²¹ Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: ^(A)“Add your burnt offerings to your sacrifices and eat meat. ^22 (B)For I did not speak to your fathers, or command them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices. ²³ But this is what I commanded them, saying, ^(C)‘Obey My voice, and ^(D)I will be your God, and you shall be My people. And walk in all the ways that I have commanded you, that it may be well with you.’ ^24 (E)Yet they did not obey or incline their ear, but ^(F)followed^[a] the counsels and the ^[b]dictates of their evil hearts, and ^(G)went^[c] backward and not forward. ²⁵ Since the day that your fathers came out of the land of Egypt until this day, I have even ^(H)sent to you all My servants the prophets, daily rising up early and sending them. ^26 (I)Yet they did not obey Me or incline their ear, but ^(J)stiffened their neck. ^(K)They did worse than their fathers.

²⁷ “Therefore ^(L)you shall speak all these words to them, but they will not obey you. You shall also call to them, but they will not answer you.

Judgment on Obscene Religion

²⁸ “So you shall say to them, ‘This is a nation that does not obey the voice of the Lord their God ^(M)nor receive correction. ^(N)Truth has perished and has been cut off from their mouth. ^29 (O)Cut off your hair and cast it away, and take up a lamentation on the desolate heights; for the Lord has rejected and forsaken the generation of His wrath.’ ³⁰ For the children of Judah have done evil in My sight,” says the Lord. ^(P)“They have set their abominations in the house which is called by My name, to ^[d]pollute it. ³¹ And they have built the ^(Q)high places of Tophet, which is in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, to ^(R)burn their sons and their daughters in the fire, ^(S)which I did not command, nor did it come into My heart.

³² “Therefore behold, ^(T)the days are coming,” says the Lord, “when it will no more be called Tophet, or the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter; ^(U)for they will bury in Tophet until there is no room. ³³ The ^(V)corpses of this people will be food for the birds of the heaven and for the beasts of the earth. And no one will frighten them away. ³⁴ Then I will cause to ^(W)cease from the cities of Judah and from the streets of Jerusalem the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride. For ^(X)the land shall be desolate.

Jeremiah Mourns for His People

8 “At that time,” says the Lord, “they shall bring out the bones of the kings of Judah, and the bones of its princes, and the bones of the priests, and the bones of the prophets, and the bones of the inhabitants of Jerusalem, out of their graves. ² They shall spread them before the sun and the moon and all the host of heaven, which they have loved and which they have served and after which they have walked, which they have sought and ^(Y)which they have worshiped. They shall not be gathered ^(Z)nor buried; they shall be like refuse on the face of the earth. ³ Then ^(AA)death shall be chosen rather than life by all the ^[e]residue of those who remain of this evil family, who remain in all the places where I have driven them,” says the Lord of hosts.

²² Speak, “Thus says the Lord:

²³ Thus says the Lord: