Jeremiah 18–22

1This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD:

2“Go down at once to the potter’s house, and there I will give you My message.”

3So I went down to the potter’s house and saw him working at the wheel.

4But the vessel that he was shaping from the clay became flawed in his hand; so he formed it into another vessel, as it seemed best for him to do.

5Then the word of the LORD came to me, saying,

6“O house of Israel, declares the LORD, can I not treat you as this potter treats his clay? Just like clay in the potter’s hand, so are you in My hand, O house of Israel.

7At any time I might announce that a nation or kingdom will be uprooted, torn down, and destroyed.

8But if that nation I warned turns from its evil, then I will relent of the disaster I had planned to bring.

9And if at another time I announce that I will build up and establish a nation or kingdom,

10and if it does evil in My sight and does not listen to My voice, then I will relent of the good I had intended for it.

11Now therefore, tell the men of Judah and the residents of Jerusalem that this is what the LORD says: ‘Behold, I am planning a disaster for you and devising a plan against you. Turn now, each of you, from your evil ways, and correct your ways and deeds.’

12But they will reply, ‘It is hopeless. We will follow our own plans, and each of us will act according to the stubbornness of his evil heart.’”

13Therefore this is what the LORD says: “Inquire among the nations: Who has ever heard things like these? Virgin Israel has done a most terrible thing.

14Does the snow of Lebanon ever leave its rocky slopes? Or do its cool waters flowing from a distance ever run dry?

15Yet My people have forgotten Me. They burn incense to worthless idols that make them stumble in their ways, leaving the ancient roads to walk on rutted bypaths instead of on the highway.

16They have made their land a desolation, a perpetual object of scorn; all who pass by will be appalled and shake their heads.

17I will scatter them before the enemy like the east wind. I will show them My back and not My face in the day of their calamity.”

18Then some said, “Come, let us make plans against Jeremiah, for the law will never be lost to the priest, nor counsel to the wise, nor an oracle to the prophet. Come, let us denounce him and pay no heed to any of his words.”

19Attend to me, O LORD. Hear what my accusers are saying!

20Should good be repaid with evil? Yet they have dug a pit for me. Remember how I stood before You to speak good on their behalf, to turn Your wrath from them.

21Therefore, hand their children over to famine; pour out the power of the sword upon them. Let their wives become childless and widowed; let their husbands be slain by disease, their young men struck down by the sword in battle.

22Let a cry be heard from their houses when You suddenly bring raiders against them, for they have dug a pit to capture me and have hidden snares for my feet.

23But You, O LORD, know all their deadly plots against me. Do not wipe out their guilt or blot out their sin from Your sight. Let them be overthrown before You; deal with them in the time of Your anger.

1This is what the LORD says: “Go and buy a clay jar from a potter. Take some of the elders of the people and leaders of the priests,

2and go out to the Valley of Ben-hinnom near the entrance of the Potsherd Gate. Proclaim there the words I speak to you,

3saying, ‘Hear the word of the LORD, O kings of Judah and residents of Jerusalem. This is what the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel, says: I am going to bring such disaster on this place that the ears of all who hear of it will ring,

4because they have abandoned Me and made this a foreign place. They have burned incense in this place to other gods that neither they nor their fathers nor the kings of Judah have ever known. They have filled this place with the blood of the innocent.

5They have built high places to Baal on which to burn their children in the fire as offerings to Baal—something I never commanded or mentioned, nor did it even enter My mind.

6So behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when this place will no longer be called Topheth or the Valley of Ben-hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter.

7And in this place I will ruin the plans of Judah and Jerusalem. I will make them fall by the sword before their enemies, by the hands of those who seek their lives, and I will give their carcasses as food to the birds of the air and the beasts of the earth.

8I will make this city a desolation and an object of scorn. All who pass by will be appalled and will scoff at all her wounds.

9I will make them eat the flesh of their sons and daughters, and they will eat one another’s flesh in the siege and distress inflicted on them by their enemies who seek their lives.’

10Then you are to shatter the jar in the presence of the men who accompany you,

11and you are to proclaim to them that this is what the LORD of Hosts says: I will shatter this nation and this city, like one shatters a potter’s jar that can never again be repaired. They will bury the dead in Topheth until there is no more room to bury them.

12This is what I will do to this place and to its residents, declares the LORD. I will make this city like Topheth.

13The houses of Jerusalem and the houses of the kings of Judah will be defiled like that place, Topheth—all the houses on whose rooftops they burned incense to all the host of heaven and poured out drink offerings to other gods.”

14Then Jeremiah returned from Topheth, where the LORD had sent him to prophesy, and he stood in the courtyard of the house of the LORD and proclaimed to all the people,

15“This is what the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel, says: ‘Behold, I am about to bring on this city and on all the villages around it every disaster I have pronounced against them, because they have stiffened their necks so as not to heed My words.’”

1When Pashhur the priest, the son of Immer and the chief official in the house of the LORD, heard Jeremiah prophesying these things,

2he had Jeremiah the prophet beaten and put in the stocks at the Upper Gate of Benjamin, which was by the house of the LORD.

3The next day, when Pashhur released Jeremiah from the stocks, Jeremiah said to him, “The LORD does not call you Pashhur, but Magor-missabib.

4For this is what the LORD says: ‘I will make you a terror to yourself and to all your friends. They will fall by the sword of their enemies before your very eyes. And I will hand Judah over to the king of Babylon, and he will carry them away to Babylon and put them to the sword.

5I will give away all the wealth of this city—all its products and valuables, and all the treasures of the kings of Judah—to their enemies. They will plunder them, seize them, and carry them off to Babylon.

6And you, Pashhur, and all who live in your house, will go into captivity. You will go to Babylon, and there you will die and be buried—you and all your friends to whom you have prophesied these lies.’”

7You have deceived me, O LORD, and I was deceived. You have overcome me and prevailed. I am a laughingstock all day long; everyone mocks me.

8For whenever I speak, I cry out; I proclaim violence and destruction. For the word of the LORD has become to me a reproach and derision all day long.

9If I say, “I will not mention Him or speak any more in His name,” His message becomes a fire burning in my heart, shut up in my bones, and I become weary of holding it in, and I cannot prevail.

10For I have heard the whispering of many: “Terror is on every side! Report him; let us report him!” All my trusted friends watch for my fall: “Perhaps he will be deceived so that we may prevail against him and take our vengeance upon him.”

11But the LORD is with me like a fearsome warrior. Therefore, my persecutors will stumble and will not prevail. Since they have not succeeded, they will be utterly put to shame, with an everlasting disgrace that will never be forgotten.

12O LORD of Hosts, who examines the righteous, who sees the heart and mind, let me see Your vengeance upon them, for to You I have committed my cause.

13Sing to the LORD! Praise the LORD! For He rescues the life of the needy from the hands of evildoers.

14Cursed be the day I was born! May the day my mother bore me never be blessed.

15Cursed be the man who brought my father the news, saying, “A son is born to you,” bringing him great joy.

16May that man be like the cities that the LORD overthrew without compassion. May he hear an outcry in the morning and a battle cry at noon,

17because he did not kill me in the womb so that my mother might have been my grave, and her womb forever enlarged.

18Why did I come out of the womb to see only trouble and sorrow, and to end my days in shame?

1This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD when King Zedekiah sent to him Pashhur son of Malchijah and the priest Zephaniah son of Maaseiah. They said,

2“Please inquire of the LORD on our behalf, since Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon is waging war against us. Perhaps the LORD will perform for us something like all His past wonders, so that Nebuchadnezzar will withdraw from us.”

3But Jeremiah answered, “You are to tell Zedekiah that

4this is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: ‘I will turn against you the weapons of war in your hands, with which you are fighting the king of Babylon and the Chaldeans who besiege you outside the wall, and I will assemble their forces in the center of this city.

5And I Myself will fight against you with an outstretched hand and a mighty arm, with anger, fury, and great wrath.

6I will strike down the residents of this city, both man and beast. They will die in a terrible plague.’

7‘After that,’ declares the LORD, ‘I will hand over Zedekiah king of Judah, his officers, and the people in this city who survive the plague and sword and famine, to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon and to their enemies who seek their lives. He will put them to the sword; he will not spare them or show pity or compassion.’

8Furthermore, you are to tell this people that this is what the LORD says: ‘Behold, I set before you the way of life and the way of death.

9Whoever stays in this city will die by sword and famine and plague, but whoever goes out and surrenders to the Chaldeans who besiege you will live; he will retain his life like a spoil of war.

10For I have set My face against this city to bring disaster and not good, declares the LORD. It will be delivered into the hand of the king of Babylon, who will destroy it with fire.’

11Moreover, tell the house of the king of Judah to hear the word of the LORD.

12O house of David, this is what the LORD says: ‘Administer justice every morning, and rescue the victim of robbery from the hand of his oppressor, or My wrath will go forth like fire and burn with no one to extinguish it because of their evil deeds.

13Behold, I am against you who dwell above the valley, atop the rocky plateau— declares the LORD— you who say, “Who can come against us? Who can enter our dwellings?”

14I will punish you as your deeds deserve, declares the LORD. I will kindle a fire in your forest that will consume everything around you.’”

1This is what the LORD says: “Go down to the palace of the king of Judah and proclaim this message there,

2saying, ‘Hear the word of the LORD, O king of Judah, who sits on the throne of David—you and your officials and your people who enter these gates.

3This is what the LORD says: Administer justice and righteousness. Rescue the victim of robbery from the hand of his oppressor. Do no wrong or violence to the foreigner, the fatherless, or the widow. Do not shed innocent blood in this place.

4For if you will indeed carry out these commands, then kings who sit on David’s throne will enter through the gates of this palace riding on chariots and horses—they and their officials and their people.

5But if you do not obey these words, then I swear by Myself, declares the LORD, that this house will become a pile of rubble.’”

6For this is what the LORD says concerning the house of the king of Judah: “You are like Gilead to Me, like the summit of Lebanon; but I will surely turn you into a desert, like cities that are uninhabited.

7I will appoint destroyers against you, each man with his weapons, and they will cut down the choicest of your cedars and throw them into the fire.

8And many nations will pass by this city and ask one another, ‘Why has the LORD done such a thing to this great city?’

9Then people will reply, ‘Because they have forsaken the covenant of the LORD their God and have worshiped and served other gods.’”

10Do not weep for him who is dead; do not mourn his loss. Weep bitterly for him who is exiled, for he will never return to see his native land.

11For this is what the LORD says concerning Shallum son of Josiah, king of Judah, who succeeded his father Josiah but has gone forth from this place: “He will never return,

12but he will die in the place to which he was exiled; he will never see this land again.”

13“Woe to him who builds his palace by unrighteousness, and his upper rooms without justice, who makes his countrymen serve without pay, and fails to pay their wages,

14who says, ‘I will build myself a great palace, with spacious upper rooms.’ So he cuts windows in it, panels it with cedar, and paints it with vermilion.

15Does it make you a king to excel in cedar? Did not your father have food and drink? He administered justice and righteousness, and so it went well with him.

16He took up the cause of the poor and needy, and so it went well with him. Is this not what it means to know Me?” declares the LORD.

17“But your eyes and heart are set on nothing except your own dishonest gain, on shedding innocent blood, on practicing extortion and oppression.”

18Therefore this is what the LORD says concerning Jehoiakim son of Josiah king of Judah: “They will not mourn for him: ‘Alas, my brother! Alas, my sister!’ They will not mourn for him: ‘Alas, my master! Alas, his splendor!’

19He will be buried like a donkey, dragged away and thrown outside the gates of Jerusalem.

20Go up to Lebanon and cry out; raise your voice in Bashan; cry out from Abarim, for all your lovers have been crushed.

21I warned you when you were secure. You said, ‘I will not listen.’ This has been your way from youth, that you have not obeyed My voice.

22The wind will drive away all your shepherds, and your lovers will go into captivity. Then you will be ashamed and humiliated because of all your wickedness.

23O inhabitant of Lebanon, nestled in the cedars, how you will groan when pangs of anguish come upon you, agony like a woman in labor.”

24“As surely as I live,” declares the LORD, “even if you, Coniah son of Jehoiakim king of Judah, were a signet ring on My right hand, I would pull you off.

25In fact, I will hand you over to those you dread, who want to take your life—to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon and to the Chaldeans.

26I will hurl you and the mother who gave you birth into another land, where neither of you were born—and there you both will die.

27You will never return to the land for which you long.”

28Is this man Coniah a despised and shattered pot, a jar that no one wants? Why are he and his descendants hurled out and cast into a land they do not know?

29O land, land, land, hear the word of the LORD!

30This is what the LORD says: “Enroll this man as childless, a man who will not prosper in his lifetime. None of his descendants will prosper to sit on the throne of David or to rule again in Judah.”