Jeremias was a priest, a native of Anathoth, a priestly city in the tribe of Benjamin:
and was sanctified from his mother's womb, to be a prophet of God; which office he began
to execute when he was yet a child in age. He was in his whole life, according to the
signification of his name, Great before the Lord; and a special figure of Jesus Christ, in
the persecutions he underwent for discharging his duty; in his charity for his
persecutors; and in the violent death he suffered at their hands: it being an ancient
tradition of the Hebrews, that he was stoned to death by the remnant of the Jews who had
retired into Egypt.
Chapters:
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52
Douay Rheims - Old Testament
1 The words of Jeremias the son of Helcias, of the priests that were in Anathoth, in the land of Benjamin.
2 The word of the Lord which came to him in the days of Josias the son of Amon king of Juda, in the thirteenth year of his reign.
3 And which came to him in the days of Joakim the son of Josias king of Juda, unto the end of the eleventh year of Sedecias the son of Josias king of Juda, even unto the carrying away of Jerusalem captive, in the fifth month.
4 And the word of the Lord came to me, saying:
5 Before I formed thee in the bowels of thy mother, I knew thee: and before thou camest forth out of the womb, I sanctified thee, and made thee a prophet unto the nations.
6 And I said: Ah, ah, ah, Lord God: behold, I cannot speak, for I am a child.
7 And the Lord said to me: Say not: I am a child: for thou shalt go to all that I shall send thee: and whatsoever I shall command thee, thou shalt speak.
8 Be not afraid at their presence: for I am with thee to deliver thee, saith the Lord.
9 And the Lord put forth his hand, and touched my mouth: and the Lord said to me: Behold I have given my words in thy mouth:
10 Lo, I have set thee this day over the nations, and over the kingdoms, to root up, and pull down, and to waste, and to destroy, and to build, and to plant.
11 And the word of the Lord came to me, saying: What seest thou, Jeremias? And I said: I see a rod watching.
12 And the Lord said to me: Thou hast seen well: for I will watch over my word to perform it.
13 And the word of the Lord came to me a second time, saying: What seest thou? I see a boiling caldron, and the face thereof from the face of the north.
14 And the Lord said to me: from the north shall an evil break forth upon all the inhabitants of the land.
15 For behold I will call together all the families of the kingdoms of the north: saith the Lord: and they shall come, and shall set every one his throne in the entrance of the gates of Jerusalem, and upon all the walls thereof round about, and upon all the cities of Juda,
16 And I will pronounce my judgements against them, touching all their wickedness, who have forsaken me, and have sacrificed to strange gods, and have adored the work of their own hands.
17 Thou therefore gird up thy loins, and arise, and speak to them all that I command thee. Be not afraid at their presence : for I will make thee not to fear their countenance.
18 For behold I have made thee this day a fortified city, and a pillar of iron, and a wall of brass, over all the land, to the kings of Juda, to the princes thereof, and to the priests, and to the people of the land.
19 And they shall fight against thee, and shall not prevail: for I am with thee, saith the Lord, to deliver thee.
1 And the word of the Lord came to me, saying:
2 Go, and cry in the ears of Jerusalem, saying: Thus saith the Lord: I have remembered thee, pitying thy soul, pitying thy youth, and the love of thy espousals, when thou followedst me in the desert, in a land that is not sown.
3 Israel is holy to the Lord, the first fruits of his increase: all they that devour him offend: evils shall come upon them, saith the Lord.
4 Hear ye the word of the Lord, O house of Jacob, and all ye families of the house of Israel.
5 Thus saith the Lord: What iniquity have your fathers found in me, that they are gone far from me, and have walked after vanity, and are become vain?
6 And they have not said: Where is the Lord, that made us come up out of the land of Egypt? that led us through the desert, through a land uninhabited and unpassable, through a land of drought, and the image of death, through a land wherein no man walked, nor any man dwelt?
7 And I brought you into the land of Carmel, to eat the fruit thereof, and the best things thereof: ad when ye entered in, you defiled my land, and made my inheritance an abomination.
8 The priests did not say: Where is the Lord? and they that held the law knew me not, and the pastors transgressed against me: and the prophets prophesied in Baal, and followed idols.
9 Therefore will I yet contend in judgement with you, saith the Lord, and I will plead with your children.
10 Pass over to the isles of Cethim, and see: and send into Cedar, and consider diligently: and see if there hath been done any thing like this.
11 If a nation hath changed their gods, and indeed they are not gods,: but my people have changed their glory into an idol.
12 Be astonished, O ye heavens, at this, and ye gates thereof, be very desolate, saith the Lord.
13 For my people have done two evils. They have forsaken me, the fountain of living water, and have digged to themselves cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water.
14 Is Israel a bondman, or a homeborn slave? why then is he become prey?
15 The lions have roared upon him, and have made a noise, they have made his land a wilderness: his cities are burnt down and there is none to dwell in them.
16 The children also of Memphis, and of Taphnes have deflowered thee, even to the crown of the head.
17 Hath not this been done to thee, because thou hast forsaken the Lord thy God at that time, when he led thee by the way?
18 And now what hast thou to do in the way of Egypt, to drink the troubled water? And what hast thou to do with the way of the Assyrians, to drink the water of the river?
19 Thy own wickedness shall reprove thee, and thy apostasy shall rebuke thee. Know thou, and see that it is an evil and a bitter thing for thee, to have left the Lord thy God, and that my fear is not with thee, saith the Lord the God of hosts.
20 Of old time thou hast broken my yoke, thou hast burst my bands, and thou saidst: I will not serve. For on every high hill, and under every green tree thou didst prostitute thyself.
21 Yet I planted thee a chosen vineyard, all true seed: how then art thou turned unto me into that which is good for nothing, O strange vineyard?
22 Though thou wash thyself with nitre, and multiply to thyself the herb borith, thou art stained in thy iniquity before me, saith the Lord God.
23 How canst thou say: I am not polluted, and I have not walked after Baalim? see thy ways in the valley, know what thou hast done: as a swift runner pursuing his course.
24 A wild ass accustomed to the wilderness in the desire of his heart, snuffed up the wind of his love: none shall turn her away: all that seek her shall not fail: in her monthly filth they shall find her.
25 Keep thy foot from being bare, and thy throat from thirst. But thou saidst: I have lost all hope, I will not do it: for I have loved strangers, and I will walk after them.
26 As the thief is confounded when he is taken, so is the house of Israel confounded, they and their kings, their princes and their priests, and their prophets.
27 Saying to a stock: Thou art my father: and to a stone: thou hast begotten me: they have turned their back to me, and not their face: and in the time of their affliction they will say: Arise, and deliver us.
28 Where are the gods, whom thou hast made thee? let them arise and deliver thee in the time of thy affliction: for according to the number of thy cities were thy gods, O Juda.
29 Why will you contend with me in judgement? you have all forsaken me, saith the Lord.
30 In vain have I struck your children, they have not received correction: your sword hath devoured your prophets, your generation is like a ravaging lion.
31 See ye the word of the Lord: Am I become a wilderness to Israel, or a lateward springing land? why then have my people said: We are revolted, we will come to thee no more.
32 Will a virgin forget her ornament, or a bride her stomacher? but my people hath forgotten me days without number.
33 Why dost thou endeavor to shew thy way good to seek my love, thou who has also taught thy malices to be thy ways,
34 And in thy skirts is found the blood of the souls of the poor and innocent? not in ditches have I found them, but in all places, which I mentioned before.
35 And thou hast said: I am without sin and am innocent: and therefore let thy anger be turned away from me. Behold, I will contend with thee in judgement, because thou hast said: I have not sinned.
36 How exceeding base art thou become, going the same ways over again! and thou shalt be ashamed of Egypt, as thou wast ashamed of Assyria.
37 For from thence thou shalt go, and thy hand shall be upon thy head: for the Lord hath destroyed thy trust, and thou shalt have nothing prosperous therein.
1 It is commonly said: If a man put away his wife, and she go from him, and marry another man, shall he return to her any more? shall not that woman be polluted, and defiled? but thou hast prostituted thyself to many lovers: nevertheless return to me, saith the Lord, and I will receive thee.
2 Lift up thy eyes on high: and see where thou hast not prostuted thyself: Thou didst sit in the ways, waiting for them as a robber in the wilderness: and thou hast polluted the land with thy fornications, and with thy wickedness.
3 Therefore the showers were withholden, and there was no lateward rain: thou hadst a harlot's forehead, thou wouldst not blush.
4 Therefore at least at this time call to me: Thou art my father, the guide of my virginity:
5 Wilt thou be angry for ever, or wilt thou continue until the end? Behold, thou hast spoken, and hast done evil things, and hast been able.
6 And the Lord said to me in the days of king Josias: Hast thou seen what rebellious Israel hast done? she hath gone out of herself upon every high mountain, and under every green tree, and hath played the harlot there.
7 And when she had done all these things, I said: Return to me, and she did not return. And her treacherous sister Juda saw,
8 That because the rebellious Israel had played the harlot, I had put her away, and had given her a bill of divorce: yet her treacherous sister Juda was not afraid, but went and played the harlot also herself.
9 And by the facility of her fornication she defiled the land, and played the harlot with stones and with stocks.
10 And after all this, her treacherous sister Juda hath not returned to me with her whole heart, but with falsehood, saith the Lord.
11 And the Lord said to me: The rebellious Israel hath justified her soul, in comparison of the treacherous Juda.
12 Go, and proclaim these words toward the north, and thou shalt say: Return, O rebellious Israel, saith the Lord, and I will not turn away my face from you: for I am holy, saith the Lord, and I will not be angry for ever.
13 But yet acknowledge thy iniquity, that thou hast transgressed against the Lord thy God: and thou hast scattered thy ways to strangers under every green tree, and hast not heard my voice, saith the Lord.
14 Return, O ye revolting children, saith the Lord: for I am your husband: and I will take you, one of a city, and two of a kindred, and will bring you into Sion.
15 And I will give you pastors according to my own heart, and they shall feed you with knowledge and doctrine.
16 And when you shall be multiplied, and increase in the land in those days, saith the Lord, they shall say no more: The ark of the covenant of the Lord: neither shall it come upon the heart, neither shall they remember it, neither shall it be visited, neither shall that be done any more.
17 At that time Jerusalem shall be called the thrown of the Lord: and all the nations shall be gathered together to it, in the name of the Lord to Jerusalem, and they shall not walk after the perversity of their most wicked heart.
18 In those days the house of Juda shall go to the house of Israel, and they shall come together out of the land of the north to the land which I gave to your fathers.
19 But I said: How shall I put thee among the children, and give thee a lovely land, the goodly inheritance of the armies of the Gentiles? And I said: Thou shalt call me father and shalt cease to walk after me.
20 But as a woman that despiseth her lover, so hath the house of Israel despised me, saith the Lord.
21 A voice was heard in the highways, weeping and howling of the children of Israel: because they have made their way wicked, they have forgotten the Lord their God.
22 Return, you rebellious children, and I will heal your rebellions. Behold we come to thee: for thou art the Lord our God.
23 In very deed the hills were liars. and the multitude of the mountains: truly in the Lord our God is the salvation of Israel.
24 Confusion hath devoured the labor of our fathers from our youth, their flocks and their herds, their sons and their daughters.
25 We shall sleep in our confusion, and our shame shall cover us, because we have sinned against the Lord our God, we and our fathers from our youth even to this day, and we have not hearkened to the voice of theLord our God.
1 If thou wilt return, O Israel, saith the Lord, return to me: if thou wilt take away thy stumblingblocks out of my sight, thou shalt not be moved.
2 And thou shalt swear: As the Lord liveth, in truth, and in judgement, and in justice: and the Gentiles shall bless him, and shall praise him.
3 For thus saith the Lord to the men of Juda and Jerusalem: Break up anew your fallow ground, and sow not upon thorns:
4 Be circumcised to the Lord, and take away the foreskins of your hearts, ye men of Juda, and ye inhabitants of Jerusalem: lest my indignation come forth like fire, and burn, and there be none that can quench it: because of the wickedness of your thoughts.
5 Declare ye in Juda, and make it heard in Jerusalem: speak, and sound with the trumpet in the land: cry aloud, and say: Assemble yourselves, and let us go into strong cities.
6 Set up the standard in Sion. Strengthen yourselves, stay not: for I bring evil from the north, and great destruction.
7 The lion is come up out of his den, and the robber of nations hath roused himself: he is come forth out of his place, to make thy land desolate: thy cities shall be laid waste, remaining without an inhabitant.
8 For this gird yourselves with haircloth, lament and howl: for the fierce anger of the Lord is not turned away from us.
9 And it shall come to pass in that day, saith the Lord: That the heart of the king shall perish, and the heart of the princes: and the priests shall be astonished, and the prophets shall be amazed
10 And I said: Alas, alas, alas, O Lord God, hast thou then deceived this people and Jerusalem, saying: You shall have peace: and behold the sword reacheth even to the soul?
11 At that time it shall be said to this people, and to Jerusalem: A burning wind is in the ways that are in the desert of the way of the daughter of my people, not to fan, nor to cleanse.
12 A full wind from these places shall come to me: and now I will speak my judgments with them.
13 Behold he shall come up as a cloud, and his chariots as a tempest: his horses are swifter than eagles: woe unto us, for we are laid waste.
14 Wash thy heart from wickedness, O Jerusalem, that thou mayst be saved: how long shall hurtful thoughts abide in thee?
15 For a voice of one declaring from Dan, and giving notice of the idol from mount Ephraim.
16 Say ye to the nations: Behold it is heard in Jerusalem, that guards are coming from a far country, and give out their voice against the cities of Juda.
17 They are set round about her, as keepers of fields: because she hath provoked me to wrath, saith the Lord.
18 They ways, and thy devices have brought these things upon thee: this is thy wickedness, because it is bitter, because it hath touched thy heart.
19 My bowels, my bowels are in pain, the senses of my heart are troubled within me, I will not hold my peace, for my soul hath heard the sound of the trumpet, the cry of battle.
20 Destruction upon destruction is called for, and all the earth is laid waste: my tents are destroyed on a sudden, and my pavilions in a moment.
21 How long shall I see men fleeing away, how long shall I hear the sound of the trumpet?
22 For my foolish people have not known me: they are foolish and senseless children: they are wise to do evil, but to do good they have no knowledge.
23 I beheld the earth, and lo it was void, and nothing: and the heavens, and there was no light in them.
24 I looked upon the mountains, and behold they trembled: and all the hills were troubled.
25 I beheld, and lo there was no man: and all the birds of the air were gone.
26 I looked, and behold Carmel was a wilderness: and all its cities were destroyed at the presence of the Lord, and at the presence of the wrath of his indignation.
27 For thus saith the Lord: All the land shall be desolate, but yet I will not utterly destroy.
28 The earth shall mourn, and the heavens shall lament from above: because I have spoken, I have purposed, and I have not repented, neither am I turned away from it.
29 At the voice of the horsemen, and the archers, all the city is fled away; they have entered into thickets and have climbed up the rocks: all the cities are forsaken, and there dwelleth not a man in them.
30 But when thou art spoiled what wilt thou do? though thou deckest thee with ornaments of gold, and paintest thy eyes with stibic stone, thou shalt dress thyself out in vain: thy lovers have despised thee, they will seek thy life.
31 For I have heard the voice as of a woman in travail, anguishes as of a woman in labor of a child. The voice of the daughter of Sion, dying away, spreading her hands: Woe is me, for my soul hath fainted because of them that are slain.
1 Go about through the streets of Jerusalem, and see, and consider, and seek in the broad places thereof, if you can fins a man that executeth judgement, and seeketh faith: and I will be merciful unto it.
2 And though they say: The Lord liveth; this also they will swear falsely.
3 O Lord, thy eyes are upon truth: thou hast struck them, and they have not grieved: thou hast bruised them, and they have refused to receive correction: they have made their faces harder than the rock, and they have refused to return.
4 But I said: Perhaps these are poor and foolish, that know not the way of the Lord, the judgement of their God.
5 I will go therefore to the great men, and I will speak to them: for they known the way of the Lord, the judgement of their God: and behold these have together broken the yoke more, and have burst the bonds.
6 Wherefore a lion out of the wood hath slain them, a wolf in the evening, hath spoiled them, a leopard watcheth for their cities: every one that shall go out thence shall be taken, because their transgressions are multiplied, their rebellions are strengthened.
7 How can I be merciful to thee? thy children have forsaken me, and swear by them that are not gods: I fed them to the full, and they committed adultery, and rioted in the harlot's house.
8 They are become as amorous horses and stallions, every one neighed after his neighbor's wife.
9 Shall I not visit for these things, sayeth the Lord? and shall not my soul take revenge on such a nation?
10 Scale down the walls thereof, and throw them down, but do not utterly destroy: take away the branches thereof, because they are not the Lord's.
11 For the house of Israel, and the house of Juda have greatly transgressed against me, saith the Lord.
12 They have denied the Lord, and said, It is not he: and the evil shall not come upon us: we shall not see the sword and famine.
13 The prophets have spoken in the wind, and there was no word of God in them: these things therefore shall befall them.
14 Thus saith the Lord the God of hosts: Because you have spoken this word, behold I will make my words in thy mouth as fire, and this people as wood, and it shall devour them.
15 Behold I will bring upon you a nation from afar, O house of Israel, saith the Lord: a strong nation, an ancient nation, a nation whose language thou shalt not know, nor understand what they say.
16 Their quiver is as an open sepulchre, they are all valiant.
17 And they shall eat up thy corn, and thy bread: they shall devour thy sons, and thy daughters: they shall eat up thy flocks, and thy herds: they shall eat thy vineyards, and thy figs: and with the sword they shall destroy thy strong cities, wherein thou trustest.
18 Nevertheless in those days, saith the Lord, I will not bring you to utter destruction.
19 And if you shall say: why hath the Lord our God done all these things to us? thou shalt say to them: As you have forsaken me, and served a strange god in your own land, so shall you serve strangers in a land that is not your own.
20 Declare ye this to the house of Jacob, and publish it in Juda, saying:
21 Hear, O foolish people, and without understanding: who have eyes, and see not: and ears, and hear not.
22 Will not you then fear me, saith the Lord: and will you not repent at my presence? I have set the sand a bound for the sea, an everlasting ordinance, which it shall not pass over: and the waves thereof shall toss themselves, and shall not prevail: they shall swell, and shall not pass over it.
23 But the heart of this people is become hard of belief and provoking, they are revolted and gone away.
24 And they have not said in their heart: let us fear the Lord our God, who giveth us the early and the latter rain in due season: who preserveth for us the fullness of the yearly harvest.
25 Your iniquities have turned these things away, and your sins have withholden good things from you.
26 For among my people are found wicked men, that lie in wait as fowlers, setting snares and traps to catch men.
27 As a net is full of birds, so their houses are full of deceit: therefore are they become great and enriched.
28 They are grown gross and fat: andhave most wickedly transgressed my words. They have not judged the cause of the widow, they have not managed the cause of the fatherless, they have not judged the judgement of the poor.
29 Shall I not visit for these things, saith the Lord? or shall not my soul take revenge on such a nation?
30 Astonishing and wonderful things have been done in the land.
31 The prophets prophesied falsehood, and the priests clapped their hands: and my people loved such things: what then shall be done in the end thereof?
1 Strengthen yourselves, ye sons of Benjamin, in the midst of Jerusalem, and sound the trumpet in Thecua, and set up the standard over Bethacarem: for evil is seen out of the north, and a great destruction.
2 I have likened the daughter of Sion to a beautiful and delicate woman.
3 The shepherds shall come to her with their flocks: they have pitched their tents against her round about: every one shall feed them that are under his hand.
4 Prepare ye war against her: arise, and let us go up at midday: woe unto us, for the day is declined, for the shadows of the evening are grown longer.
5 Arise, and let us go up in the night, and destroy her houses.
6 For thus saith the Lord of hosts: Hew down her trees, cast up a trench about Jerusalem: this is the city to be visited, all oppression is in the midst of her.
7 As a cistern maketh its water cold, so hath she made her wickedness cold: violence and spoil shall be heard in her, infirmity and stripes are continually before me.
8 Be thou instructed, O Jerusalem, lest my soul depart from thee, lest I make thee desolate, a land uninhabited.
9 Thus saith the Lord of hosts: They shall gather the remains of Israel, as in a vine, even to one cluster: turn back thy hand, as a grape gatherer into the basket.
10 To whom shall I speak? and to whom shall I testify, that he may hear? behold, their ears are uncircumcised, and they cannot hear: behold the word of the Lord is become unto them a reproach: and and they will not receive it.
11 Therefore am I full of the fury of the Lord, I am weary with holding in: pour it out upon the child abroad, and upon the council of the young men together: for man and woman shall be taken, the ancient and he that is full of days.
12 And their houses shall be turned over to others, with their lands and their wives together: for I will stretch for my hand upon the inhabitants of the land, saith the Lord.
13 For from the least of them even to the greatest, all are given to covetousness: and from the prophet even to the priest, all are guilty of deceit.
14 And they healed the breach of the daughter of my people disgracefully, saying: Peace, peace: and there was no peace.
15 They were confounded, because they commmitted abomination: yea, rather they were not confounded with confusion, and they knew not how to blush: wherefore they shall fall among them that fall: in the time of their visitation they shall fall down, saith the Lord.
16 Thus saith the Lord: Stand ye on the ways, and see and ask for the old paths which is the good way, and walk ye in it: and you shall find refreshment for your souls. And they said: we will not walk.
17 And I appointed watchmen over you, saying: Hearken ye to the sound of the trumpet. And they said: We will not hearken.
18 Therefore hear, ye nations, and know, O congregation, what great things I will do to them.
19 Hear, O earth: Behold I will bring evils upon this people, the fruits of their own thoughts: because they have not heard my words, and they have cast away my law.
20 To what purpose do you bring me frankincense from Saba, and the sweet smelling cane from a far country? your holocausts are not acceptable, nor are your sacrifices pleasing to me.
21 Therefore thus saith the Lord: Behold, I will bring destruction upon this people, by which fathers and sons together shall fall, neighbor and kinsman shall perish.
22 Thus saith the Lord: Behold a people cometh from the land of the north, and a great nation shall rise up from the ends of the earth.
23 They shall lay hold on arrow and shield: they are cruel, and will have no mercy. Their voice shall roar like the sea: and they shall mount upon horses, prepared as men for war, against thee, O daughter of Sion.
24 We have heard the fame thereof, our hands grow feeble: anguish hath taken hold of us, as a woman in labor.
25 Go not out into the fields, nor walk in the highway: for the sword of the enemy, and fear is on every side.
26 Gird thee with sackcloth, O daughter of my people, and sprinkle thee with ashes: make thee mourning as for an only son, a bitter lamentation, because the destroyer shall suddenly come upon us.
27 I have set thee for a strong trier among my people: and thou shalt know and prove their way.
28 All of these princes go out of the way, they walk deceitfully, they are brass and iron: they are all corrupted.
29 The bellows have failed, the lead is consumed in the fire, the founder hath melted in vain: for their wicked deeds are not consumed.
30 Call them reprobate silver, for the Lord hath rejected them.
1 The word that came to Jeremias from the Lord, saying:
2 Stand in the gate of the house of the Lord, and proclaim there this word, and say: Hear ye the word of the Lord, all ye men of Juda, that enter in at these gates, to adore the Lord.
3 Thus saith the Lord of hosts the God of Israel: Make your ways and your doings good: and I will dwell with you in this place.
4 Trust not in lying words, saying: The temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, it is the temple of the Lord.
5 For if you will order well your ways, and your doings: if you will execute judgement between a man and his neighbor,
6 If you opress not the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow, and shed not innocent blood in this place, and walk not after strange gods to your own hurt,
7 I will dwell with you in this place: in the land, which I gave to your fathers from the beginning and for evermore.
8 Behold you put your trust in lying words, which shall not profit you:
9 To steal, to murder, to commit adultery, to swear falsely, to offer to Baalim, and to go after strange gods, which you know not.
10 And you have come, and stood before me in this house, in which my name is called upon, and have said: We are delivered, because we have done all these abominations.
11 Is this house then, in which my name hath been called upon, in your eyes become a den of robbers? I, I am he: I have seen it, saith the Lord.
12 Go ye to my place in Silo, where my name dwelt from the beginning: and see what I did to it for the wickedness of my people Israel:
13 And now, because you have done all these works, saith the Lord: and I have spoken to you rising up early, and speaking, and you have not heard: and I have called you, and you have not answered:
14 I will do to this house, in which my name is called upon, and in which you trust, and to the places which I have given you and your fathers, as I did to Silo.
15 And I will cast you away from before my face, as I have cast away all your brethren, the whole seed of Ephraim.
16 Therefore, do not thou pray for this people, nor take to thee praise and supplication for them: and do not withstand me: for I will not hear thee.
17 Seest thou not what they do in the cities of Juda, and in the streets of Jerusalem?
18 The children gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire and the women knead the dough, to make cakes to the queen of heaven, and to offer libations to strange gods, and to provoke me to anger.
19 Do they provoke me to anger, saith the Lord? Is it not themselves, to the confusion of their contenance?
20 Therefore thus saith the Lord God: Behold my wrath and my indignation was enkindled against this place, upon men and upon beasts, and upon the trees of the field, and upon the fruits of the land, and it shall burn, and shall not be quenched.
21 Thus saith the Lord of hosts the God of Israel: Add your burnt offerings to your sacrifices, and eat ye the flesh.
22 For I spoke not to your fathers, and I commanded them not, in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning the matter of burnt offerings and sacrifices.
23 But this thing I commanded them, saying: Hearken to my voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be my people: and walk ye in all the way that I have commanded you, that it may be well with you.
24 But they hearkened not, nor inclined their ear: but walked in their own will, and in the perversity of their wicked heart: and went backward and not forward,
25 From the day that their fathers came out of the land of Egypt, even to this day. And I have sent to you all my servants the prophets from day to day, rising up early and sending.
26 And they have not hearkened to me: nor inclined their ear: but have hardened their neck, and have done worse than their fathers.
27 And thou shalt speak to them all these words, but they will not hearken to thee: and thou shalt call them, but they will not answer thee.
28 And thou shalt say to them: This is a nation which hath not hearkened to the voice of the Lord their God, nor received instruction: Faith is lost, and is carried away out of their mouth.
29 Cut off thy hair, and cast it away: and take up a lamentation on high: for the Lord hath rejected and forsaken the generation of his wrath,
30 Because the children of Juda have done evil in my eyes, saith the Lord. They have set their abominations in the house in which my name is called upon, to pollute it;
31 And they have built the high places of Topeth, which is in the valley of the son of Ennom, to burn their sons, and their daughters in the fire: which I commanded not, nor thought on in my heart.
32 Therefore behold the days shall come, saith the Lord, and it shall no more be called Topeth, nor the valley of the son of Ennom: but the valley of slaughter, and they shall bury in Topeth, because there is no place.
33 And the carcasses of this people shall be meat for the fowls of the air, and for the beasts of the earth, and there shall be non to drive them away.
34 And I will cause ot cease out of the cities of Juda, and out of the streets of Jerusalem, the voice of joy, and the coice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride: for the land shall be desolate.
1 At that time, saith the Lord, they shall cast out the bones of the kings of Juda, and the bones of the princes thereof, and the bones of the priests, and the bones of the inhabitants of Jerusalem, out of their graves.
2 And they shall spread them abroad to the sun, and the moon, and all the host of heaven, whom they have loved, and whom they have served, and after whom they have walked, and whom they have sought, and adored: they shall not be gathered, and they shall not be buried: they shall be as dung upon the face of the earth.
3 And death shall be chosen rather than life by all that shall remain of this wicked kindred in all places, which are left, to which I have cast them out, saith the Lord of hosts.
4 And thou shalt say to them: Thus saith the Lord: Shall not he that falleth, rise again? and he that is turned away, shall he not turn again?
5 Why then is this people in Jerusalem turned away with a stubborn revolting? they have laid hold on lying, and have refused to return.
6 I attended, and hearkened; no man speaketh what is good, there is none that doth penance for his sin, saying: What have I done? They are all turned to their own course, as a horse rushing to the battle.
7 The kite in the air hath known her time: the turtle, and the swallow, and the stork have observed the time of their coming: but my people have not known the judgment of the Lord.
8 How do you say: We are wise, and the law of the Lord is with us? Indeed the lying pen of the scribes hath wrought falsehood.
9 The wise men are confounded, they are dismayed, and taken: for they have cast away the word of the Lord, and there is no wisdom in them.
10 Therefore I will give their women to strangers, their fields to others for an inheritance: because from the least even to the greatest all follow covetousness: from the prophet even to the priest, all deal deceitfully.
11 And they healed the breach of the daughter of my people disgracefully, saying Peace, peace: when there was no peace.
12 They are confounded, because they have committed abomination: yea rather they are not confounded with confusion, and they have not know how to blush: therefore shall they fall among them that fall; in the time of their visitation they shall fall, saith the Lord.
13 Gathering I will gather them together, saith the Lord, there is no grape on the vines, and there are no figs on the fig tree, the leaf is fallen: and I have given them the things that are passed away.
14 Why do we sit still? assemble yourselves, and let us enter into the fenced city, and let us be silent there: for the Lord our God hath put us to silence, and hath given us water of gall to drink: for we have sinned against the Lord.
15 We looked for peace and no good came: for a time of healing, and behold fear.
16 The snorting of his horse was heard from Dan, all the land was moved at the sound of the neighing of his warriors: and they came and devoured the land, and all that was in it: the city and its inhabitants.
17 For behold I will send among you serpents, basilisks, against which there is no charm: and they shall bite you, saith the Lord.
18 My sorrow is above sorrow, my heart mourneth within me.
19 Behold the voice of the daughter my people from a far country: Is not the Lord in Sion, or is not her king in her? why then have they provoked me to wrath with their idols, and strange vanities?
20 The harvest is passed, the summer is ended, and we are not saved.
21 For the affliction of the daughter of my people I am afflicted, and made sorrowful, astonishment hath taken hold on me.
22 Is there no balm in Galaad? or is no physician there? Why then is not the wound of the daughter of my people closed?
1 Who will give water to my head, and a fountain of tears to my eyes? and I will weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people.
2 Who will give me in the wilderness a lodging place of wayfaring men, and I will leave my people, and depart from them? because they are all adulterers, an assembly of transgressors.
3 And they have bent their tongue, as a bow, for lies, and not for truth: they have strengthened themselves upon the earth, for they have proceeded from evil to evil, and me they have not known, saith the Lord.
4 Let every man take heed of his neighbor, and let his not trust in any brother of his: for every brother will utterly supplant, and every friend will walk deceitfully.
5 And a man shall mock his brother, and they will not speak the truth: for they have taught their tongue to speak lies: they have laboured to commit iniquity.
6 Thy habitation is in the midst of deceit: Through deceit they have refused to know me, saith the Lord.
7 Therefore thus saith the Lord of hosts: Behold I will melt, and try them: for what else shall I do before the daughter of my people?
8 Their tongue is a piercing arrow, it hath spoken deceit: with his mouth one speaketh peace with his friend, and secretly he lieth in wait for him.
9 Shall I not visit them for these things, saith the Lord? or shall not my soul be revenged on such a nation?
10 For the mountains I will take up weeping and lamentation, and for the beautiful places of the desert, mourning: because they are burnt up, for that there is not a man that passeth through them: and they have not heard the voice of the owner: from the fowl of the air to the beasts they are gone away and departed.
11 And I will make Jerusalem to be heaps of sand, and dens of dragons: and I will make the cities of Juda desolate, for want of an inhabitant.
12 Who is the wise man, that may understand this, and to whom the word of the mouth of the Lord may come that he may declare this, why the land hath perished, and is burnt up like a wilderness, which none passeth through?
13 And the Lord said: Because they have forsaken my law, which I gave them, and have not heard my voice, and have not walked in it.
14 But they have gone after the perverseness of their own heart, and after Baalim, which their fathers taught them.
15 Therefore thus saith the Lord of hosts the God of Israel: Behold I will feed this people with wormwood, and give them water of gall to drink.
16 And I will scatter them among the nations, which they and their fathers have not known: and I will send the sword after them till they be consumed.
17 Thus saith the Lord of hosts the God of Israel: Consider ye, and call for the mourning women, and let them come: and send to them that are wise women, and let them make haste:
18 Let them hasten and take up a lamentation for us: let our eyes shed tears, and our eyelids run down with waters.
19 For a voice of wailing is heard out of Sion: How are we wasted and greatly confounded? because we have left the land, because our dwellings are cast down.
20 Hear therefore, ye women, the word of the Lord: and let your ears receive the word of his mouth: and teach your daughters wailing: and every one her neighbor mourning.
21 For death is come up through our windows, it is entered into our houses to destroy the children from without, the young men from the streets.
22 Speak: Thus saith the Lord: Even the carcass of man shall fall as dung upon the face of the country, and as grass behind the back of the mower, and there is none to gather it.
23 Thus saith the Lord: Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, and let not the strong man glory in his strength, and let not the rich man glory in his riches:
24 But let him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth me, for I am the Lord that exercise mercy, and judgment, and justice in the earth: for these things please me, saith the Lord.
25 Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, and I will visit upon every one that hath the foreskin circumcised.
26 Upon Egypt, and upon Juda, and upon Edom, and upon the children of Ammon, and upon Moab, and upon all that have their hair polled round, that dwell in the desert: for all the nations are uncircumcised in the flesh, but all the house of Israel are uncircumcised in the heart.
1 Hear ye the word which the Lord hath spoken concerning you, O house of Israel.
2 Thus saith the Lord: Learn not according to the ways of the Gentiles: and be not afraid of the signs of heaven, which the heathens fear:
3 For the laws of the people are vain: for the works of the hand of the workman hath cut a tree out of the forest with an axe.
4 He hath decked it with silver and gold: he hath put it together with nails and hammers, that it may not fall asunder.
5 They are framed after the likeness of a palm tree, and shall not speak: they must be carried to be removed, because they cannot go. Therefore, fear them not, for they can neither do evil nor good.
6 There is none like to thee, O Lord: thou art great and great is thy name in might.
7 Who shall fear thee, O king of nations? for thine is the glory: among all the wise men of the nations, and in all their kingdoms there is none like unto thee.
8 They shall all proved together to be senseless and foolish: the doctrine of their vanity is wood.
9 Silver spread into plates is brought from Tharsis, and gold from Ophaz: the work of the artificer, and of the hand of the coppersmith: violet and purple is their clothing: all these things are the work of artificers.
10 But the Lord is the true God: he is the living God, and the everlasting king, at his wrath the earth shall tremble, and the nations shall not be able to abide his threatening.
11 Thus then shall you say to them: The gods that have not made heaven and earth, let them perish from the earth, and from among those places that are under heaven.
12 He that maketh the earth by his power, that prepareth the world by his wisdom, and stretcheth out the heavens by his knowledge.
13 At his voice he giveth a multitude of waters in the heaven, and lifteth up the clouds from the ends of the earth: he maketh lightnings for rain, and bringeth for the wind out of his treasures.
14 Every man is become a fool for knowledge every artist is confounded in his graven idol: for what he hath cast is false, and there is no spirit in them.
15 They are vain things and a ridiculous work: in the time of their visitation they shall perish.
16 The portion of Jacob is not like these: for it is he who formed all things: and Israel is the rod of his inheritance: the Lord of hosts is his name.
17 Gather up thy shame out of the land, thou that dwellest in a siege.
18 For thus saith the Lord: Behold I will cast away far off the inhabitants of the land at this time: and I will afflict them, so that they may be found.
19 Woe is me for my destruction, my wound is very grievous. But I said: Truly this is my own evil, and I will bear it.
20 My tabernacle is laid waste, all my cords are broken: my children are gone out from me, and they are not: there is none to stretch forth my tent any more, and to set up my curtains.
21 Because the pastors have done foolishly, and have not sought the Lord: therefore have they not understood, and all their flock is scattered.
22 Behold the sound of a noise cometh, a great commotion out of the land of the north: to make the cities of Juda a desert, and a dwelling for dragons.
23 I know, O Lord, that the way of a man is not his: neither is it in a man to walk, and to direct his steps.
24 Correct me, O Lord, but yet with judgement: and not in fury, lest thou bring me to nothing.
25 Pour out thy indignation upon the nations that have not known thee, and upon the provinces that have not called upon thy name: because they have eaten up Jacob, and devoured him, and consumed him, and have destroyed his glory.
1 The word that came from the Lord to Jeremias, saying:
2 Hear ye the words of this covenant, and speak to the men of Juda, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem,
3 And thou shalt say to them: Thus saith the Lord the God of Israel: Cursed is the man that shall not hearken to the words of yethis covenant,
4 Which I commanded your fathers in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, from the iron furnace, saying: Hear ye my voice, and do all things that I command you: and you shall be my people, and I will be your God:
5 That I may accomplish the oath which I swore to your fathers, to give them a land flowing with milk and honey, as it is this day. And I answered and said: Amen, O Lord.
6 And the Lord said to me: Proclaim aloud all these words in the cities of Juda, and in the streets of Jerusalem, saying: Hear ye the words of the covenant, and do them:
7 For protesting I conjured your fathers in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt even to this day: rising early I conjured them, and said: Hearken ye to my voice:
8 And they obeyed not, nor inclined their ear: but walked every one in the perverseness of his own wicked heart: and I brought upon them all the words of this covenant, which I commanded them to do, but they did them not.
9 And the Lord said to me: A conspiracy is found among the men of Juda, and among the inhabitants of Jerusalem.
10 They are returned to the former iniquities of their fathers, who refused to hear my words: so these likewise have gone after strange gods, to serve them: the house of Israel, and the house of Juda have made void my covenant, which I made with their fathers.
11 Wherefore thus saith the Lord: Behold I will bring in evils upon them, which they shall not be able to escape: and they shall cry to me, and I will not hearken to them.
12 And the cities of Juda, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem shall go, and cry to the gods to whom they offer sacrifice, and they shall not save them in the time of their affliction.
13 For according to the number of thy cities were thy gods, O Juda: and according to the number of the streets of Jerusalem thou hast set up altars of confusion, altars to offer sacrifice to Baalim.
14 Therefore, do not thou pray for this people, and do not take up praise and prayer for them: for I will not hear them in the time of their cry to me, in the time of their affliction.
15 What is the meaning that my beloved hath wrought muck wickedness in my house? shall the holy flesh take away from thee thy crimes, in which thou hast boasted?
16 The Lord called thy name, a plentiful olive tree, fair, fruitful, and beautiful: at the noise of a word, a great fire was kindled in it and the branches thereof are burnt.
17 And the Lord of hosts that planted thee, hath pronounced evil against thee: for the evils of the house of Israel, and the house of Juda, which they have done to themselves, to provoke me, offering sacrifice to Baalim.
18 But thou, O Lord, hast shewn me, and I have known: then thou shewedst me their doings.
19 And I was as a meek lamb, that is carried to be a victim: and I knew not that they had devised counsels against me, saying: Let us put wood on his bread, and cut him off from the land of the living, and let his name be remembered no more.
20 But thou, O Lord of Sabaoth, who judgest justly, and triest the reins and hearts, let me see thy revenge on them: for to thee I have revealed my cause.
21 Therefore thus saith the Lord to the men of Anathoth, who seek thy life, and say: Thou shalt not prophesy in the name of the Lord, and thou shalt not die in our hands.
22 Therefore thus saith the Lord of hosts: Behold I will visit upon them: and their young men shall die by the sword, their sons and their daughters shall die by famine.
23 And there shall be no remains of them: for I will bring in evil upon the men of Anathoth, the year of their visitation.
1 Thou indeed, O Lord, art just, if I plead with thee, but yet I will speak what is just to thee: Why doth the way of the wicked prosper: why is it well with all them that transgress, and do wickedly?
2 Thou hast planted them, and they have taken root: they prosper and bring forth fruit: thou art near in their mouth, and far from their reins.
3 And thou, O Lord, hast known me, thou hast seen me, and proved my heart with thee: gather them together as sheep for a sacrifice, and prepare them for the day of slaughter.
4 How long shall the land mourn, and the herb of every field wither for the wickedness of them that dwell therein? The beasts and the birds are consumed: because they have said: He shall not see our last end.
5 If thou hast wearied with running with footmen, how canst thou contend with horses? and if thou hast been secure in a land of peace, what wilt thou do in the swelling of the Jordan?
6 For even thy brethren, and the house of thy father, even they have fought against thee, and have cried after thee with full voice: believe them not when they speak good things to thee.
7 I have forsaken my house, I have left my inheritance: I have given my dear soul into the land of her enemies.
8 My inheritance is become to me as a lion in the wood: is hath cried out against me, therefore have I hated it.
9 Is my inheritance to me as a speckled bird? Is it as a bird died throughout? come ye, assemble yourselves, all the beasts of the earth, make haste to devour.
10 Many pastors have destroyed my vineyard, they have trodden my portion under foot: they have changed my delightful portion into a desolate wilderness.
11 They have laid it waste, and it hath mourned for me. With desolation is all the land made desolate; because there is none that considereth in the heart.
12 The spoilers are come upon all the ways of the wilderness, for the sword of the Lord shall devour from one end of the land to the other end thereof: there is no peace for all flesh.
13 They have sown wheat, and reaped thorns: they have received an inheritance, and it shall not profit them: you shall be ashamed of your fruits, because of the fierce wrath of the Lord.
14 Thus saith the Lord against all my wicked neighbors, that touch the inheritance that I have shared out to my people Israel: Behold I will pluck them out of their land, and I will pluck the house of Juda out of the midst of them.
15 And when I shall have plucked them out, I will return, and have mercy on them: and I will bring them back, every man to his inheritance, and every man to his land.
16 And it shall come to pass, if they will be taught, and will learn the ways of my people, to swear by my name: The Lord liveth, as they have taught my people to swear by baal: that they shall be built up in the midst of my people.
17 But if they will not hear, I will utterly pluck out and destroy that nation, saith the Lord.
1 Thus saith the Lord to me: Go, and get thee a linen girdle, and thou shalt put it about thy loins, and shalt not put it into water.
2 And I got a girdle accoding to the word of the Lord, and put it about my loins.
3 And the word of the Lord came to me the second time, saying:
4 Take the girdle which thou hast got, which is about thy loins, and arise, and go to the Euphrates, and hide it there in a hole of the rock.
5 And I went, and hid it by the Euphrates, as the Lord had commanded me.
6 And it came to pass after many days, that the Lord said to me: Arise, go to the Euphrates, and take from thence the girdle, which I commanded thee to hide there.
7 And I went to the Euphrates, and digged, and took the girdle out of the place where I had hid it: and behold the girdle was rotten, so that it was fit for no use.
8 And the word of the Lord came to me, saying:
9 Thus saith the Lord: after this manner will I make the pride of Juda, and the great pride of Jerusalem to rot.
10 This wicked people, that will not hear my words, and that walk in the perverseness of their heart, and have gone after strange gods to serve them, and to adore them: and they shall be as this girdle which is fit for no use.
11 For as the girdle sticketh close to the loins of a man, so have I brought close to me all of the house of Israel, and all the house of Juda, saith the Lord: that they might be my people, and for a name, and for a praise, and for a glory: but they would not hear.
12 Thou shalt speak therefore to them this word: Thus saith the Lord God of Israel: Every bottle shall be filled with wine, and they shall say to thee: Do we not know that every bottle shall be filled with wine?
13 And thou shalt say to them: Thus saith the Lord: Behold I will fill all the inhabitants of this land, and the kings of the race of David that sit upon his throne, and the priests, and the prophets, and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem. with drunkenness.
14 And I will scatter them every man from his brother, and fathers and sons in like manner, saith the Lord: I will not spare, and I will not pardon: nor will I have mercy, but to destroy them.
15 Hear ye, and give ear: Be not proud, for the Lord hath spoken.
16 Give ye glory to the Lord your God, before it be dark, and before your feet stumble upon the dark mountains: you shall look for light, and he will turn it into the shadow of death, and into darkness.
17 But if you will not hear this, my soul shall weep in secret for your pride: weeping it shall weep, and my eyes shall run down the tears, because the flock of the Lord is carried away captive.
18 Say to the king, and to the queen: Humble yourselves, sit down: for the crown of your glory is come down from your head.
19 The cities of the south are shut up, and there is none to open them: all Juda is carried away captive with an entire captivity.
20 Lift up your eyes, and see, you that come from the north: where is the flock that is given thee, thy beautiful cattle?
21 What wilt thou say when he shall visit thee? for thou hast taught them against thee, and instructed them against thy own head: shall not sorrows lay hold on thee, as a woman in labour?
22 And if thou shalt say in thy heart: Why are these things come upon me? For the greatness of thy iniquity, thy nakedness is discovered, the soles of thy feet are defiled.
23 If the Ethiopian can change his skin, or the leopard his spots: you may also do well, when you have learned evil.
24 And I will scatter them as stubble, which is carried away by the wind in the desert.
25 This is thy lot, and the portion of thy measure from me, saith the Lord, because thou hast forgotten me, and hast trusted in falsehood.
26 Wherefore I have also bared my thighs against thy face, and thy shame hath appeared.
27 I have seen thy adulteries, and thy neighing, the wickedness of thy fornication: and thy abominations, upon the hills in the field. Woe to thee, Jerusalem, wilt thou not be made clean after me: how long yet?
1 The Word of the Lord that came to Jeremias concerning the words of the drought.
2 Judea hath mourned, and the gates thereof are fallen, and are become obscure on the ground, and the cry of Jerusalem is gone up.
3 The great ones sent their inferiors to the water: they came to draw, they found no water, they carried back their vessels empty: they were confounded and afflicted, and covered their heads.
4 For the destruction of the land, because there came no rain upon the earth, the husbandmen were confounded, they covered their heads.
5 Yea, the hind also brought forth in the field, and left it, because there was no grass.
6 And the wild asses stood upon the rocks, they snuffed up the wind like dragons, their eyes failed, because there was no grass.
7 If our iniquities have testified against us, O Lord, do thou it for thy name's sake, for our rebellions are many, we have sinned against thee.
8 O expectation of Israel, the Saviour thereof in time of trouble: why wilt thou be a stranger in the land, and as a wayfaring man turning in to lodge?
9 Why wilt thou be as a wandering man, as a mighty man that cannot save? but thou, O Lord, art among us, and thy name is called upon by us, forsake us not.
10 Thus saith the Lord to his people, that have loved to move their feet, and have not rested, and have not pleased the Lord: He will now remember their iniquities, and visit their sins.
11 And the Lord said to me: Pray not for this people for their good.
12 When they fast I will not hear their prayers: and if they offer holocausts and victims, I will not receive them: for I will consume them by the sword, and by famine, and by the pestilence.
13 And I said: Ah, ah, ah, O Lord God, the prophets say to them: You shall not see the sword, and there shall be no famine among you, but he will give you true peace in this place.
14 And the Lord said to me: The prophets prophesy falsely in my name: I sent them not, neither have I commanded them, nor have I spoken to them: they prophesy unto you a lying vision, and divination and deceit, and the seduction of their own heart.
15 Therefore thus saith the Lord concerning the prophets that prophecy in my name, whom I did not send, that say: Sword and famine shall not be in this land: By sword and famine shall those prophets be consumed.
16 And the people to whom they prophecy, shall be cast out in the streets of Jerusalem because of the fanmine and the sword, and there shall be none to bury them: they and their wives, their sons and their daughters, and I will pour out their wickedness upon them.
17 And thou shalt speak this word to them: Let my eyes shed down tears night and day, and let them not cease, because the virgin daughter of my people is afflicted with a great affliction, with an exceeding grievous evil.
18 If I go forth into the fields, behold the slain with the sword: and if I enter into the city, behold them that are consumed with famine. The prophet also and the priest are gone into a land which they knew not.
19 Hast thou utterly cast away Juda, or hath thy soul abhorred Sion? why then hast thou struck us, so that there is no healing for us? we have looked for peace, and there is no good: and for the time of healing, and behold trouble.
20 We acknowledge, O Lord, our wickedness, the iniquities of our fathers, because we have sinned against thee.
21 Give us not to be a reproach, for thy name's sake, and do not disgrace in us the throne of thy glory: remember, break not thy covenant with us.
22 Are there any among the graven things of the Gentiles that can send rain? or can the heavens give showers? art not thou the Lord our God, whom we have looked for? for thou hast made all these things.
1 And the Lord said to me: If Moses and Samuel shall stand before me, my soul is not towards this people: cast them out from my sight, and let them go forth.
2 And if they shall say unto thee: Whither shall we go forth? thou shalt say to them: Thus saith the Lord: Such as are for death, to death: and such as are to the sword, to the sword: and such as are for famine, to famine: and such as are to captivity, to captivity.
3 And I will visit them with four kinds, saith the Lord: The sword to kill, and the dogs to tear, and the fowls of the air, and the beasts of the earth, to devour and destroy.
4 And I will give them up to the rage of all the kingdoms of the earth: because of Manasses the son of Ezechias the king of Juda, for all that he did in Jerusalem.
5 For who shall have pity on thee, O Jerusalem? or who shall bemoan thee? or who shall go to pray for thy peace?
6 Thou hast forsaken me, saith the Lord, thou art gone backward: and I will stretch out my hand against thee, and I will destroy thee: I am weary of entreating thee.
7 And I will scatter them with a fan in the gates of the land: I have killed and destroyed my people, and yet they are not returned form their ways.
8 Their widows are multiplied unto me above the sand of the sea: I have brought upon them against the mother of the young man a spoiler at noonday: I have cast a terror on a sudden upon the cities.
9 She that hath borne seven is become weak, her soul hath fainted away: her sun is gone down, while it was yet day: she is confounded, and ashamed: and the residue of them I will give up to the sword in the sight of their enemies, saith the Lord.
10 Woe is me, my mother: why hast thou borne me a man of strife, a man of contention to all the earth? I have not lent on usury, neither hath any man lent to me on usury: yet all curse me.
11 The Lord saith to me: Assuredly it shall be well with thy remnant, assuredly I shall help thee in the time of affliction, and in the time of tribulation against the enemy.
12 Shall iron be allied with the iron from the north, and the brass?
13 Thy riches and thy treasures I will give unto spoil for nothing, because of all thy sins, even in all thy borders.
14 And I will bring thy enemies out of a land, which thou knowest not: for a fire is kindled in my rage, it shall burn upon you.
15 O Lord, thou knowest, remember me, and visit me, and defend me from them that persecute me, do not defend me in thy patience: know that for thy sake I have sufferred reproach.
16 Thy words were found, and I did eat them, and thy word was to me a joy and gladness of my heart: for thy name is called upon me, O Lord God of hosts.
17 I sat not in the assembly of jesters, nor did I make a boast of the presence of thy hand: I sat alone, because thou hast filled me with threats.
18 Why is my sorrow become perpetual, and my wound desperate so as to refuse to be healed? it is become to me as the falsehood of deceitful waters that cannot be trusted.
19 Therefore thus saith the Lord: If thou wilt be converted, I will convert thee, and thou shalt stand before my face; and if thou wilt separate the precious from the vile, thou shalt be as my mouth: they shall be turned to thee, and thou shalt not be turned to them.
20 And I will make thee to this people as a strong wall of brass: and they shall fight against thee, and shall not prevail: for I am with thee to save thee, and to deliver thee, saith the Lord.
21 And I will deliver thee out of the hand of the wicked, and I will redeem thee out of the hand of the mighty.
1 And the word of the Lord came to me, saying:
2 Thou shalt not take thee a wife, neither shalt thou have thee sons and daughters in this place.
3 For thus saith the Lord concerning the sons and daughters, that are born in this place, and concerning their mothers that bore them: and concerning their fathers, of whom they were born in this land:
4 They shall die by the death of grievous illnesses: they shall not be lamented, and they shall not be buried, they shall be as dung upon the face of the earth: and they shall be consumed with the sword, and with famine: and their carcasses shall be meat for the fowls of the air, and for the beasts of the earth.
5 For thus saith the Lord: Enter not into the house of feasting, neither go thou to mourn, nor to comfort them: because I have taken away my peace from this people, saith the Lord, my mercy and commiserations.
6 Both the great and the little shall die in the land: they shall not be buried nor lamented, and men shall not cut themselves, nor make themselves bald for them.
7 And they shall not break bread among them to him that mourneth, to comfort him for the dead: neither shall they give them to drink of the cup, to comfort them for their father and mother.
8 And do not thou go into the house of feasting, to sit with them, and to eat and drink.
9 For thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Behold I will take away out of this place in your sight, and in your days the voice of mirth, and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom, and the voice of the bride.
10 And when thou shalt tell this people all these words, and they shall say to thee: Wherefore hath the Lord pronounced against us all this great evil? what is our iniquity? and what is our sin, that we have sinned against the Lord our God?
11 Thou shalt say to them: Because your fathers forsook me, saith the Lord: and went after strange gods, and served them, and adored them: and they forsook me, and kept not my law.
12 And you also have done worse than your fathers: for behold every one of you walketh after the perverseness of his evil heart, so as not to hearken to me.
13 So I will cast you forth out of this land, into a land which you know not, nor you fathers: and there you shall serve strange gods day and night, which shall not give you any rest.
14 Therefore behold the days come, saith the Lord, when it shall be said no more: The Lord liveth, that brought for the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt:
15 But, the Lord liveth, that brought the children of Israel out of the land of the north, and out of all the lands to which I cast them out: and I will bring them again into their land, which I gave to their fathers.
16 Behold I will send many fishers, saith the Lord, and they shall fish them: and after this I will send them many hunters, and they shall hunt them from every mountain, and from every hill, and out of the holes of the rocks.
17 For my eyes are upon all their ways: they are not hid from my face, and their iniquity hath not been hid from my eyes.
18 And I will repay first their double iniquities, and their sins: because they have defiled my land with the carcasses of their idols, and they have filled my inheritance with their abominations.
19 O Lord, my might, and my strength, and my refuge in the day of tribulation: to thee the Gentiles shall come from the ends of the earth, and shall say: Surely our fathers have possessed lies, a vanity which hath not profited them.
20 Shall a man make gods unto himself, and there are no gods?
21 Therefore, behold I will this once cause them to know, I will shew them my hand and my power: and they shall know that my name is the Lord.
1 The sin of Juda is written with a pen of iron, with the point of a diamond, it is graven upon the table of their heart, upon the horns of their altars.
2 When their children shall remember their altars, and their groves, and their green trees upon high mountains,
3 Sacrificing in the field: I will give thy strength, and all thy treasures to the spoil, and thy high places for sin in all thy borders.
4 And thou shalt be left stripped of thy inheritance, which I gave thee: and I will make thee serve thy enemies in a land which thou knowest not: because thou hast kindled a fire in my wrath, it shall burn for ever.
5 Thus saith the Lord: Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the Lord.
6 For he shall be like tamaric in the desert, and he shall not see when good shall come: but he shall dwell in dryness in the desert in a salt land, and not inhabited.
7 Blessed be the man that trusteth in the Lord, and the Lord shall be his confidence.
8 And he shall be as a tree that is planted by the waters, that spreadeth out its roots towards moisture: and it shall not fear when the heat cometh. And the leaf thereof shall be green, and in the time of drought it shall not be solicitous, neither shall it cease at any time to bring forth fruit.
9 The heart is perverse above all things, and unsearchable, who can know it?
10 I am the Lord who search the heart and prove the reins: who give to every one according to his way, and according to the fruit of his devices.
11 As the partridge hath hatched eggs which she did not lay: so is he that hath gathered riches, and not by right: in the midst of his days he shall leave them, and in his latter end he shall be a fool.
12 A high and glorious throne from the beginning is the place of our sanctification:
13 O Lord the hope of Israel: all that forsake thee shall be confounded: they that depart from thee, shall be written in the earth: because they have forsaken the Lord, the vein of living waters.
14 Heal me, O Lord, and I shall be healed: save me, and I shall be saved, for thou art my praise.
15 Behold they say to me: Where is the word of the Lord? let it come.
16 And I am not troubled, following thee for my pastor, and I have not desired the day of man, thou knowest. That which went out of my lips, hath been right in thy sight.
17 Be not thou a terror unto me, thou art my hope in the day of affliction.
18 Let them be confounded that persecute me, and let not me be confounded: let them be afraid, and let not me be afraid: bring upon them the day of affliction, and with a double destruction, destroy them.
19 Thus saith the Lord to me: Go, and stand in the gate of the children of the people, by which the kings of Juda come in, and go out, and in all the gates of Jerusalem:
20 And thou shalt say to them: Hear the word of the Lord, ye kings of Juda, and all Juda, and all the inhabitant of Jerusalem, that enter in by these gates.
21 Thus saith the Lord: Take heed to your souls and carry no burdens on the Sabbath day: and bring them not in by the gates of Jerusalem.
22 And do not bring burdens out of your houses on the sabbath day, neither do ye any work: sanctify the sabbath day, as I commanded your fathers.
23 But they did not hear, nor incline their ear: but hardened their neck, that they might not hear me, and might not receive instruction.
24 And it shall come to pass: if you will hearken to me, saith the Lord, to bring in no burdens by the gates of this city on the sabbath day: and if you will sanctify the sabbath day, to do no work therein:
25 Then shall there enter in by the gates of this city kings and princes, sitting upon the throne of David, and riding in chariots and on horses, they and their princes, the men of Juda, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem: and this city shall be inhabited forever.
26 And they shall come from the cities of Juda, and from the places round about Jerusalem, and from the land of Benjamin, and from the plains, and from the mountains, and from the south, bringing holocausts, and victims, and sacrifices, and frankincense, and they shall bring in an offering into the house of the Lord.
27 But if you will not hearken to me, to sanctify the sabbath day, and not to carry burdens, and not to bring them in by the gates of Jerusalem on the sabbath day: I will kindle a fire in the gates thereof, and it shall devour the houses of Jerusalem, and it shall not be quenched.
1 The word that came from Jeremias to the Lord, saying:
2 Arise, and go down to the potter's house, and there thou shalt hear my words.
3 And I went down into the potter's house, and behold he was doing a work on the wheel.
4 And the vessel was broken which he was making with clay with his hands: and turning he made another vessel, as it seemed good in his eyes to make it.
5 Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying:
6 Cannot I do with you as this potter, saith the Lord? behold as clay is in the hand of the potter, so are you in my hand, O house of Israel.
7 I will suddenly speak against a nation, and against a kingdom, to root out, and to pull down, and to destroy it.
8 If that nation against which I have spoken, shall repent of their evil, I also will repent of the evil that I have thought to do to them.
9 And I will suddenly speak of a nation and of a kingdom, to build up and plant it.
10 If it shall do evil in my sight, that it obey not my voice: I will repent of the good that I have spoken to do unto it.
11 Now therefore tell the men of Juda, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, saying: Thus saith the Lord: Behold I frame evil against you, and devise a device against you: let every man of you return from his evil way, and make ye your ways and your doings good.
12 And they said: We have no hopes: for we will go after our own thoughts, and we will do every one according to the perverseness of his evil heart.
13 Therefore thus saith the Lord: Ask among the nations: Who hath heard such horrible things, as the virgin of Israel hath done to excess?
14 Shall now the snow of Libanus fail from the rock of the field? or can the cold waters that gush out and run down, be taken away?
15 Because my people have forgotten me, sacrificing in vain, and stumbling in their ways, in ancient paths, to walk by them in a way not trodden:
16 That their land might be given up to desolation, and to a perpetual hissing: every one that shall pass by it, shall be astonished, and wag his head.
17 As a burning will I scatter them before the enemy: I will shew them the back, and not the face, in the day of their destruction.
18 And they said: Come, and let us invent devices against Jeremias: for the law shall not perish from the priest, nor counsel from the wise, nor the word from the prophet: come, and let us strike him with the tongue, and let us give no heed to all his words.
19 Give heed to me, O Lord, and hear the voice of my adversaries.
20 Shall evil be rendered for good, because they have digged a pit for my soul? Remember that I have stood in thy sight, so speak good for them, and turn away thy indignation from them.
21 Therefore deliver up their children to famine, and bring them into the hands of the sword: let their wives be bereaved of children and widows: and let their husbands be slain by death: let their young men be stabbed with the sword in battle.
22 Let a cry be heard out of their houses: for thou shalt bring the robber upon them suddenly: because they have digged a pit to take me, and have hid snares for my feet.
23 But thou, O Lord, knowest all their counsel against me unto death: forgive not their iniquity, and let not their sin be blotted out from thy sight: let them be overthrown before thy eyes, in the time of thy wrath do thou destroy them.
1 Thus saith the Lord: Go, and take a potter's earthen bottle, and take of the ancients of the people, and of the ancients of the priests:
2 And go forth into the valley of the son of Ennom, which is by the entry of the earthen gate: and there thou shalt proclaim the words that I shall tell thee.
3 And thou shalt say: Hear the word of the Lord, O ye kings of Juda, and ye inhabitants of Jerusalem: Thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Behold I will bring an affliction upon this place: so that whoever shall hear it, his ears shall tingle:
4 Because they have forsaken me, and have profaned this place: and have sacrificed therein to strange gods, whom neither they nor their fathers knew, nor the kings of Juda: and they have filled this place with the blood of innocents.
5 And they have built the high places of Baalim, to burn their children with fire for a holocaust to Baalim: which I did not command, nor speak of, neither did it once come into my mind.
6 Therefore behold the days come, saith the Lord, that this place shall no more be called Topheth, nor the valley of the son of Ennom, but the valley of slaughter.
7 And I will defeat the counsel of Juda and of Jerusalem in this place: and I will destroy them with the sword in the sight of their enemies, and by the hands of them that seek their lives: and I will give their carcasses to be meat for the fowls of the air, and for the beasts of the earth.
8 And I will make this city an astonishent, and a hissing: every one that shall pass by it, shall be astonished, and shall hiss because of all the plagues thereof.
9 And I will feed them with the flesh of their sons, and with the flesh of their daughters: and they shall eat every one the flesh of his friend in the siege, and in the distress wherewith their enemies, and they that seek their lives shall straiten them.
10 And thou shalt break the bottle in the sight of the men that shall go with thee.
11 And thou shalt say to them: Thus saith the Lord of hosts: even so will I break this people, and this city, as the potter's vessel is broken, which cannot be made whole again: and they shall be buried in Topheth, because there is no other place to bury in.
12 Thus will I do to this place, saith the Lord, and to the inhabitants thereof: and I will make this city as Topheth.
13 And the houses of Jerusalem, and the houses of Juda shall be unclean as the place of Topheth: all the houses upon whose roots they have sacrificed to all the host of heaven, and have poured out drink offerings to strange gods.
14 Then Jeremias came from Topheth, whither the Lord had sent him to prophecy, and he stood in the court of the house of the Lord, and said to all people:
15 Thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Behold I will bring in upon this city, and upon all the cities thereof all the evils that I have spoken against it: because they have hardened their necks, and they might not hear my words.
1 Now Phassur the son of Emmur, the priest, who was appointed chief in the house of the Lord, heard Jeremias prophesying these words.
2 And Phassur struck Jeremias the prophet, and put him in the stocks, that were in the upper gate of Benjamin, in the house of the Lord.
3 And when it was light the next day, Phassur brought Jeremias out of the stocks. And Jeremias said to him: The Lord hath not called thy name Phassur, but fear on every side.
4 For thus saith the Lord: Behold I will deliver thee up to fear, thee and all thy friends: and they shall fall by the sword of their enemies, and thy eyes shall see it, and I will give all Juda into the hand of the king of Babylon: and he shall strike them with the sword.
5 And I will give all the substance of this city, and all its labour, and every precious thing thereof, and all the treasures of the kings of Juda will I give into the hands of their enemies: and they shall pillage them, and take them away, and carry them to Babylon.
6 But thou, Phassur, and all that dwell in thy house, shall go into captivity, and thou shalt go to Babylon, and there thou shalt die, and there thou shalt be buried, thou and all thy friends, to whom thou hast prophesied a lie.
7 Thou hast deceived me, O Lord, and I am deceived: thou hast been stronger than I, and thou hast prevailed. I am become a laughing-stock all the day, all scoff at me.
8 For I am speaking now this long time, crying out against iniquity, and I often proclaim devistation: and the word of the Lord is made a reproach to me, and a derision all the day.
9 Then I said: I will not make mention of him, nor speak any more in his name: and there came in my heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I was wearied, not being able to bear it.
10 For I heard the reproaches of many, and terror on every side: Persecute him, and let us persecute him: from all the men that were my familiars, and continued at my side: if by any means he may be deceived, and we may prevail against him, and be revenged on him.
11 But the Lord is with me as a strong warrior: therefore they that persecute me shall fall, and shall be weak: they shall be greatly confounded, because they have not understood the everlasting reproach, which never shall be effaced.
12 And thou, O Lord of hosts, prover of the just, who seest the reins and the heart: let me see, I beseech thee, thy vengeance on them: for to thee I have laid open my cause.
13 Sing ye to the Lord, praise the Lord: because he hath delivered the soul of the poor out of the hand of the wicked.
14 Cursed be the day wherein I was borne: let not the day in which my mother bore me, be blessed.
15 Cursed be the man that brought the tidings to my father, saying: A man child is born to thee: and made him greatly rejoice.
16 Let that man be as the cities that the Lord hath overthrown, and hath not repented: let him hear a cry in the morning, and howling at noontide:
17 Who slew me not from the womb, that my mother might have been my grave, and her womb an everlasting conception.
18 Why came I out of the womb, to see labour and sorrow, and that my days should be spent in confusion?
1 The word that came to Jeremias from the Lord, when king Sedecias sent unto him Phassur, the son of Melchias, and Sophonias, the son of Maasias the priest, saying:
2 Inquire of the Lord for us, for Nabuchodonosor king of Babylon maketh war against us: if so be the Lord will deal with us according to all his wonderful works, that he may depart from us.
3 And Jeremias said to them: Thus shall you say to Sedecias:
4 Thus saith the Lord, the God of Israel: Behold I will turn back the weapons of war that are in your hands, with which you fight against the king of Babylon, and the Chaldeans, that besiege you round about the walls: and I will gather them together in the midst of this city.
5 And I myself will fight against you with an outstretched hand, and with a strong arm, and in fury, and in indignation, and in great wrath.
6 And I will strike the inhabitants of this city, men and beasts shall die of a great pestilence.
7 And after this, saith the Lord, I will give Sedecias the king of Juda, and his servants, and his people, and such as are left in this city from the pestilence, and the sword , and the famine, into the hand of Nabuchodonosor the king of Babylon, and into the hand of their enemies, and into the hand of them that seek their life, and he shall strike them with the edge of the sword, and he shall not be moved to pity, nor spare them, nor shew mercy on them.
8 And to this people thou shalt say: Thus saith the Lord: Behold I set before you the way of life, and the way of death.
9 He that shall abide in this city, shall die by the sword, and by the famine, and by the pestilence: but he that shall go out and flee over to the Chaldeans, that besiege you, shall live, and his life shall be to him as a spoil.
10 For I have set my face against this city for evil, and not for good, saith the Lord: it shall be given into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he shall burn it with fire.
11 And to the house of the king of Juda: Hear ye the word of the Lord,
12 O house of David, this saith the Lord: Judge ye judgement in the morning, and deliver him that is oppressed by violence out of the hand of the oppressor: lest my indignation go forth like a fire, and be kindled, and there be none to quench it, because of the evil of your ways.
14 Behold I come to thee that dwelleth in a valley upon a rock above a plain, saith the Lord: and you say: Who shall strike us? and who shall enter into our houses?
15 But I will visit upon you according to the fruit of your doings, saith the Lord: and I will kindle a fire in the forest thereof: and it shall devour all things round about it.
1 Thus saith the Lord: Go down to the house of the king of Juda, and there thou shalt speak this word,
2 And thou shalt say: Hear the word of the Lord, O king of Juda, that sittest upon the throne of David: thou and thy servants, and thy people, who enter in by these gates.
3 Thus saith the Lord: Execute judgement and justice, and deliver him that is oppressed out of the hand of the oppressor: and afflict not the stranger, the fatherless, nor the widow, nor oppress them unjustly: and shed not innocent blood in this place.
4 For if you will do this thing indeed, then shall there enter in by the gates of this house, kings of the race of David sitting upon his throne, and riding in chariots and on horses, they and their servants, and their people.
5 But if you will not hearken to these words: I swear by myself, saith the Lord, that this house shall become a desolation.
6 For thus saith the Lord to the house of the king of Juda: Thou art to me Galaad the head of Libanus: yet surely I will make thee a wilderness, and cities not habitable.
7 And I will prepare against thee the destroyer and his weapons: and they shall cut down thy chosen cedars, and shall cast them headlong into the fire.
8 And many nations shall pass by this city: and they shall say every man to his neighbor: Why hath the Lord done so to this great city?
9 And they shall answer: Because they have forsaken the covenant of the Lord their God, and have adored strange gods, and served them.
10 Weep not for him that is dead, nor bemoan him with your tears: lament him that goeth away, for he shall return no more, nor see his native country.
11 For thus saith the Lord to Sellum the son of Josias the king of Juda, who reigned instead of his father, who went forth out of this place: He shall return hither no more:
12 But in the place, to which I have removed him, there shall he die, and he shall not see this land any more.
13 Woe to him that buildeth up his house by injustice, and his chambers not in judgement: that will oppress his friend without cause, and will not pay him his wages.
14 Who saith: I will build me a wide house and large chambers: who openeth to himself windows, and maketh roofs of cedar, and painteth them with vermilion.
15 Shalt thou reign, because thou comparest thyself to the cedar? did not thy father eat and drink, and do judgment and justice, and it was then well with him?
16 He judged the cause of the poor and needy for his own good: was it not therefore because he knew me, saith the Lord?
17 But thy eyes and thy heart are set upon covetousness, and upon shedding innocent blood, and upon oppression, and running after evil works.
18 Therefore thus saith the Lord concerning Joakim the son of Josias king of Juda: They shall not mourn for him, Alas, my brother, and Alas, sister: they shall not lament for him, Alas, my Lord, or, Alas, the noble one.
19 He shall be buried with the burial of an ass, rotten and cast forth without the gates of Jerusalem.
20 Go up to Libanus, and cry: and lift up thy voice in Basan, and cry to them that pass by, for all thy lovers are destroyed.
21 I spoke to thee in thy properity: and thoiu saidst: I will not hear: this hath been thy way from thy youth, because thou hast not heard my voice.
22 The wind shall feed all thy pastors, and thy lovers shall go into captivity: and then shalt thou be confounded, and ashamed of all thy wickedness.
23 Thou that sittest in Libanus, and makest thy nest in the cedars, how hast thou mourned when sorrows came upon thee, as the pains of a woman in labour?
24 As I live, saith the Lord, if Jechonias the son of Joakim the king of Juda were a ring on my right hand, I would pluck him thence.
25 And I will give thee into the hand of them that seek thy life, and into the hand of them whose face thou fearest, and into the hand of Nabuchodonosor king of Babylon, and into the hand of the Chaldeans.
26 And I will send thee, and thy mother that bore thee, into a strange country, in which you were not born, and there you shall die:
27 And they shall not return into the land, whereunto they lift up their mind to return thither.
28 Is this man Jechonias an earthen and a broken vessel? is he a vessel wherein there is no pleasure? why are they cast out, he and his seed, and are cast into a land which they know not?
29 O earth, earth, earth, hear the word of the Lord.
30 Thus saith the Lord: Write this man barren, a man that shall not prosper in his days: for there shall not be a man of his seed that shall sit upon the throne of David, and have power any more in Juda.
1 Woe to the pastors, that destroy and tear the sheep of my pasture, saith the Lord.
2 Therefore thus saith the Lord the God of Israel to the pastors that feed my people: You have scattered my flock, and driven them away, and have not visited them: behold I will visit upon you for the evil of your doings, saith the Lord.
3 And I will gather together the remnant of my flock, out of all the lands into which I have cast them out: and I will make them return to their own fields, and they shall increase and be multiplied.
4 And I will set up pastors over them, and they shall feed them: they shall fear no more, and they shall not be dismayed: and none shall be wanting of their number, saith the Lord.
5 Behold the days come, saith the Lord, and I will raise up to David a just branch: and a king shall reign, and shall be wise, and shall execute judgement and justice in the earth.
6 In those days shall Juda be saved, and Israel shall dwell confidently: and this is the name that they shall call him: the Lord our just one.
7 Therefore behold the days to come, saith the Lord, and they shall say no more: The Lord liveth, who brought up the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt:
8 But the Lord liveth, who hath brought out, and brought hither the seed of the house of Israel from the land of the north, and out of all the lands, to which I had cast them forth: and they shall dwell in their own land.
9 To the prophets: My heart is broken within me, all my bones tremble: I am become as a drunken man, and as a man full of wine, at the presence of the Lord, and at the presence of his holy words.
10 Because the land is full of adulterers, because the land hath mourned by reason of cursing, the fields of the desert are dried up: and their course is become evil, and their strength unlike.
11 For the prophet and the priest are defiled: and in my house I have found their wickedness, saith the Lord.
12 Therefore their way shall be as a slippery way in the dark: for they shall be driven on, and fall therein: for I will bring evils upon them, the year of their visitation, saith the Lord.
13 And I have seen folly in the prophets of Samaria: they prophesied in Baal, and deceived my people Israel.
14 And I have seen the likeness of adulterers, and the way of lying in the peophets of Jerusalem: and they strengthened the hand of the wicked, that no man should return from his evil doings: that are all become unto me as Sodom, and the inhabitants thereof as Gamorrha.
15 Therefore thus saith the Lord of hosts to the prophets: Behold I will feed them with wormwood, and I will give them gall to drink: for from the prophets of Jerusalem corruption has gone forth into all the land.
16 Thus saith the Lord of hosts: Hearken not to the words of the prophets that prophesy to you, and deceive you: they speak a vision of their own heart, and not out of the mouth of the Lord.
17 They say tothem that blaspheme me: The Lord hath said: You shall have peace: and to every one that walketh in the perverseness of his own heart, they have said: No evil shall come to you.
18 For who hath stood in the counsel of the Lord, and hath seen and heard his word? Who hath considered his word and heard it?
19 Behold the whirlwind of the Lord's indignation shall come forth, and a tempest shall break out and come upon the head of the wicked.
20 The wrath of the Lord shall not return till he execute it, and till he accomplish the thought of his heart: in the latter days you shall understand his counsel.
21 I did not send prophets, yet they ran: I have not spoken to them, yet they prophesied.
22 If they stood in my counsel, and had made my words known to my people, I should have turned them from their evil way and from their wicked doings.
23 Am I, think ye, a God at hand, saith the Lord, and not a God afar off?
24 Shall a man be hid in secret places, and I not see him, saith the Lord? do not I fill heaven and earth, saith the Lord?
25 I have heard what the prophets said, that prophesylies in my name, and say: I have dreamed, I have dreamed.
26 How long shall this be in the heart of the prophets that prophesy lies, and that prophesy the delusions of their own heart?
27 Who seek to make my people forget my name through their dreams, which they tell every man to his neighbor: as their fathers forgot my name for Baal.
28 The prophet that hath a dream, let him tell a dream: and he that hath my word, let him speak my word with truth: what hath the chaff to do with the wheat, saith the Lord?
29 Are not my words as a fire, saith the Lord: and as a hammer that breaketh the rock in pieces?
30 Therefore behold I am against the prophets, saith the Lord: who steal my words every one from his neighbor.
31 Behold I am against the prophets, saith the Lord: who use their tongues, and say: The Lord saith it.
32 Behold I am against the prophets that have lying dreams, saith the Lord: and tell them, and cause my people to err by their lying, and by their wonders: when I sent them not, nor commanded them, who have not profited this people at all, saith the Lord.
33 If therefore this people, or the prophet, or the priest shall ask thee, saying: What is the burden of the Lord? thou shalt say to them: You are the burden: for I will cast you away, saith the Lord.
34 And as for the prophet, and the priest, and the people that shall say: The burden of the Lord: I will visit upon that man, and upon his house.
35 Thus shall you say every one to his neighbor, and to his brother: What hath the Lord answered? and what hath the Lord spoken?
36 And the burden of the Lord shall be mentioned no more, for every man's word shall be his burden: for you have perverted the words of the living God, of the Lord of hosts our God.
37 Thus shalt thou say to the prophet: What hath the Lord answered thee? and what hath the Lord spoken?
38 But if you shall say: The burden of the Lord: therefore thus saith the Lord: Because you have said this word: The burden of the Lord: and I have sent to you saying: Say not, Tne burden of the Lord:
39 Therefore behold I will take you away carrying you, and will forsake you, and the city which I gave to you, and to your fathers, out of my presence.
40 And I will bring an everlasting reproach upon you, and a perpetual shame which shall never be forgotten.
1 The Lord shewed me: and behold two baskets full of figs, set before the temple of the Lord: after that Nabuchodonosor king of Babylon had carried away Jechonias the son of Joakim the king of Juda, and his chief men, and the craftsmen, and engravers of Jerusalem, and had brought them to Babylon.
2 One basket had very good figs, like the figs of the first season: and the other basket had very bad figs, which could not be eaten, because they were bad.
3 And the Lord said to me: What seest thou, Jeremias? And I said: Figs, the good figs, very good: and the bad figs, very bad, which cannot be eaten because they are bad.
4 And the word of the Lord came to me, saying:
5 Thus saith the Lord the God of Israel: Like these good figs, so will I regard the captives of Juda, whom I have sent forth out of this place into the land oif the Chaldeans, for their own good.
6 And I will set my eyes upon them to be pacified, and I will bring them again into this land: and I will be their God: and I will build them up, and not pull them down: and I will plant them, and not pluck them up.
7 And I will give them a heart to know me, that I am the Lord: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God: because they shall return to me with their whole heart.
8 And as the very bad figs, that cannot be eaten, because they are bad: thus saith the Lord: So will I give Sedecias the king of Juda, and his princes, and the residue of Jerusalem, that have remained in this city, and that dwell in the land of Egypt.
9 And I will deliver them up to vexation, and affliction, to all the kingdoms of the earth: to be a reproach, and a byword, and a proverb, and to be a curse in all places, to which I have cast them out.
10 And I will send among them the sword, and the famine, and the pestilence: till they be consumed out of the land which I gave to them, and their fathers.
1 The word that came to Jeremias concerning all the people of Juda, in the fourth year of Joakim the son of Josias king of Juda, (the same is the first year of Nabuchodonosor king of Babylon,)
2 Which Jeremias the prophet spoke to all the people of Juda, and to all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, saying:
3 From the thirteenth year of Josias the son of Ammon king of Juda until this day: this is the three and twentieth year, the word of the Lord hath come to me, and I have spoken to you, rising before day, and speaking, and you have not hearkened.
4 And the Lord hath sent to you all his servants the prophets, rising early, and sending, and you have not hearkened, nor inclined your ears to hear.
5 When he said: Return ye, every one from his evil way, and from your wicked devices, and you shall dwell in the land which the Lord hath given to you, and your fathers for ever and ever.
6 And go not after strange gods to serve them, and adore them: nor provoke me to wrath by the works of your hands, and I will not afflict you.
7 And you have not heard me, saith the Lord, that you might provoke me to anger with the works of your hands, to your own hurt.
8 Therefore thus saith the Lord of hosts: Because you have not heard my words:
9 Behold I will send, and take all the kindreds of the north, saith the Lord, and Nabuchodonosor the king of Babylon my servant: and I will bring them against this land, and against the inhabitants thereof, and against all the nations that are round about it: and I will destroy them, and make them an astonishment and a hissing, and perpetual desolations.
10 And I will take away from them the voice of mirth, and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom, and the voice of the bride, the sound of the mill, and the light of the lamp.
11 And all this land shall be a desolation, and an astonishment: and all these nations shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years.
12 And when the seventy years shall be expired, I will punish the king of Babylon, and that nation, saith the Lord, for their iniquity, and the land of the Chaldeans: and I will make it perpetual desolations.
13 And I will bring upon the land all my words, that I have spoken against it, all that is written in this book, all that Jeremias hath prophesied against all nations:
14 For they have served them, whereas they were many nations, and great kings: and I will repay them according to their deeds, and according to the works of their hands.
15 For thus saith the Lord of hosts the God of Israel: Take the cup of wine of this fury at my hand: and thou shalt make all nations to drink thereof, unto which I shall send thee.
16 And they shall drink, and be troubled, and be mad because of the sword, which I shall send among them.
17 And I took the cup at the hand of the Lord, and I presented it to all the nations to drink of it, to which the Lord sent me:
18 To wit, Jerusalem, and the cities of Juda, and the kings thereof, and the princes thereof: to make them a desolation, and an astonishment, and a hissing, and a curse, as it is at this day.
19 Pharao the king of Egypt, and his servants, and his princes, and all his people,
20 And all in general: all the kings of the land of Ausitis, and all the kings of the land of the Philistines, and Ascalon, and Gaza, and Accaron, and the remnant of Azotus.
21 And Edom, and Moab, and the children of Ammon.
22 And all the kings of Tyre, and all the kings of Sidon: and the kings of the land of the islands that are beyond the sea.
23 And Dedan, and Thema, and Buz, and all that have their hair cut round.
24 And all the kings of Arabia, and all the kings of the west, that dwell in the desert.
25 And all the kings of Zambri, and all the kings of Elam, and all the kings of Medes:
26 And all the kings of the north far and near, every one against his brother: and all the kingdoms of the earth, which are upon the face thereof: and the king of Sesac shall drink after them.
27 And thou shalt say to them: Thus saith the Lord of hosts the God of Israel: Dring ye, and be drunken, and vomit: and fall, and rise no more, because of the sword, which I shall send among you.
28 And if they refuse to take the cup at thy hand to drink, thou shalt say to them: Thus saith the Lord of hosts: Drinking you shall drink:
29 For behold I begin to bring evil on the city wherein my name is called upon: and shall you be as innocent and escape free? you shall not escape free: for I will call for the sword upon all the inhabitants of the earth, saith the Lord of hosts.
30 And thou shalt prophesy unto them all these words, and thou shalt say to them: The Lord shall roar from on high, and shall utter his voice from his holy habitation: roaring he shall roar upon the place of his beauty: the shout as it were of them that tread grapes shall be given out against all the inhabitants of the earth.
31 The noise is come even to the ends of the earth: for the Lord entereth into judgement with the nations: he entereth into judgement with all flesh; the wicked I have delivered up to the sword, saith the Lord.
32 Thus saith the Lord of hosts: Behold evil shall go forth from nation to nation: and a great whirlwind shall go forth from the ends of the earth.
33 And the slain of the Lord shall be at that day from one end of the earth even to the other end thereof: they shall not be lamented, and they shall not be gathered up, nor buried: they shall lie as dung upon the face of the earth.
34 Howl, ye shepherds, and cry: and sprinkle yourselves with ashes, ye leaders of the flock: for the days of your slaughter and your dispersion are accomplished, and you shall fall like precious vessels.
35 And the shepherds shall have no way to flee, nor the leaders of the flock to save themselves.
36 A voice of the cry of the shepherds, and a howling of the principal of the flock: because the Lord hath watsed their pastures.
37 And the fields of peace have been silent, because of the fierce anger of the Lord.
38 He has forsaken his covert as the lion, for the land is laid waste because of the wrath of the dove, and because of the fierce anger of the Lord.
1 In the beginning of the reign of Joakim the son of Josias king of Juda, came this word from the Lord, saying:
2 Thus saith the Lord: Stand in the court of the house of the Lord, and speak to all the cities of Juda, out of which they come, to adore in the house of the Lord, all the words which I have commanded thee to to speak unto them: leave not out one word.
3 If so be they will hearken and be converted every one from his evil way; that I may repent me of the evil that I think to do unto them for the wickedness of their doings.
4 And thou shalt say to them: Thus saith the Lord: If you will not hearken to me to walk in my law, which I have given to you:
5 To give ear to the words of my servants the prophets, whom I sent to you rising up early: and sending, and you have not hearkened:
6 I will make this house like Silo: and I will make this city a curse to all the nations of the earth.
7 And the priests, and the prophets, and all the people heard Jeremias speaking these words in the house of the Lord.
8 And when Jeremias made an end of speaking all that the Lord had commanded him to speak to all the people, the priests, and the prophets, and all the people laid hold on him, saying: Let him be put to death.
9 Why hath he prophesied in the name of the Lord, saying: This house shall be like Silo; and this city shall be made desolate, without an inhabitant? And all the people were gathered together against Jeremias in the house of the Lord.
10 And the princes of Juda heard these words: and they went up from the king's house into the house of the Lord, and sat in the entry of the new gate of the house of the Lord.
11 And the priests and the prophets spoke to the princes, and to all the people, saying: The judgement of death is for this man: because he hath prophesied against this city, as you have heard with your ears.
12 Then Jeremias spoke to all the princes, and to all the people, saying: The Lord sent me to prophesy concerning this house, and concerning this city all the words you have heard.
13 Now therefore amend your ways, and your doings, and hearken to the voice of the Lord your God: and the Lord will repent of the evil that he hath spoken against you.
14 But as for me, behold I am in your hands: do with me what is good and right in your eyes:
15 But know ye, and understand, that if you put me to death, you will shed innocent blood against your own selves, and against this city, and the inhabitants thereof. For in truth the Lord sent me to you, to speak all these words in your hearing.
16 Then the princes, and all the people said to the priests, and to the prophets: There is no judgement of death for this man: for he hath spoken to us in the name of the Lord our God.
17 And some of the ancients of the land rose up: and they spoke to all the assembly of the people, saying:
18 Micheas of Morasthi was a prophet in the days of Ezechias king of Juda, and he spoke to all the people of Juda, saying: Thus saith the Lord of hosts: Sion shall be ploughed like a field, and Jerusalem shall be a heap of stones: and the mountain of the house the high places of woods.
19 Did Ezechias king of Juda, and all Juda, condemn him to death? did they not fear the Lord, and beseech the face of the Lord: and the Lord repented of the evil that they had spoken against them? therefore we are doing a great evil against our souls.
20 There was also a man that prophesied in the name of the Lord, Urias the son of Semei of Cariathiarim: and he prophesied against this city, and against this land, according to all the words of Jeremias.
21 And Joakim, and all his men in power, and his princes heard these words: and the king sought to put him to death. And Urias heard it, and was afraid, and fled and went into Egypt.
22 And king Joakim sent men into Egypt, Elnathan the son of Achobor, and men with him into Egypt.
23 And they brought Urias out of Egypt: and brought him to king Joakim, and he slew him with the sword: and he cast his dead body into the graves of the common people.
24 So the hand of Ahicam the son of Saphan was with Jeremias, that he should not be delivered into the hands of the people, to put him to death.
1 In the beginning of the reign of Joakim the son of Josias king of Juda, this word came to Jeremias from the Lord, saying:
2 Thus saith the Lord to me: Make thee bands, and chains: and thou shalt put them on thy neck.
3 And thou shalt send them to the of Edom, and to the king of Moab, and to the king of the children of Ammon, and to the king of Tyre, and to the king of Sidon: by the hand of the messengers that are come to Jerusalem to Sedecias the king of Juda.
4 And thou shalt command them to speak to their masters: Thus saith the Lord of hosts the God of Israel: Thus shall you say to your masters:
5 I made the earth, and the men, and the beasts that are upon the face of the earth, by my great power, and by my stretched out arm: and I have given it to whom it seemed good in my eyes.
6 And now I have given all these lands into the hand of Nabuchodonosor king of Babylon my servant: moreover also the beasts of the field I have given him to serve him.
7 And all nations shall serve him, and his son, and his son's son: till the time come for his land and himself: and many nations and great kings shall serve him.
8 But the nation and kingdom that will not serve Nabuchodonosor king of Babylon, and whosoever will not bend his neck under the yoke of the king of Babylon: I will visit upon that nation with the sword, and with famine, and with pestilence, saith the Lord: till I consume them by his hand.
9 Therefore hearken not to your prophets, and diviners, and dreamers, and soothsayers, and sorcerers, that say to you: You shall not serve the king Babylon.
10 For they prophesy lies to you: to remove you far from your country, and east you out, and to make you perish.
11 But the nation that shall bend down their neck under the yoke of the king Babylon, and shall serve him: Will let them remain in their own land, saith the Lord: and they shall till it, and dwell in it.
12 And I spoke to Sedecias the king of Juda according to all these words, saying: Bend down your necks under the yoke of the king of Babylon, and serve him, and his people, and you shall live.
13 Why will you die, thou and thy people by the sword, and by famine, and by the pestilence, as the Lord hath spoken against the nation that will not serve the king of Babylon?
14 Hearken not to the words of the prophets that say to you: You shall not serve the king of Babylon: for they tell you a lie.
15 For I have not sent them, saith the Lord: and they prophesy in my name falsely: to drive you out, and that you may perish, both you, and the prophets that prophesy to you.
16 I spoke also to the priests, and to this people, saying: Thus saith the Lord: Hearken not to the words of your prophets, that prophesy to you, saying: Behold the vessels of the Lord shall now in a short time be brought again from Babylon: for they prophesy a lie unto you.
17 Therefore hearken not to them, but serve the king of Babylon, that you may live. Why should this city be given up to desolation?
18 But if they be prophets, and the word of the Lord be in them: let them interpose themselves before the Lord of hosts, that the vessels which were left in the house of the Lord, and in the house of the king of Juda, and in Jerusalem, may not go to Babylon.
19 For thus saith the Lord of hosts d to the pillars, and to the sea, and to the bases, and to the rest of the vessels that remain in this city:
20 Which Nabuchodonosor the king of Babylon did not take, when he carried away Jechonias the son of Joakim the king of Juda, from Jerusalem to Babylon, and all the great men of Juda and Jerusalem.
21 For thus saith the Lord of hosts the God of Israel, to the vessels that are left in the house of the Lord, and in the house of the king of Juda and Jerusalem:
22 They shall be carried to Babylon, and there they shall be until the day of their visitation, saith the Lord: and I will cause them to be brought, and to be re- stored in this place.
1 And it came to pass in that year, in the beginning of the reign of Sedecias king of Juda, in the fourth year, in the fifth month, that Hananias the son of Azur, a prophet of Gabaon spoke to me, in the house of the Lord before the priests, and all the people, saying:
2 Thus saith the Lord of hosts the God of Israel: I have broken the yoke of the king of Babylon.
3 As yet two years of days, and I will cause all the vessels of the house of the Lord to be brought back into this place, which Nabuchodonosor king of Babylon took away from this place, and carried them to Babylon.
4 And I will bring back to this place Jechonias the son of Joakim king of Juda, and all the captives of Juda, that are gone to Babylon, saith the Lord: for I will break the yoke of the king of Babylon.
5 And Jeremias the prophet said to Hananias the prophet in the presence of the priests, and in the presence of all the people that stood in the house of the Lord:
6 And Jeremias the prophet said: Amen, the Lord do so: the Lord perform thy words, which thou hast prophesied: that the vessels may be brought again into the house of the Lord, and all the captives may return out of Babylon to this place.
7 Nevertheless hear this word that I speak in thy ears, and in the ears of all the people:
8 The prophets that have been before me, and before thee from the beginning, and have prophesied concerning many countries, and concerning great kingdoms, of war, and of affliction, and of famine.
9 The prophet that prophesied peace when his word shall come to pass, the prophet shall be known, whom the Lord hath sent in truth.
10 And Hananias the prophet took the chain from the neck of Jeremias the prophet, and broke it.
11 And Hananias spoke in the presence of all the people, saying: Thus saith the Lord: Even so will I break the yoke of Nabuchodonosor the king of Babylon after two full years from off the neck of all the nations.
12 And Jeremias the prophet went his way. And the word of the Lord came to Jeremias, after that Hananias the prophet had broken the chain from off the neck of Jeremias the prophet, saying:
13 Go, and tell Hananias: Thus saith the Lord: Thou hast broken chains of wood, and thou shalt make for them chains of iron.
14 For thus saith the Lord of hosts the God of Israel: I have put a yoke of iron upon the neck of all these nations, to serve Nabuchodonosor king of Babylon, and they shall serve him: moreover also I have given him the beasts of the earth.
15 And Jeremias the prophet said to Hananias the prophet: Hear now, Hananias: the Lord hath not sent thee, and thou hast made this people to trust in a lie.
16 Therefore thus saith the Lord: Behold I will send thee away from off the face of the earth: this year shalt thou die: for thou hast spoken against the Lord.
17 And Hananias the prophet died in that year, in the seventh month.
1 Now these are the words of the letter which Jeremias, the prophet sent from Jerusalem to the residue of the ancients that were carried into captivity, and to the priests, and to the prophets, and to all the people, whom Nabuchodonosor had carried away from Jerusalem to Babylon:
2 After that Jechonias the king, and the queen, and the eunuchs, and the princes of Juda, and of Jerusalem, and the craftsman, and the engravers were departed out of Jerusalem :
3 By the hand of Elasa the son of Saphan, and Gamarias the son of Helcias, whom Sedecias king of Juda sent to Babylon to Nabuchodonosor king of Babylon, saying:
4 Thus saith the Lord of hosts the God of Israel, to all that are carried away captives, whom I have caused to be carried away from Jerusalem to Babylon:
5 Build ye houses, and dwell in them: and plant orchards, and eat the fruit of them.
6 Take ye wives, and beget sons and daughters: and take wives for your sons, and give your daughters to husbands, and let them bear sons and daughters: and be ye multiplied there, and be not few in number.
7 And seek the peace of the city, to which I have caused you to be carried away captives; and pray to the Lord for it: for in the peace thereof shall be your peace.
8 For thus saith the Lord of hoses the God of Israel: Let not your prophets that are in the midst of you, and your diviners deceive you: and give no heed to your dreams which you dream:
9 For they prophesy falsely to you in my name: and I have not sent them, saith the Lord.
10 For thus saith the Lord: When the seventy years shall begin to be accomplished in Babylon, I will visit you: and I will perform my good word in your favour, to bring you again to this place.
11 For I know the thoughts that I think towards you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of affliction, to give you an end and patience.
12 And you shall call upon me, and you shall go: and you shall pray to me, and I will hear you.
13 You shall seek me, and shall find me: when you shall seek me with all your heart.
14 And I will be found by you, saith the Lord: and I will bring back your captivity, and I will gather you out of all nations, and from all the places to which I have driven you out, saith the Lord: and I will bring you back from the place to which I caused you to be carried away captive.
15 Because you have said: The Lord hath raised us up prophets in Babylon:
16 For thus saith the Lord to the king that sitteth upon the throne of David, and to all the people that dwell in this city, to your brethren that are not gone forth with you into captivity.
17 Thus saith the Lord of hosts: Behold I will send upon them the sword, and the famine, and the pestilence: and I will make them like bad figs that cannot be eaten, because they are very bad.
18 And I will persecute them with the sword, and with famine, and pith the pestilence: and I will give them up unto affliction to all the kingdoms of the earth: to be a curse, and an astonishment, and a hissing, and a reproach to all the nations to which I have driven them out:
19 Because they have not hearkened to my words, saith the Lord: which I sent to them by my servants the prophets, rising by night, and sending: and you have not heard, saith the Lord.
20 Hear ye therefore the word of the Lord, all ye of the captivity, whom I have sent out from Jerusalem to Babylon.
21 Thus saith the Lord of hosts the God of Israel, to Achab the son of Colias, and to Sedecias the son of Maasias, who prophesy unto you in my name falsely: Behold I will deliver them up into the hands of Nabuchodonosor the king of Babylon: and he shall kill them before your eyes.
22 And of them shall be taken up a curse by all the captivity of Juda, that are in Babylon, saying: The Lord make thee like Sedecias, and like Achab, whom the king of Babylon fried in the fire :
23 Because they have acted folly in Israel, and have committed adultery with the wives of their friends, and have spoken lying words in my name, which I commanded them not: I am the judge and the witness, saith the Lord.
24 And to Semeias the Nehelamite thou shalt say:
25 Thus saith the Lord of hosts the God of Israel: Because thou hast sent letters in thy name to all the people that are in Jerusalem, and to Sophonias the son of Maasias the priest, and to all the priests, saying:
26 The Lord hath made thee priest in- stead of Joiada the priest, that thou shouldst be ruler in the house of the Lord, over every man that raveth and prophesieth, to put him in the stocks, and into prison.
27 And now why hast thou not rebuked Jeremias the Anathothite, who prophesieth to you?
28 For he hath also sent to us in Babylon, saying: It is a long time: build ye houses, and dwell in them: and plant gardens, and eat the fruits of them.
29 So Sophonias the priest read this letter, in the hearing of Jeremias the prophet.
30 And the word of the Lord came to Jeremias, saying:
31 Send to all them of the captivity, saying: Thus saith the Lord to Semeias the Nehelamite: Because Semeias hath prophesied to you, and I sent him not: and hath caused you to trust in a lie :
32 Therefore thus saith the Lord: behold I will visit upon Semeias the Nehelamite, and upon his seed: he shall not have a man to sit in the midst of this people, and he shall not see the good that I will do to my people, saith the Lord: because he hath spoken treason against the Lord.
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