jeremiah in Tahpanhes, saying:
9 Take in your hand large stones, and you will bury them in the clay-flooring, in the brick-terrace which is at the portal of Pharaoh’s house in Tahpanhes before the eyes of Jewish men,
10 and you will say to them, Thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: Behold, I am sending, and I will take Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon, My servant, and I will set his throne above these stones which I have buried; he will stretch out his state tapestry over them.
11 He will come and smite the land of Egypt: Those who are for death, to death; And who are for captivity, to captivity, And who are for the sword, to the sword.
12 Then he will ravage with fire the houses of the elohim of Egypt, and he will burn them or capture them, and he will muffle himself with the land of Egypt just as a shepherd muffles himself with his cloak, and he will go forth from there in peace.
13 He will break down the monuments of the house of the sun which is in the land of Egypt, and the houses of the elohim of Egypt he shall burn with fire.

Chapter 44
1 The word which came to Jeremiah for all the Jews who dwelt in the land of Egypt, who dwelt in Migdol and in Tahpanhes and in Noph and in the land of Pathros, saying:
2 Thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: You yourselves have seen all the evil which I brought upon Jerusalem and upon all the cities of Judah. Behold them this day deserted; there is not a dweller in them
3 because of their evil which they have done to provoke Me to vexation, going to fume incense to serve other elohim whom they had not known, they, you or your fathers.
4 Yet I have been sending to you all My servants, the prophets, rising early and sending, saying, Oh do not do this abhorrent thing which I hate.
5 But they did not hearken nor stretch out their ear to turn back from their evil, by no means to fume incense to other elohim.
6 So My fury and My anger were poured forth and consumed in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem so that they became a waste and a desolation as at this day.
7 And now, thus says Yahweh Elohim of hosts, Elohim of Israel: Why are you doing this great evil to your souls, to cut off for yourselves man and woman, infant and suckling from the midst of Judah, so as not to leave a remnant for yourselves,
8 to provoke Me to vexation by the works of your hands, to fume incense to other elohim in the land of Egypt where you have come to sojourn in order to cut yourselves off and in order that you become a malediction and a reproach among all the lands of the earth?
9 Have you forgotten the evils of your fathers and the evils of the kings of Judah and the evils of their wives and your own evils and the evils of your wives which they committed in the land of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem?
10 They are not contrite to this day, nor do they fear, nor do they go in My law and in My statutes which I have given before you and before your fathers.
11 Therefore thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: Behold, I shall set My face against you for evil, to cut off all Judah.
12 I will take the remnant of Judah who have set their face to enter the land of Egypt to sojourn there, and they all will be finished in the land of Egypt. They shall fall by sword; by famine they shall be finished from the smallest unto the greatest; by sword and by famine they shall die, and they will become an execration and an appalling object and a malediction and a reproach.
13 And I will call to account those dwelling in the land of Egypt just as I called Jerusalem to account, with sword, with famine and with plague.
14 There shall not be a delivered one or a survivor of the remnant of Judah who entered to sojourn there in the land of Egypt, nor one to return to the land of Judah where they lift up their soul to return and to dwell, yet they shall not return, save a few delivered ones.
15 Then they answered Jeremiah, all the men who knew that their wives were fuming incense to other elohim, and all the women who stood there, a great assembly, and all the people who were dwelling in the land of Egypt in Pathros, saying:
16 This word which you have spoken to us in the name of Yahweh none of us shall hearken to you.
17 For we shall do, yea do every thing that has come forth from our mouth: to fume incense to the queen of the heavens, and to libate libations to her just as we did, we and our fathers, our kings and our chief officials, in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem. Then we were surfeited with bread, and we were well off, and we did not see evil.
18 Yet since we halted fuming incense to the queen of the heavens and libating libations to her we have lacked everything, and we have been finished by sword and by famine.
19 And when we were fuming incense to the queen of the heavens and libated libations to her, was it apart from our men’s approval that we made biscuits for her depicting her and libated libations to her?
20 Then Jeremiah spoke to all the people concerning the masters and the women and all the people who were answering back to him this way, saying:
21 As to the incense which you fumed in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem, you and your fathers, your kings and your chief officials and the people of the land does not Yahweh remember them? It ascended on His heart,
22 and Yahweh could not bear it any longer because of the evil of your actions. Because of the abhorrences which you have done, your land became a waste and a desolation and a malediction without a dweller as at this day.
23 Because of the fact you fumed incense and you sinned against Yahweh and would not hearken to the voice of Yahweh, and in His law, in His statutes and in His testimonies you would not go, therefore this evil has befallen you as at this day.
24 Jeremiah further said to all the people and to all the women: Hear the word of Yahweh, all Judah who are in the land of Egypt.
25 Thus speaks Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel, saying: You and your wives, you have spoken with your mouth, and with your hands you have fulfilled it, saying, We shall perform, yea perform our vows which we have vowed, to fume incense to the queen of the heavens and to libate libations to her. You shall carry out, yea carry out your vows, and you shall perform, yea perform your vows!
26 Therefore hear the word of Yahweh, all Judah who dwell in the land of Egypt: Behold Me! I have sworn by My great Name, says Yahweh, that My Name shall assuredly not be called upon any longer by the mouth of any man of Judah in all the land of Egypt, saying, As my Lord Yahweh lives!
27 Behold, I am alert over them for evil and not for good, and every man of Judah who is in the land of Egypt will be spent by sword and by famine until they are finished.
28 And any delivered from the sword who return from the land of Egypt to the land of Judah will be men few in number, and all the remnant of Judah who entered the land of Egypt to sojourn there will know Whose word shall be confirmed, Mine or theirs.
29 This is the sign to you, averring is Yahweh, that I will call you to account in this place that you may know that My words shall be confirmed, yea confirmed against you for evil.
30 Thus says Yahweh: Behold, I shall give Pharaoh Hophra king of Egypt into the hand of his enemies, into the hand of those seeking his soul, just as I gave Zedekiah king of Judah into the hand of Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon his enemy who was seeking his soul.

Chapter 45
1 The word which Jeremiah the prophet spoke to Baruch son of Neriah when he wrote these words in a scroll at the bidding of Jeremiah in the fourth year of Jehoiakim son of Josiah king of Judah, saying:
2 Thus says Yahweh, Elohim of Israel, concerning you, Baruch:
3 You say, Woe to me, for Yahweh has added affliction to my pain. I am wearied with my sighing, and I do not find rest.
4 Thus you shall say to him, Thus says Yahweh: Behold, that which I have built I shall demolish, and that which I have planted I shall pluck up, that is, the entire land.
5 Yet you, are you seeking great things for yourself? Do not seek them. For behold, I shall bring evil upon all flesh, averring is Yahweh, yet I will grant you your soul as spoils in all the places where you go.

Chapter 46
1 That which came as the word of Yahweh to Jeremiah the prophet concerning the nations:
2 Concerning Egypt, about the army of Pharaoh Necho king of Egypt which was at the stream Euphrates in Carchemish, which Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon smote in the fourth year of Jehoiakim son of Josiah king of Judah:
3 Array with buckler and large shield, And come close for battle!
4 Harness up the horses, and mount up, you horsemen! Stand by with helmets on! Unsheathe the lances! Put on the coats-of-armor!
5 For what reason do I see them in dismay, turned away back? Their masterful men are pounded; In flight they flee, and they do not turn around! Shrinking fear is round about! averring is Yahweh.
6 Let not the fleet flee away, And let not the masterful man escape! Northward, by the side of the stream Euphrates, they stumble and fall.
7 Who is this who ascends like the Nile, Like streams whose waters reel?
8 It is Egypt who ascends like the Nile, And like streams whose waters reel. He said, Let me ascend; Let me cover the earth; Let me destroy both city and those dwelling in it!
9 On, you horses, And rave, you charioteers! Let the masterful men go forth, Cush and Put, who grasp the buckler, And the Ludim who grasp and position the bow!
10 Yet that day is for my Lord Yahweh of hosts, A day of vengeance to be avenged of His foes. The sword will devour and be surfeited And be soaked with their blood, For a sacrifice belongs to my Lord Yahweh of hosts In the land of the north by the stream Euphrates.
11 Ascend to Gilead and take balm, virgin daughter of Egypt; With futility do you multiply remedies; There is no recovery for you.
12 Nations have heard your dishonor, And your yelling fills the earth; For masterful man stumbles against masterful man; The two of them fall down together.
13 The word which Yahweh spoke to Jeremiah the prophet about the coming of Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon to smite the land of Egypt:
14 Tell it in Egypt, and announce it in Migdol; Announce it in Noph and in Tahpanhes. Say: Stand by and prepare yourselves, For the sword has devoured round about you.
15 For what reason is he flattened? Your sturdy one does not stand, For Yahweh thrusts him down.
16 Your multitude stumbles; Also each man falls over his associate; They are saying: Rise, and let us return to our people, And to the land of our birth, in view of the tyrannizing sword.
17 Call the name of Pharaoh king of Egypt: The tumult who let the appointed time pass by.
18 As I live, averring is the King, Yahweh of hosts is His Name: Like Tabor among the mountains, And like Carmel by the sea, so shall he come.
19 Prepare for yourself gear for deportation, Dweller, daughter of Egypt, For Noph shall become a desolation, And it will be ravaged without a dweller.
20 A most lovely heifer is Egypt; A horsefly from the north has come upon her.
21 Moreover, her hirelings among her who were like stall-fed calves, They too turn around; They flee together; They do not stand; For the day of their calamity has come on them, The era of their visitation.
22 She makes a sound like a serpent as it goes away, For they are marching with potent power, And with hatchets they come against her like men chopping trees.
23 They cut down her wildwood, averring is Yahweh, Since it cannot be searched out; Indeed they are more numerous than the locust, And there is no numbering of them.
24 Shamed is the daughter of Egypt; She is given into the hand of the people of the north.
25 Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel, has said: Behold, I shall call to account Amon of No and Pharaoh, even Egypt and her elohim and her kings and Pharaoh with those who trust in him.
26 I will give them into the hand of those seeking their soul, and into the hand of Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon and into the hand of his officials, and afterward she shall tabernacle as in former days, averring is Yahweh.
27 And you, do not fear, My servant Jacob, And do not be dismayed, Israel; For behold, I shall save you from afar And your seed from the land of their captivity; And Jacob will return and be given quietness And be tranquil with no one making him tremble.
28 You, do not fear, My servant Jacob, averring is Yahweh, For I am with you; Indeed I shall make an end of all the nations where I have driven you away; Yet I shall not make an end of you, Though I discipline you for judgment And am not holding you innocent, nay innocent.

Chapter 47
1 That which came as the word of Yahweh to Jeremiah the prophet concerning the Philistines ere Pharaoh smote Gaza:
2 Thus says Yahweh: Behold, waters are ascending from the north, And they become an overflowing torrent; They shall overflow the land and its fullness, Both city and the dwellers in it; Humanity will cry out, And all who dwell in the land will howl.
3 At the sound of the thudding of hooves of his sturdy beasts, At the quaking of his chariots, The clamor of his rolling wheels, Fathers will not turn around to their children due to slackness of hands
4 Because of the day that is coming to devastate all the Philistines, To cut off from Tyre and Sidon every surviving helper, For Yahweh is devastating the Philistines, the remnant of the island of Caphtor.
5 Baldness comes to Gaza; Ashkelon is stilled, the remnant of their vale. How long shall you slash yourself?
6 Woe! Sword of Yahweh, how long shall you be unquiet? Be gathered back into your scabbard; Be lulled and still.
7 How can it be quiet when Yahweh has instructed it? Against Ashkelon and against the shore of the sea, there has He appointed it.

Chapter 48
1 Concerning Moab: Thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: Woe to Nebo, for she is devastated! Shamed! seized is Kiriathaim! The impregnable retreat is shamed and dismayed!
2 The praise of Moab is no more; In Heshbon they devise evil against her: Come, and let us cut her off from being a nation! Madmen, too, you shall be stilled; The sword shall follow after you!
3 The sound of a cry from Horonaim: Devastation and great brokenness!
4 Moab is broken! The outcry is made heard to Zoar.
5 For at the ascent of Luhith, one is ascending on it with lamentation; For at the descent of Horonaim, they hear the distresses of a cry of brokenness:
6 Flee! Escape with your souls! And you shall become like a dwarf juniper in the wilderness.
7 For because you trust in your deeds and in your treasures, you too shall be seized, And Chemosh will go forth into deportation, its priests and its chief officials together.
8 The devastator shall come to every city, And no city shall escape; The vale will perish, And the tableland will be exterminated, as Yahweh has said.
9 Set up a cairn for Moab, for she shall go forth, yea forth, And her cities shall become a desolation without a dweller in them.
10 (Cursed is one doing the work of Yahweh indolently, And cursed is one withholding his sword from bloodshed.)
11 Moab has been tranquil from his youth, And he has been quietly resting on his lees; He has not been emptied out from vessel to vessel And has not gone into deportation. Therefore his fine taste has lasted in him, And his bouquet is not changed.
12 Therefore behold, days are coming, averring is Yahweh, When I will send tilters to him, who will tilt him, And they shall empty his vessels and shatter his crocks.
13 Then Moab will be ashamed because of Chemosh, Just as the house of Israel was ashamed because of Bethel, their trust.
14 How can you say: We are masters of war And men of valor in battle?
15 The devastator of Moab and her cities ascends, And the choicest of his choice young men descend to the slaughter, Averring is the King, Yahweh of hosts is His Name.
16 The calamity of Moab is near to come, And evil on him hastens exceedingly.
17 Condole with him, all who are round about him, And all who know his name; Say: How the strong rod is broken, The beautiful stave!
18 Descend from glory; Sit in thirst, dweller of the daughter of Dibon, For the devastator of Moab has ascended upon you; He has ruined your fortresses.
19 On the road, stand and watch, dweller of Aroer; Ask him who flees and her who escapes; Say: What has happened?
20 Moab is put to shame, for it is undone; Howl and cry out! Tell at the Arnon that Moab is devastated!
21 Judgment has come on the level land, On Holon, on Jahzah and on Mephaath,
22 On Dibon, on Nebo and on Beth-diblathaim,
23 On Kiriathaim, on Beth-gamul and on Beth-meon,
24 On Kerioth and on Bozrah, And on all the cities of the land of Moab, far and near.
25 The horn of Moab is hacked off, And his arm is broken, averring is Yahweh.
26 Make him drunk, For he has magnified himself against Yahweh; Moab will slump into his vomit, And he too will become an object of sport.
27 Assuredly Israel became the object of sport to you; as if he was found among thieves, Indeed as often as your words were about him you shook your head.
28 Forsake the cities, And tabernacle among the crags, dwellers of Moab! Become like a dove that is making her nest in the sides of the inlet to a dark hole.
29 We hear of the pomp of Moab, very proud, His haughtiness and his pomp and his pride, And the highness of his heart.
30 I Myself know his overbearing, averring is Yahweh, And his pretenses, which are not so, Not so in what they do.
31 Therefore I shall howl over Moab, And I shall cry out for Moab, all of it; For the men of Kir-hareseth I shall soliloquize.
32 More than the lamentation of Jazer I shall lament for you, vine of Sibmah; Your vine-branches passed over to the sea; They touched as far as the sea of Jazer; Upon your summer fruit and upon your vintage the devastator has fallen.
33 Rejoicing and exultation have been swept up from the cropland, From the land of Moab, And I have caused the wine from the winevats to cease; The treader is not treading; The vintage-shout is not a vintage-shout.
34 From the outcry of Heshbon unto Elealeh, They raise their voice unto Jahaz, From Zoar unto Horonaim and Eglath-shelishiyah; Indeed even the waters of Nimrim shall become desolations.
35 I will eradicate from Moab, averring is Yahweh, Him who offers up on a high-place and fumes incense to his elohim.
36 Therefore, My heart keens like flutes for Moab; My heart keens like flutes for the men of Kir-hareseth; Therefore, the surplus one has made they will lose.
37 For on every head is baldness, And every beard is hacked off; On all hands are slashes, And on all waists sackcloth.
38 On all the housetops of Moab and in its squares, all of it is wailing; For I have broken Moab like a vessel in which there is no delight, averring is Yahweh.
39 How it is undone! Howl! How Moab has turned around the nape of his neck! He is shamed! Moab becomes an object of sport And a cause of dismay to all around about him!
40 For thus says Yahweh: Behold, like a vulture he swoops down And spreads his wings against Moab.
41 The towns are seized, And the fastnesses are taken possession of; The heart of Moab’s masterful men will become in that day Like the heart of a woman in her throes.
42 Moab will be exterminated from being a people, For he magnified himself against Yahweh.
43 Alarm and dark hole and snare are upon you, dweller of Moab, averring is Yahweh.
44 The one who flees because of the alarm, he shall fall into the dark hole; And the one who ascends from the dark hole, he shall be seized by the snare. For I shall bring upon it, upon Moab, the year of their visitation, averring is Yahweh.
45 In the shadow of Heshbon those who flee stand without vigor; For fire has gone forth from Heshbon, And a blaze from the house of Sihon, And it devours the edge of Moab And the crown of the head of the sons of tumult.
46 Woe to you, Moab! The people of Chemosh have perished! For your sons are taken captive, And your daughters into captivity.
47 Yet I will reverse the captivity of Moab in the latter days, averring is Yahweh. Thus far is the judgment of Moab.

Chapter 49
1 Concerning the sons of Ammon: Thus says Yahweh: Are there no sons for Israel? Or is there no one to enjoy the tenancy for him? For what reason does Milcom enjoy the tenancy of Gad, And do his people dwell in its cities?
2 Therefore behold, days are coming, averring is Yahweh, When I will make heard, against Rabbah of the sons of Ammon, the shout of war; It will become a ruin-mound of desolation, And her outskirts shall be ravaged with fire, And Israel will dispossess his dispossessors, declares Yahweh.
3 Howl, Heshbon, for Ai is devastated! Cry, daughters of Rabbah! Gird on sackcloth; wail! Go to and fro among the stone dikes, For Milcom is going into deportation, His priests and his chief officials together.
4 Why are you boasting about the vales, Your prolific vales, backsliding daughter, You who are trusting in its treasures, Who are saying: Who shall come against me?
5 Behold, I shall bring upon you alarm, averring is my Lord, Yahweh of hosts, From all round about you, And you will be driven away, each one straight before himself, And there will be no one gathering together the wanderer.
6 Yet afterward I shall reverse the captivity of the sons of Ammon, averring is Yahweh.
7 Concerning Edom: Thus says Yahweh of hosts: Is wisdom no longer in Teman? Has counsel perished from the astute? Has their wisdom gone stale?
8 Flee! Be turned around! Find depths in which to dwell, dwellers of Dedan! For I will bring on him the calamity of Esau, The era when I call him to account.
9 If grape pickers came to you would they not let some clean-gleanings remain? If thieves in the night, they would ruin no more than their quota.
10 But I Myself have bared Esau; I have exposed his places of concealment, So he is not able to hide; Devastated are his seed, his kinsmen and his neighbors, And there is no one to say:
11 Leave your orphans; I myself shall keep them alive; And let your widows trust in me.
12 For thus says Yahweh: Behold, if they who are not duly bound to drink the cup still must drink, yea drink, shall you be one exempted, yea exempted? You shall not be exempted, for you shall drink, yea drink!
13 For by Myself I have sworn, averring is Yahweh, that Bozrah shall become an appalling thing, a reproach, a wasted place and a malediction, and all her cities shall become eonian wastes!
14 I hear a report from Yahweh; An agent is sent among the nations: Gather together and come against her, And rise for battle!
15 For behold, I have made you small among the nations, Despised among humanity.
16 Your obscene idol lures you, The arrogance of your heart, You who are tabernacling in the clefts of the crag, Who are grasping the height of the hill; Though you make your nest as lofty as the vulture, From there I shall bring you down, averring is Yahweh.
17 Edom will become an object of astonishment; Everyone passing by her shall be appalled And shall hiss at all her smitings.
18 Like the overturning of Sodom and Gomorrah And its neighbors, says Yahweh, No man shall dwell there, And no son of humanity shall sojourn in her.
19 Behold, like a lion that comes up from the jungle of the Jordan to the perennial homestead, Indeed in a moment I shall make him run from her; I shall note the choicest of her rams; For who is like Me? And who can summon Me? And what is this shepherd who can stand before Me?
20 Therefore, hear the counsel of Yahweh which He counsels against Edom, And His designs which He designs against the dwellers of Teman: Assuredly the farm-menials shall pull away their pieces! Assuredly their homestead shall be appalled over them!
21 At the sound of their fall, the earth quakes; The cry its voice is heard at the Sea of Weeds.
22 Behold, like a vulture he ascends and swoops down, And he spreads his wings against Bozrah, And the heart of Edom’s masterful men will become in that day Like the heart of a woman in her throes.
23 Concerning Damascus: Ashamed are Hamath and Arpad, For they have heard a report of evil; They are dissolved in anxiety like the sea that is not able to be quiet.
24 Damascus has grown slack; She turns around to flee, Yet trepidation holds her fast; Distress and cramps hold her as a woman giving birth.
25 How is it that the boasted city is not forsaken, The town of elation?
26 Therefore, her choice young men shall fall in her squares, And all the men of war shall be stilled in that day, averring is Yahweh of hosts;
27 I will ravage with fire at the wall of Damascus, And it will devour the citadels of Ben-hadad.
28 Concerning Kedar and the kingdoms of Hazor Which Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon smote: Thus says Yahweh: Rise, go up against Kedar, And devastate the sons of the east!
29 They shall take away their tents and their flocks, Their tent sheets and all their gear, And they shall carry off their camels for themselves; They will call out against them: Shrinking fear is round about.
30 Flee! Wander away very far! Dig deep to dwell, dwellers of Hazor, averring is Yahweh, For Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon has counseled a counsel against you, And he has designed a design against you!
31 Rise! Ascend upon a nation at ease, Dwelling in serenity, averring is Yahweh; It has neither double doors nor bar; They are tabernacling alone.
32 Their camels shall become plunder, And their cattle throng loot; I will toss them away to every wind, those who cut away the edge of their hair, And from all its sides I shall bring their calamity, averring is Yahweh.
33 Hazor will become the habitation of wild jackals, A desolation for the eon; No man shall dwell there, And no son of humanity shall sojourn in it.
34 That which came as the word of Yahweh to Jeremiah the prophet concerning Elam, at the beginning of the reign of Zedekiah king of Judah, saying:
35 Thus says Yahweh of hosts: Behold, I shall break the bow of Elam, The beginning of their mastery.
36 I will bring upon Elam four winds from the four ends of the heavens, And I will toss them away to all these winds; There shall not be a nation where the outcasts of Elam shall not come.
37 I will cause Elam to be dismayed before their enemies, And before those who seek their soul; I will bring evil upon them, the heat of My anger, averring is Yahweh, And I will send the sword after them until I have finished them.
38 I will place My throne in Elam, And I will destroy from there both king and chief officials, averring is Yahweh.
39 Yet it will come in the days hereafter, I shall reverse the captivity of Elam, averring is Yahweh.

Chapter 50
1 The word which Yahweh spoke concerning Babylon, concerning the land of the Chaldeans, by means of Jeremiah the prophet:
2 Tell among the nations and announce it! Lift up a banner; Announce it! Do not suppress it! Say: Babylon is seized; Bel is put to shame; Morodach is dismayed; Her fetishes are put to shame; Her idol clods are dismayed.
3 For a nation from the north has come up against her; It shall make her land a desolation, And there shall not be a dweller in her; From human unto beast they will wander away; They will go.
4 In those days and in that era, averring is Yahweh, The sons of Israel shall come, They and the sons of Judah together; Walking and lamenting, they shall go, And they shall seek Yahweh their Elohim.
5 They shall ask the way to Zion, Their faces turned thither; Come, and let us reattach ourselves to Yahweh By a covenant eonian that shall not be forgotten.
6 My people became a lost flock; Their shepherds led them astray; They turned them away on the mountains; They roved from mountain to hill; They forgot their reclining place.
7 All who found them devoured them, And their foes said, We are not guilty Because they sinned against Yahweh, The Homestead of Righteousness And the Expectation of their fathers, Yahweh.
8 Wander away from the midst of Babylon, And from the land of the Chaldeans, go forth, And become like the he-goats before the flock.
9 For behold, I shall rouse and bring up against Babylon An assembled force of great nations from the north land, And they will array themselves against her, And she shall be seized from there; Their arrows are like a master of war who causes bereavement; He shall not return empty handed.
10 So the Chaldeans will become loot; All who loot her shall be surfeited, averring is Yahweh.
11 Though you were rejoicing, Though you were joyous, robbers of My allotment, Though you were frolicking like calves in verdure, And you were neighing like sturdy beasts,
12 Your mother is shamed exceedingly; She who bore you is abashed; Behold the hindmost of the nations, A wilderness, arid and a steppe.
13 Because of the wrath of Yahweh she shall not be indwelt, And she will become a desolation, all of her; Whoever passes by Babylon shall be appalled And shall hiss at all her smitings.
14 Array yourselves against Babylon round about, All who position the bow; Shoot at her; Do not spare the arrow, For she has sinned against Yahweh.
15 Shout over her round about; She has given up her hand; Her bastions have fallen; Her walls are demolished; Indeed this is the vengeance of Yahweh; Avenge yourselves upon her; Just as she has done, do to her.
16 Cut off the sower from Babylon, And him who handles the sickle at harvest season; From the presence of the tyrannizing sword, Each man shall face to his own people, And each shall flee to his own land.
17 A dispersed flockling is Israel; Lions have driven him away; First the king of Assyria devoured him, And after this Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon picked his bones.
18 Therefore, thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: Behold, I shall call to account the king of Babylon and his land, just as I called to account the king of Assyria.
19 I will bring Israel back to his homestead, And he will graze in Carmel and Bashan, And in mount Ephraim and Gilead his soul shall be surfeited.
20 In those days and in that era, averring is Yahweh, The depravity of Israel shall be sought, yet there will be none, And the sins of Judah, yet they shall not be found, For I shall pardon those whom I leave as a remnant.
21 Against the land of Merathaim, go up against her, And against the dwellers of Pekod; put to the sword and doom them, averring is Yahweh, And do according to all that I instruct you.
22 The sound of battle in the land, And a great breaking!
23 How it is hacked down and broken, the sledgehammer of the entire earth! How Babylon has become an object of astonishment among the nations!
24 I set a trap for you, And you were seized, Babylon, yet you yourself did not know; You were found and also apprehended, for you were stirred up against Yahweh.
25 Yahweh has opened His storehouse, And He is bringing forth the weapons of His indignation, For that is the work my Lord Yahweh of hosts has in the land of the Chaldeans.
26 Come against her from the outmost part; Open her storage bins; Heap her up like grain-piles, and doom her; Let not a remnant remain for her.
27 Put all her young bulls to the sword; Let them go down to the slaughter; Woe to them, for their day has come, The era of their visitation!
28 The sound of those who flee, Delivered ones from the land of Babylon, To tell in Zion the vengeance of Yahweh our Elohim, Vengeance for His temple!
29 Summon the multitudes against Babylon, all who position the bow; Encamp against her round about; Let there not be any deliverance for her; Repay her according to her deed; According to all that she has done, do to her, For she has been arrogant against Yahweh, Against the Holy One of Israel.
30 Therefore her choice young men shall fall in her squares, And all her men of war shall be stilled in that day, averring is Yahweh.
31 Behold, I am against you, arrogant one! averring is my Lord Yahweh of hosts, For your day shall come, the era I call you to account!
32 Then the arrogant one will stumble and fall, And no one shall raise him up; I will ravage with fire in his cities, And it will devour all his surroundings.
33 Thus says Yahweh of hosts: Weighted down are the sons of Israel and the sons of Judah together, And all their captors hold them fast; They refuse to let them go.
34 Yet their Redeemer is steadfast, Yahweh of hosts is His Name; He shall contend for, yea contend for their cause That He may give respite to the land yet disturb the dwellers of Babylon.
35 A sword against the Chaldeans, averring is Yahweh, And against the dwellers of Babylon, And against her chief officials and her wise!
36 A sword against the deceiving inventors that they may be made foolish! A sword against her masterful men that they may be dismayed!
37 A sword against her horses and her chariots And against all the mixed multitude who are in her midst, that they may become like women! A sword against her treasuries that they may be plundered!
38 Scorching heat against her waters that they may dry up! For she is a land of carvings, And they rave among the dreaded idols.
39 Therefore the desert-beasts shall dwell with the desert-howlers, And ostriches will dwell in her; She shall not be indwelt again permanently Nor be tabernacled in for generation after generation,
40 Like Elohim’s overturning of Sodom and Gomorrah and their neighbors, averring is Yahweh; No man shall dwell there, And no son of humanity shall sojourn in her.
41 Behold, a people coming from the north, a great nation, And many kings are roused from the remote parts of the earth.
42 Bow and scimitar they hold fast; They are cruel and show no compassion; Their voice clamors like the sea, And on horses they ride, Arrayed like a man for battle against you, daughter of Babylon.
43 The king of Babylon has heard a report of them; And his hands fall slack; Distress holds him fast, Travail as a woman giving birth.
44 Behold, like a lion that comes up from the jungle of the Jordan to the perennial homestead, Indeed in a moment I shall make them run from her; I shall note the choicest of her rams; For who is like Me? And who can summon Me? And what is this shepherd who can stand before Me?
45 Therefore, hear the counsel of Yahweh which He counsels against Babylon, And His designs which He designs against the land of the Chaldeans: Assuredly the farm-menials shall pull away their pieces! Assuredly their homestead shall be appalled over them!
46 At the sound when Babylon is grasped, the earth is quaked, And the outcry is heard among the nations.

Chapter 51
1 Thus says Yahweh: Behold, I am rousing against Babylon And against the dwellers of Leb Kamai a ruinous wind.
2 I send winnowers to Babylon, and they will winnow her, And they shall make her land void, For they will come against her from round about on the day of evil.
3 Against him who positions let the bowman position his bow, And against him who mounts himself up in his coat-of-armor; Do not spare her choice young men! Doom all her military host!
4 The slain will fall in the land of the Chaldeans, And those who are stabbed, in her streets.
5 For Israel and Judah have not been widowed by Elohim, by Yahweh of hosts, But their land is full of guilt before the Holy One of Israel.
6 Flee from the midst of Babylon, And escape, each one with his soul; Do not be stilled in her depravity, For it is an era of vengeance for Yahweh; He shall pay the requital to her.
7 Babylon was a golden cup in Yahweh’s hand, making the entire earth drunk; The nations drank of her wine; therefore the nations are raving.
8 Suddenly Babylon fell and was broken; Howl over her! Take balm for her pain; Perhaps she shall be healed.
9 We would have healed Babylon, Yet she would not be healed; Forsake her! And let us go, each one to his land, For her judgment touches the heavens, And it is lifted unto the skies.
10 Yahweh has brought forth our righteousness; Come, and let us relate in Zion the deed of Yahweh our Elohim.
11 Furbish the arrows! Fill the arrow-cases! Yahweh has roused the spirit of the kings of the Medes, For His plan is against Babylon, to ruin it, For it is the vengeance of Yahweh, The vengeance for His temple.
12 Lift up a banner against the walls of Babylon; Make steadfast the guard; Set up sentinels; Prepare the ambushers; For Yahweh has both planned and done what He spoke against the dwellers of Babylon.
13 You who tabernacle by great waters, great in treasures, Your end has come, the full cubit length of your gain.
14 Yahweh of hosts has sworn by His soul: Indeed, assuredly I will fill you with humanity like young-locusts, And they will respond against you with a vintage-shout.
15 Yahweh is the Maker of the earth by His vigor, The Establisher of the habitance by His wisdom, And by His understanding He stretched out the heavens.
16 When He sounds forth His voice, there is a rumble of water in the heavens, And He brings up vapors from the end of the earth; He makes lightening bolts for the rain And brings forth wind from His treasuries.
17 Every human is proved irrational, without knowledge; Every goldsmith is put to shame by his carving, For his molten image is falsehood, And there is no spirit in them.
18 Vanity are they, a work of aberrations; In the era of their visitation they shall perish.
19 Not like these is the Portion of Jacob, For the Former of all is He, And Israel is the tribe of His allotment; Yahweh of hosts is His Name.
20 You are a maul for Me, My implement of war; With you I will shatter nations, And with you I will ruin kingdoms.
21 With you I will shatter the horse and its rider, And with you I will shatter the chariot and its charioteer.
22 With you I will shatter man and woman, And with you I will shatter elder and youth, And with you I will shatter choice young man and virgin.
23 With you I will shatter shepherd and his drove, And with you I will shatter farmworker and his team, And with you I will shatter viceroys and prefects.
24 And I will repay Babylon and all the dwellers of Chaldea for all their evil which they have done to Zion before your eyes, averring is Yahweh.
25 Behold, I am against you, Ruinous Mountain, averring is Yahweh, The ruiner of the entire earth; I will stretch out My hand against you And roll you down from the crags And make you a mountain of burnt waste.
26 They shall not take from you a stone for a corner Or a stone for foundations, For you shall become an eonian desolation, averring is Yahweh.
27 Lift up a banner on earth! Blow a trumpet among the nations! Hallow nations against her! Summon kingdoms against her, Ararat, Minni and Ashkenaz! Appoint against her a marshal! Bring up horses like the bristling young-locust!
28 Hallow nations against her, the kings of the Medes, its viceroys and all its prefects and every land of his rule.
29 The earth shall quake and travail, for the designs of Yahweh have arisen against Babylon, to make the land of Babylon a desolation without a dweller.
30 The masterful men of Babylon shun fighting; They sit in the fastnesses; Their mastery is parched; They have become like women; Her tabernacles are ravaged; Her bars are broken.
31 Runner is running to meet runner, And message-bearer to meet message-bearer, To tell the king of Babylon that his city is seized from end to end,
32 And the fords are taken possession of, And they have burned the marsh-reeds with fire, And the men of war are panicked.
33 For thus says Yahweh of hosts, Elohim of Israel: The daughter of Babylon is like a threshing site at the time of its treading; in a little while the time of harvest will come to her.
34 He devoured me, discomfited me, Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon; He put me down an empty vessel; He swallowed me down like a monster; He filled his paunch with my luxuries; He rinsed me out.
35 The violence to me and the devastation to me be on Babylon, saying is the dweller of Zion, And my blood be upon the dwellers of Chaldea, saying is Jerusalem.
36 Therefore, thus says Yahweh: Behold, I shall contend your cause, And I will avenge with vengeance for you; I will drain her sea and dry up her fountain.
37 Babylon will become rubble mounds, a habitation of wild jackals, An object of astonishment and hissing, without a dweller.
38 They roar together like sheltered lions; They shake like whelps of lions.
39 In their warmth I shall set out their feast, And I will make them drunk that they may be joyous; Then they will sleep an eonian sleep, And they shall not awake, averring is Yahweh.
40 I shall bring them down like butting lambs to slaughter, Like rams and he-goats.
41 How Sheshak is seized, And the praise of the entire earth is taken possession of! How Babylon has become an object of astonishment among the nations!
42 The sea has come up over Babylon; She is covered with its clamorous billows.
43 Her cities have become a desolation, An arid land and a steppe, A land where no one at all shall dwell in them, Nor shall a son of humanity pass through them.
44 I will call Bel to account in Babylon And bring forth from his mouth what he has swallowed; No longer shall nations stream to him; Even the wall of Babylon will fall.
45 Come forth from her midst, My people, And escape, each with his soul, from the heat of Yahweh’s anger!
46 Now lest your heart should become timorous, And you are fearful over a report that is heard in the land, For a report will come one year, And another report after it in the next year: Violence in the land! Ruler against ruler!
47 Therefore behold, days are coming, When I will call to account the carvings of Babylon, And all her land shall be ashamed, And all her slain shall fall in her midst.
48 The heavens and the earth and all that is in them shall be jubilant over Babylon, For from the north the devastators shall come against her, averring is Yahweh.
49 Indeed Babylon is to fall for the slain of Israel, Even as the slain of all the earth have fallen for Babylon.
50 You who are delivered from the sword, Go! Do not stay! Remember Yahweh from afar, And let Jerusalem come up on your heart.
51 We are shamed, for we have heard reproach; Mortification has covered our faces, For aliens have entered the grand sanctuary of the house of Yahweh.
52 Therefore behold, days are coming, averring is Yahweh, When I will call to account her carvings, And in all her land the mortally wounded shall groan.
53 Though Babylon should ascend to the heavens, And though she should fortress her stronghold to the height, From Me devastators shall come against her, averring is Yahweh.
54 The sound of an outcry from Babylon, And a great breaking from the land of Chaldea!
55 For Yahweh is devastating Babylon, And He destroys her loud voice; Their billows clamor like many waters; The tumult of their voice is raised.
56 For a devastator comes against her, against Babylon, And her masterful men are seized; Their bow is snapped, For Yahweh is an El of Requitals; He shall repay, yea repay.
57 I will make drunk her chief officials and her wise, Her viceroys, her prefects and her masterful men; They will sleep an eonian sleep, And they shall not awake, averring is the King, Yahweh of hosts is His Name.
58 Thus says Yahweh of hosts: The broad wall of Babylon shall be razed, yea razed, And her lofty gates shall be ravaged with fire; Peoples shall labor only for nought, And the folk shall be faint only for fire.
59 The word which Yahweh instructed Jeremiah the prophet to say to Seraiah son of Neriah son of Mahseiah when he went from Zedekiah king of Judah to Babylon in the fourth year of his reign ( Seraiah was chief over tributary presents).
60 Jeremiah wrote all the evil that would come to Babylon in one scroll, all these words which were written concerning Babylon.
61 And Jeremiah said to Seraiah: When you come to Babylon, then you will see and read all these words,
62 and you will say, O Yahweh, You Yourself have spoken concerning this place, to cut it off, so that there not remain in it a dweller from human unto beast, for it shall become eonian desolations.
63 Then it will come to be when you finish reading this scroll, you shall tie a stone to it, and you will fling it into the midst of the Euphrates,
64 and you will say, Thus Babylon shall drown, and she shall not rise, because of the evil which I am bringing upon her. [And they will be faint. Thus far the words of Jeremiah.]

Chapter 52
1 Zedekiah was twenty-one years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem for eleven years; his mother’s name was Hamutal daughter of Jeremiah from Libnah.
2 He did what was evil in the eyes of Yahweh according to all that Jehoiakim had done.
3 For it was on account of Yahweh’s anger that this occurred in Jerusalem and Judah, until He had flung them away from His presence. Zedekiah revolted against the king of Babylon.
4 It came to pass in the ninth year of his reign, in the tenth month on the tenth day of the month that Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon, he and his whole army, came up against Jerusalem. They encamped outside it and built siege work against it all around.
5 Thus the city came under siege until the eleventh year of king Zedekiah.
6 In the fourth month, on the ninth day of the month, the famine was unyielding in the city, and there was no bread for the people of the land.
7 When the city was broken into, all the men trained for war fled away; they went forth from the city at night by way of the gate between the two walls that were at the king’s garden, while the Chaldeans were all around against the city. When they advanced by way of the Arabah,
8 the army of the Chaldeans pursued after the king and overtook Zedekiah in the plains of Jericho, and all his army was scattered away from him.
9 Then they apprehended the king and brought him up to the king of Babylon by Riblah in the land of Hamath, and he pronounced judgments on him.
10 The king of Babylon slew the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes and also slew all the chief officials of Judah in Riblah.
11 Then he blinded the eyes of Zedekiah and bound him with two bronze fetters; and the king of Babylon brought him to Babylon where he put him in the house of supervision until the day of his death.
12 In the fifth month on the tenth day of the month, that is, the nineteenth year of king Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon, the grandee of the imperial guard, Nebuzaradan, who stood before the king of Babylon, came into Jerusalem.
13 He burned the house of Yahweh and the king’s house and all the houses of Jerusalem; he burned down every house of a great man with fire.
14 All the army of the Chaldeans that was with the grandee of the imperial guard tore down all the walls around Jerusalem.
15 As for some from the poor of the people and the rest of the people who were remaining in the city, and those who had fallen away, who fell to the king of Babylon, and the rest of the throng, Nebuzaradan the grandee of the imperial guard deported them.
16 Yet the grandee of the imperial guard, Nebuzaradan, let some of the poorest people of the land remain as vinedressers and as field hands.
17 As for the columns of bronze that were in the house of Yahweh, and the bases and the sea of bronze that were in the house of Yahweh, the Chaldeans broke them up and carried all their bronze to Babylon;
18 they also took away the pots and the shovels, the snippers, the sprinkling bowls, the spoons and all the articles of bronze with which they had been ministering.
19 The basins, the firepans, the sprinkling bowls the pots, the lampstands, the spoons and the sacrificial-bowls whatever were of gold, the grandee of the imperial guard took away as gold, and whatever of silver, as silver.
20 The two columns, the one sea and the twelve bronze oxen that were under the sea, and the bases that king Solomon had made for the house of Yahweh, the weight of their bronze of all these articles was not estimated.
21 As for the columns, eighteen cubits in rise was one column, and a thread of twelve cubits went around it, and its thickness was four fingers; it was hollow.
22 The capital on it was of bronze; the rise of one capital was five cubits, and the meshing and the pomegranates all around on the capital, the whole of it was of bronze. And the second column was like these, also the pomegranates.
23 There were ninety-six pomegranates with those for each direction; all the pomegranates were a hundred on the meshing round about.
24 The grandee of the imperial guard took Seraiah the principal priest and Zephaniah the second priest and three of the keepers of the threshold.
25 From the city he took one eunuch who had been supervisor over the men of war, and seven men of those appearing in the king’s presence who were found in the city, and the chief scribe of the military host who had been mustering the people of the land, and sixty men of the people of the land who were found inside the city.
26 The grandee of the imperial guard Nebuzaradan took them captive and made them go to the king of Babylon at Riblah.
27 The king of Babylon smote them and put them to death at Riblah in the land of Hamath. Thus Judah was deported, away from its ground.
28 This is the number of the people whom Nebuchadrezzar deported in the seventh year: 3,023 Jews;
29 in the eighteenth year of Nebuchadrezzar 832 souls from Jerusalem;
30 in the twenty-third year of Nebuchadrezzar, Nebuzaradan the grandee of the imperial guard deported of Jews, 745 souls; all the souls were 4,600.
31 It came to be in the thirty-seventh year of the exile of king Jehoiachin of Judah, in the twelfth month, on the twenty-fifth day of the month that Evil-morodach king of Babylon, in the first year of his reign, lifted up the head of Jehoiachin king of Judah and brought him forth out of the house of detention.
32 He spoke good things to him and put his covered seat above the covered seats of the other kings who were with him in Babylon.
33 He made him exchange the clothes of his detention, and he ate bread before him continually, all the days of his life.
34 As for his ration, a continual ration was given to him by the king of Babylon, the menu of a day in its day until the day of his death, all the days of his life.