Jeremiah 9

Jeremiah 8 Jeremiah 10

Jeremiah 9 New International Version (NIV)

9 ^[a]¹Oh, that my head were a spring of water
    and my eyes a fountain of tears!
I would weep day and night
    for the slain of my people.
²Oh, that I had in the desert
    a lodging place for travelers,
so that I might leave my people
    and go away from them;
for they are all adulterers,
    a crowd of unfaithful people.

³“They make ready their tongue
    like a bow, to shoot lies;
it is not by truth
    that they triumph^[b] in the land.
They go from one sin to another;
    they do not acknowledge me,”
declares the Lord.
⁴“Beware of your friends;
    do not trust anyone in your clan.
For every one of them is a deceiver,^[c]
    and every friend a slanderer.
⁵Friend deceives friend,
    and no one speaks the truth.
They have taught their tongues to lie;
    they weary themselves with sinning.
⁶You^[d] live in the midst of deception;
    in their deceit they refuse to acknowledge me,”
declares the Lord.

⁷Therefore this is what the Lord Almighty says:

“See, I will refine and test them,
    for what else can I do
    because of the sin of my people?
⁸Their tongue is a deadly arrow;
    it speaks deceitfully.
With their mouths they all speak cordially to their neighbors,
    but in their hearts they set traps for them.
⁹Should I not punish them for this?”
    declares the Lord.
“Should I not avenge myself
    on such a nation as this?”

¹⁰I will weep and wail for the mountains
    and take up a lament concerning the wilderness grasslands.
They are desolate and untraveled,
    and the lowing of cattle is not heard.
The birds have all fled
    and the animals are gone.

¹¹“I will make Jerusalem a heap of ruins,
a haunt of jackals;
and I will lay waste the towns of Judah
so no one can live there.”

¹²Who is wise enough to understand this? Who has been instructed by the Lord and can explain it? Why has the land been ruined and laid waste like a desert that no one can cross?

¹³The Lord said, “It is because they have forsaken my law, which I set before them; they have not obeyed me or followed my law. ¹⁴Instead, they have followed the stubbornness of their hearts; they have followed the Baals, as their ancestors taught them.” ¹⁵Therefore this is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says: “See, I will make this people eat bitter food and drink poisoned water. ¹⁶I will scatter them among nations that neither they nor their ancestors have known, and I will pursue them with the sword until I have made an end of them.”

¹⁷This is what the Lord Almighty says:

“Consider now! Call for the wailing women to come;
    send for the most skillful of them.
¹⁸Let them come quickly
    and wail over us
till our eyes overflow with tears
    and water streams from our eyelids.
¹⁹The sound of wailing is heard from Zion:
    ‘How ruined we are!
    How great is our shame!
We must leave our land
    because our houses are in ruins.’”

²⁰Now, you women, hear the word of the Lord;
    open your ears to the words of his mouth.
Teach your daughters how to wail;
    teach one another a lament.
²¹Death has climbed in through our windows
    and has entered our fortresses;
it has removed the children from the streets
    and the young men from the public squares.

²²Say, “This is what the Lord declares:

“‘Dead bodies will lie
like dung on the open field,
like cut grain behind the reaper,
with no one to gather them.’”

²³This is what the Lord says:

“Let not the wise boast of their wisdom
    or the strong boast of their strength
    or the rich boast of their riches,
²⁴but let the one who boasts boast about this:
    that they have the understanding to know me,
that I am the Lord, who exercises kindness,
    justice and righteousness on earth,
    for in these I delight,”
declares the Lord.

²⁵“The days are coming,” declares the Lord, “when I will punish all who are circumcised only in the flesh— ²⁶Egypt, Judah, Edom, Ammon, Moab and all who live in the wilderness in distant places.^[e] For all these nations are really uncircumcised, and even the whole house of Israel is uncircumcised in heart.”

Footnotes:

Jeremiah 9:1 In Hebrew texts 9:1 is numbered 8:23, and 9:2-26 is numbered 9:1-25.
Jeremiah 9:3 Or lies; / they are not valiant for truth
Jeremiah 9:4 Or a deceiving Jacob
Jeremiah 9:6 That is, Jeremiah (the Hebrew is singular)
Jeremiah 9:26 Or wilderness and who clip the hair by their foreheads