Beginning
Mend Your Ways!
7 The word that came to Jeremiah from Adonai, saying: 2 Stand in the gate of Adonai’s house and proclaim there this word and say: “Hear the word of Adonai, all you of Judah that come through these gates to worship Adonai. 3 Thus says Adonai-Tzva’ot, the God of Israel; mend your ways and your deeds, and I will let you live in this place. 4 Do not trust in deceptive words and say ‘The Temple of Adonai, the Temple of Adonai, the Temple of Adonai!’
5 “No, if you truly mend your ways and your deeds—if you are doing justice between a man and his neighbor, 6 not oppressing the sojourner, orphan and widow nor shedding innocent blood in this place, nor going after other gods to your own ruin— 7 then I will let you dwell in this place, in the land that I gave to your fathers forever and ever. 8 Look, you are trusting in deceptive words that are empty. 9 Will you steal, murder, and commit adultery and perjury, and offer incense to Baal and walk after other gods whom you have not known— 10 and then come and stand before Me in this house that bears My Name, saying, ‘We are saved!’—so that you may keep doing all these abominations? 11 Has this House, which bears My Name, become a den of robbers in your eyes?[a] Look, even I have seen it!” It is a declaration of Adonai.
12 “Indeed, go now to My place that was in Shiloh, where I first made My Name dwell. Now see what I did to it because of the wickedness of My people Israel. 13 While you were doing all these things,” declares Adonai, “I spoke to you early and often, but you did not listen, and I called you but you did not answer. 14 Therefore I will do to the House that bears My Name—the one in which you trust, the one that I gave to you and to your fathers—as I have done to Shiloh. 15 And I will cast you out of My sight, just as I cast out all your brothers, all the offspring of Ephraim.
16 “As for you, do not pray for this people. Do not offer any supplication or petition for them, nor entreat Me, because I will not hear you. 17 Do you not see what they are doing in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem? 18 The children gather wood, the fathers light the fire and the women knead the dough to make sacrificial cakes to the queen of heaven. Moreover, they pour out drink offerings to other gods in order to provoke Me to anger. 19 But am I the One they are provoking?” declares Adonai. “Are they not vexing themselves to their own shame?”
20 Therefore thus says Adonai Elohim: “My anger and My wrath is about to be poured out on this place—on man and beast, and on the trees of the field and the fruit of the land—and it will burn and not be quenched.”
21 Thus says Adonai-Tzva’ot, the God of Israel: “Add your burnt offerings to your sacrifices and eat the meat! 22 For on the day that I brought your fathers out of the land of Egypt I did not speak to them nor did I command them concerning burnt offerings and sacrifices, 23 but I explicitly commanded them: ‘Obey My voice and I will be your God to you and you will be My people. Walk in all the ways that I command you that it may go well with you.’ 24 But they did not listen or pay attention. Instead they followed their own counsel, in the stubbornness of their evil heart. They have gone backward and not forward, 25 from the day your fathers left the land of Egypt until today. Although I sent to you all My servants the prophets, daily and persistently, 26 they did not listen to Me or pay attention. Rather, they stiffened their neck, doing more evil than their fathers.
27 “When you tell them all these things, they will not listen to you. When you call to them, they will not answer you. 28 So you will say to them, ‘This nation has not obeyed the voice of Adonai their God or received correction. Truth has perished and is cut off from their mouth. 29 Cut off your hair and throw it away and take up a lamentation on the barren hills. For Adonai has spurned and cast off the generation of His wrath.”
Valley of Slaughter
30 “The children of Judah have done what is evil in My sight”—it is a declaration of Adonai—“They have set their detestable things in the House that bears My Name to defile it. 31 They have built the high places of Topheth in the Valley of Ben-Hinnom to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire—which I did not command, nor did it even enter My mind. 32 Therefore, the days are soon coming,” declares Adonai, “when it will no longer be called Topheth, nor the Valley of Ben-Hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter. For they will bury in Topheth until there is no room. 33 The carcasses of this people will be food for the birds of the sky and for the beasts of the earth, and no one will frighten them away. 34 Then I will bring an end, from the cities of Judah and from the streets of Jerusalem, to the voice of joy and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride. For the land will be desolate.”
8 “At that time”—it is a declaration of Adonai—“the bones of the kings of Judah and the bones of his princes, the bones of the kohanim and the bones of the prophets, and the bones of the inhabitants of Jerusalem will be brought out of their graves. 2 They will spread them out to the sun, the moon and all the host of heaven, which they have loved and served, and after which they have walked and sought, and which they have worshipped. They will not be gathered or buried, but will be like dung on the face of the ground. 3 So death will be chosen rather than life by all the remnant that remains of this evil family that remains in all the places to which I have driven them.” It is a declaration of Adonai-Tzva’ot.
Each Turns His Own Way
4 Moreover you will say to them, thus says Adonai:
“Do men fall and not get up again?
Does one turn away and not return?
5 Why then has this people—Jerusalem—
turned away in perpetual backsliding?
They cling to deceit; they refuse to return.
6 I listened attentively,
but they have not spoken what is right.
No one repents of his wickedness,
saying, ‘What have I done?’
Each one turns in his own direction,
like a horse charging into battle.
7 Even the stork in the sky
knows her appointed times,
and the turtledove, swallow and crane
observe the time of their migration,
but My people do not know
the judgments of Adonai.
8 How can you say, ‘We are wise!
The Torah of Adonai is with us’?
In fact, it is the lying pen of the scribes
that have made it a lie.
9 The wise men will be put to shame—
shattered, trapped.
Look! They have rejected Adonai’s word,
so what wisdom do they have?
10 Therefore I will give their wives to others
and their fields to new owners.
For from the least to the greatest
everyone is greedy for gain.
From the prophet even to the kohen
everyone practices deceit.
11 They heal the fracture of the daughter of My people
by treating it superficially—
saying, ‘Shalom, shalom,’
when there is no shalom.
12 Were they ashamed of the abomination they committed?
No, not ashamed, not at all—
they do not know how to blush!
So they will fall among the fallen.
At the time of their punishment
they will be brought down.”
It is a declaration of Adonai.
13 “I will utterly consume them,” says Adonai.
“There will be no grapes on the vine,
and no figs on the fig tree,
and even the leaf will wither,
and what I gave them will pass away.”
14 “Why are we sitting here?
Assemble!
Let us flee to the fortified cities
and perish there!
For Adonai Eloheinu has silenced us
and given us poisoned water to drink.
For we have sinned against Adonai.
15 We hoped for shalom,
but it is no good,
for a time of healing
—and suddenly, terror!”
16 From Dan is heard
the snorting of his horses.
At the sound of his stallions neighing,
the whole land quakes.
For they come and devour
the land and everything in it—
the city and all who live there.
17 “For I am about to send serpents on you,
vipers for which there is no charm,
and they will bite you.”
It is a declaration of Adonai.
Weeping for Jerusalem
18 My joy is overcome by grief,
my heart is faint within me.
19 Listen, the sound of the cry of the daughter of my people
—a voice from a distant land—
“Is Adonai no longer in Zion?
Is her King no longer in her?”
“Why have they provoked Me with their graven images,
with foreign idols?”
20 “Harvest is past,
summer is over,
yet we are not saved.”
21 “Because of the brokenness of the daughter of my people,
I am brokenhearted.
I mourn—desolation grips me.
22 Is there no balm in Gilead?
Is there no physician there?
Then why has no healing gone up
for the daughter of my people?
23 If only my head were water
and my eyes a fountain of tears,
then I would weep day and night
for the slain of the daughter of my people!
9 If only I had a travelers’ lodging place
in the wilderness,
then I might leave my people
and get away from them!
For they are all adulterers,
a bunch of traitors.
2 They bend their tongue like a bow.
Lies, not faithfulness,
prevail in the land.
“For they go from evil to evil
and do not know Me,” says Adonai.
3 Beware, everyone, of your neighbor!
Don’t even trust a brother.
For every brother grabs like Jacob
and every neighbor spreads slander.
4 Everyone deceives his neighbor
and does not speak the truth.
They taught their tongue to speak lies.
They wear themselves out doing wrong.
5 “You dwell in the midst of deceit.
In deceit they refuse to know Me.”
It is a declaration of Adonai.
6 Therefore thus says Adonai-Tzva’ot:
“I am about to refine them and test them.
For what else can I do
for the daughter of My people?
7 Their tongue is a deadly arrow,
speaking deceit.
With his mouth
each says shalom to his neighbor,
while inwardly setting a trap for him.
8 For such things shall I not punish them?”
It is a declaration of Adonai.
“Should I not avenge Myself
on such a nation as this?”
9 For the mountains I lift up weeping and wailing,
a lament for the desert pastures.
For they are so scorched
that no one passes through—
the lowing of cattle is not heard.
The birds of the air have fled
and the animals are gone.
10 “I will make Jerusalem a heap of ruins,
a lair for jackals.
I will make the cities of Judah
a wasteland without inhabitant.
11 Who is the one wise enough to understand this?
To whom has the mouth of Adonai spoken
that he may explain it?
Why is the land ruined,
laid waste like a wilderness,
so that no one passes through?”
12 Adonai said “It is because they have forsaken My Torah that I set before them. They have neither obeyed My voice nor walked according to it, 13 but have walked after the stubbornness of their heart, and after the Baalim that their fathers taught them. 14 Therefore, thus says Adonai-Tzva’ot, the God of Israel, “look, I will make this people eat wormwood and drink poisoned water. 15 I will scatter them among the nations whom neither they nor their fathers have known. I will pursue them with the sword, until I have finished with them.”
16 Thus says Adonai-Tzva’ot:
“Pay attention! Call the dirge-singers and let them come.
Send for the most skillful wailers and let them come!”
17 “Let them come quickly
and lift up a wailing over us
so our eyes may run down with tears
and our eyelids gush with water.”
18 For a wailing voice is heard from Zion:
“How we are ruined!
We are utterly ashamed—
we have forsaken the land,
for they tore down our dwellings.”
19 Now, hear the word of Adonai, O women,
let your ear receive the word of His mouth.
Teach your daughters wailing
and everyone her neighbor a dirge.
20 For death has climbed through our windows.
It has entered into our palaces
to cut off children from the street
and young men from the squares.”
21 “Say this,” declares Adonai.
“The carcasses of men will lie
like dung on the open field,
like cut grain behind the reaper,
with no one gathering them.”
Boast in Knowing Adonai
22 Thus says Adonai:
“Let not the wise boast in his wisdom
nor the mighty boast in his might
nor the rich glory in his riches.
23 But let one who boasts boast in this:
that he understands and knows Me.
For I am Adonai who exercises lovingkindness,
justice and righteousness on earth.
For in these things I delight.”
It is a declaration of Adonai.
24 “Days are soon coming,” declares Adonai, “when I will punish all who are circumcised and yet uncircumcised— 25 Egypt, Judah, Edom and Ammon’s children and Moab, and all that have cut the corners of their hair—that dwell in the wilderness. For all the nations are uncircumcised but all the house of Israel are uncircumcised in the heart.
Tree of Life (TLV) Translation of the Bible. Copyright © 2015 by The Messianic Jewish Family Bible Society.