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Jeremiah’s Celibacy and Message

16 The word of the Lord came to me:(A) You shall not take a wife, nor shall you have sons or daughters in this place.(B) For thus says the Lord concerning the sons and daughters who are born in this place and concerning the mothers who bear them and the fathers who father them in this land:(C) They shall die of deadly diseases. They shall not be lamented, nor shall they be buried; they shall become like dung on the surface of the ground. They shall perish by the sword and by famine, and their dead bodies shall become food for the birds of the air and for the wild animals of the earth.(D)

For thus says the Lord: Do not enter the house of mourning or go to lament or bemoan them, for I have taken away my peace from this people, says the Lord, my steadfast love and mercy.(E) Both great and small shall die in this land; they shall not be buried, and no one shall lament for them; there shall be no gashing, no shaving of the head for them.(F) No one shall break bread[a] for the mourner, to offer comfort for the dead, nor shall anyone give them the cup of consolation to drink for their fathers or their mothers.(G) You shall not go into the house of feasting to sit with them, to eat and drink.(H) For thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: I am going to banish from this place, in your days and before your eyes, the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride.(I)

10 And when you tell this people all these words, and they say to you, “Why has the Lord pronounced all this great evil against us? What is our iniquity? What is the sin that we have committed against the Lord our God?”(J) 11 then you shall say to them: It is because your ancestors have forsaken me, says the Lord, and have gone after other gods and have served and worshiped them and have forsaken me and have not kept my law,(K) 12 and because you have behaved worse than your ancestors, for here you are, every one of you, following your stubborn evil will, refusing to listen to me.(L) 13 Therefore I will hurl you out of this land into a land that neither you nor your ancestors have known, and there you shall serve other gods day and night, for I will show you no favor.(M)

God Will Restore Israel

14 Therefore, the days are surely coming, says the Lord, when it shall no longer be said, “As the Lord lives who brought the people of Israel up out of the land of Egypt,”(N) 15 but “As the Lord lives who brought the people of Israel up out of the land of the north and out of all the lands where he had driven them.” For I will bring them back to their own land that I gave to their ancestors.(O)

16 I am now sending for many fishermen, says the Lord, and they shall catch them, and afterward I will send for many hunters, and they shall hunt them from every mountain and every hill and out of the clefts of the rocks.(P) 17 For my eyes are on all their ways; they are not hidden from my presence, nor is their iniquity concealed from my sight.(Q) 18 And[b] I will doubly repay their iniquity and their sin because they have polluted my land with the carcasses of their detestable idols and have filled my inheritance with their abominations.(R)

19 O Lord, my strength and my stronghold,
    my refuge in the day of trouble,
to you shall the nations come
    from the ends of the earth and say:
“Our ancestors have inherited nothing but lies,
    worthless things in which there is no profit.(S)
20 Can mortals make for themselves gods?
    Such are no gods!”(T)

21 “Therefore I am surely going to teach them, this time I am going to teach them my power and my might, and they shall know that my name is the Lord.”(U)

Judah’s Sin and Punishment

17 The sin of Judah is written with an iron pen; with a diamond point it is engraved on the tablet of their hearts and on the horns of their altars,(V) while their children remember their altars and their sacred poles[c] beside every green tree and on the high hills, on the mountains in the open country. Your wealth and all your treasures I will give for spoil as the price of your sin[d] throughout all your territory. By your own act you shall lose the heritage that I gave you, and I will make you serve your enemies in a land that you do not know, for in my anger a fire is kindled that shall burn forever.(W)

Thus says the Lord:
Cursed are those who trust in mere mortals
    and make mere flesh their strength,
    whose hearts turn away from the Lord.(X)
They shall be like a shrub in the desert
    and shall not see when relief comes.
They shall live in the parched places of the wilderness,
    in an uninhabited salt land.(Y)

Blessed are those who trust in the Lord,
    whose trust is the Lord.(Z)
They shall be like a tree planted by water,
    sending out its roots by the stream.
It shall not fear when heat comes,
    and its leaves shall stay green;
in the year of drought it is not anxious,
    and it does not cease to bear fruit.(AA)

The heart is devious above all else;
    it is perverse—
    who can understand it?(AB)
10 I the Lord test the mind
    and search the heart,
to give to all according to their ways,
    according to the fruit of their doings.(AC)

11 Like the partridge hatching what it did not lay,
    so are all who amass wealth unjustly;
in midlife it will leave them,
    and at their end they will prove to be fools.

12 O glorious throne, exalted from the beginning,
    shrine of our sanctuary!
13 O hope of Israel! O Lord!
    All who forsake you shall be put to shame;
those who turn away from you[e] shall be recorded in the underworld,[f]
    for they have forsaken the fountain of living water, the Lord.(AD)

Jeremiah Prays for Vindication

14 Heal me, O Lord, and I shall be healed;
    save me, and I shall be saved,
    for you are my praise.(AE)
15 See how they say to me,
    “Where is the word of the Lord?
    Let it come!”(AF)
16 But I have not run away from being a shepherd[g] in your service,
    nor have I desired the fatal day.
You know what came from my lips;
    it was before your face.
17 Do not become a terror to me;
    you are my refuge in the day of disaster;(AG)
18 Let my persecutors be shamed,
    but do not let me be shamed;
let them be dismayed,
    but do not let me be dismayed;
bring on them the day of disaster;
    destroy them with double destruction!(AH)

Hallow the Sabbath Day

19 Thus said the Lord to me: Go and stand in the People’s Gate, by which the kings of Judah enter and by which they go out, and in all the gates of Jerusalem, 20 and say to them: Hear the word of the Lord, you kings of Judah, and all Judah, and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem who enter by these gates.(AI) 21 Thus says the Lord: For the sake of your lives, take care that you do not bear a burden on the Sabbath day or bring it in by the gates of Jerusalem.(AJ) 22 And do not carry a burden out of your houses on the Sabbath or do any work, but keep the Sabbath day holy, as I commanded your ancestors.(AK) 23 Yet they did not listen or incline their ear; they stiffened their necks and would not hear or receive instruction.(AL)

24 But if you listen to me, says the Lord, and bring in no burden by the gates of this city on the Sabbath day but keep the Sabbath day holy and do no work on it,(AM) 25 then there shall enter by the gates of this city kings[h] who sit on the throne of David, riding in chariots and on horses, they and their officials, the people of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and this city shall be inhabited forever.(AN) 26 And people shall come from the towns of Judah and the places around Jerusalem, from the land of Benjamin, from the Shephelah, from the hill country, and from the Negeb, bringing burnt offerings and sacrifices, grain offerings and frankincense, and bringing thank offerings to the house of the Lord.(AO) 27 But if you do not listen to me, to keep the Sabbath day holy and to carry in no burden through the gates of Jerusalem on the Sabbath day, then I will kindle a fire in its gates; it shall devour the palaces of Jerusalem and shall not be quenched.(AP)

Footnotes

  1. 16.7 Gk: Heb break for them
  2. 16.18 Gk: Heb And first
  3. 17.2 Or Asherahs
  4. 17.3 Cn: Heb spoil, your high places for sin
  5. 17.13 Heb me
  6. 17.13 Or in the earth
  7. 17.16 Meaning of Heb uncertain
  8. 17.25 Cn: Heb kings and officials