Jeremias 7

¹ This is the word that came to Jeremiah from Jehovah:

² »Stand at the gate of Jehovah’s house and proclaim there this word: ‘Hear the word of Jehovah, all you of Judah who enter by these gates to worship Jehovah!

³ »‘Thus says Jehovah of Hosts, the God of Israel: »Amend make right your ways and your deeds, and I will let you dwell in this place.

⁴ »‘»Do not trust in deceptive words. They say: ‘This is the Temple of Jehovah, the Temple of Jehovah, and the Temple of Jehovah.

⁵ »‘»For if you truly amend your ways and your deeds, if you truly practice justice between a man and his neighbor,

⁶ if you do not oppress the alien, the orphan, or the widow, and do not shed innocent blood in this place, nor walk after other gods to your own ruin,

⁷ then I will let you dwell in this place, in the land I gave to your fathers from generation to generation and for a very long time.« ’«

⁸ »You are trusting in deceptive words that are of no value to you.

⁹ »Will you steal, murder, commit adultery, swear falsely, offer sacrifices to Baal and walk after other gods that you have not known?

¹⁰ »Then come and stand before me in this house. It is called by my name. You say, ‘We are safe to do all these abominations.’

¹¹ »Has this house, called by my name, become a den of robbers in your sight? Behold, I, even I, have seen it,« declares Jehovah.

¹² »But go to my place in Shiloh, where I made my name dwell from the beginning, and see what I did to it because of the wickedness of my people Israel.

¹³ »For the reason that you did all these things,« says Jehovah, »I spoke to you. I rose up early and spoke. But you did not hear, and I called you but you did not answer.

¹⁴ »Consider what I will do to the house that is called by my name. It is the house in which you trust. It is the place I gave you and your fathers, as I did to Shiloh.

¹⁵ »I will cast you out of my sight, as I have cast out all your brothers, all the offspring of Ephraim.

¹⁶ »As for you, do not pray for this people. Do not lift up cry or prayer for them, and do not intercede with me for I do 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, and the fathers kindle the fire. The women knead dough to make cakes for the queen of heaven. They pour out drink offerings to other gods in order to spite me.

¹⁹ »Do they spite me?« Asks Jehovah. »Is it not themselves they spite, to their own shame?«

²⁰ Therefore the Lord Jehovah says: »My anger and my wrath will be poured out on this place, on man and on beast, on the trees of the field and on the fruit of the ground. It will burn and not be quenched.«

²¹ Thus says Jehovah of Hosts, the God of Israel: »Add your burnt offerings to your sacrifices and eat flesh.

²² »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 and sacrifices.

²³ »‘I gave them this command: ‘Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and you will be my people. You will walk in all the way that I command you that it may be well with you.’«

²⁴ »Yet they did not obey or incline their ear. They walked in their own counsels and in the stubbornness of their evil heart. They went backward and not forward.

²⁵ »Since the day your fathers came out of the land of Egypt until this day, I have sent you all my servants the prophets, daily rising early and sending them.

²⁶ »Yet they did not listen to me or incline their ear. Instead they stiffened their neck became stubborn. They did more evil than their fathers.

²⁷ »You will speak all these words to them. But they will not listen to you. You will call them but they will not answer you.

²⁸ »You will say to them: ‘This is the nation that did not obey the voice of Jehovah their God or accept correction. Truth has perished and truth has been removed from their mouth.

²⁹ ‘Cut off your hair and cast it away. Take up a cry of sorrow and grief on the bare heights. Jehovah has rejected and forsaken the generation of his wrath.’

³⁰ »The sons of Judah have done what is evil in my sight,« declares Jehovah. »They placed their detestable things in the house called by my name, to defile it.

³¹ »They have built the high places of Topheth, which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire. I did not command this. I would never think of such a thing. It would not come from my heart.

³² »Days are coming, says Jehovah, when it will no longer be called Topheth, or the valley of the son of Hinnom Ben-hinnom, but the valley of the Slaughter. They will bury in Topheth because there is no other place.

³³ »The dead bodies of this people will be food for the birds of the sky and for the beasts of the earth. No one will frighten them away.

³⁴ »I will cause the voice of joy and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride to cease from the cities of Judah and from the streets of Jerusalem. The land will become a ruin.«