Add parallel Print Page Options

Hear the word of the Lord, you house of Jacob.
All you families of the house of Israel,
this is what the Lord says.
What fault did your fathers find in me,
that they departed so far from me?
They followed worthless idols,
and so they became worthless themselves.
They did not say,
“Where is the Lord, who brought us up from the land of Egypt?
Where is the one who led us through the wilderness,
    through a desert wasteland filled with ravines,
    through a land of drought and the shadow of death,
    a land which no one passes through,
    a land where no human being lives?”
I brought you into a fertile land,
to eat its fruit and its good things.
But you defiled my land
and made my inheritance repulsive.
The priests did not ask, “Where is the Lord?”
The experts in the law did not acknowledge me.
Their shepherds rebelled against me.
The prophets prophesied by Baal
and went after useless idols.

Read full chapter

The Unfaithfulness of Israel’s Ancestors

Hear the word of Yahweh, O house of Jacob, and all the clans[a] of the house of Israel. Thus says Yahweh:

“What injustice did your ancestors[b] find in me
    that they were far from me,
and they went after the vanity,
    and they became vain?
And they did not say,
    ‘Where is Yahweh,
the one who brought us up from the land of Egypt,
    the one who led us in the desert,[c]
in a land of desert plains and gorges,[d]
    in a land of dryness and deep darkness,
in a land that no one passes through,[e]
    and no human lives there?’
And I brought you to the land of the orchard,
    to eat its fruit, and its good things.[f]
But you entered and defiled my land,
    and my inheritance you made a detestable thing.[g]
The priests did not say, ‘Where is Yahweh?’
    and those who handle the law did not know me,
and the shepherds have rebelled against me,[h]
    and the prophets prophesied by Baal,
and they went after things which do not profit.

Read full chapter

Footnotes

  1. Jeremiah 2:4 Or “families”
  2. Jeremiah 2:5 Or “fathers”
  3. Jeremiah 2:6 Or “wilderness”
  4. Jeremiah 2:6 Hebrew “gorge”
  5. Jeremiah 2:6 Literally “no man passes through in it”
  6. Jeremiah 2:7 Hebrew “good thing”
  7. Jeremiah 2:7 Or “abomination”
  8. Jeremiah 2:8 Literally “broken with me”