Jeremiah 19–22

Chapter 19

Thus saith the Lord: Go, and take a potter’s earthen bottle, and take of the ancients of the people, and of the ancients of the priests:

²And go forth into the valley of the son of Ennom, which is by the entry of the earthen gate: and there thou shalt proclaim the words that I shall tell thee.

³And thou shalt say: Hear the word of the Lord, O ye kings of Juda, and ye inhabitants of Jerusalem: Thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Behold I will bring an affliction upon this place: so that whosoever shall hear it, his ears shall tingle:

⁴Because they have forsaken me, and have profaned this place:and have sacrificed therein to strange gods, whom neither they nor their fathers knew, nor the kings of Juda: and they have filled this place with the blood of innocents.

⁵And they have built the high places of Baalim, to burn their children with fire for a holocaust to Baalim: which I did not command, nor speak of, neither did it once come into my mind.

⁶Therefore behold the days come, saith the Lord, that this place shall no more be called Topheth, nor the valley of the son of Ennom, but the valley of slaughter.

⁷And I will defeat the counsel of Juda and of Jerusalem in this place: and I will destroy them with the sword in the sight of their enemies, and by the hands of them that seek their lives: and I will give their carcasses to be meat for the fowls of the air, and for the beasts of the earth.

⁸And I will make this city an astonishment, and a hissing: every one that shall pass by it, shall be astonished, and shall hiss because of all the plagues thereof.

⁹And I will feed them with the flesh of their sons, and with the flesh of their daughters: and they shall eat every one the flesh of his friend in the siege, and in the distress wherewith their enemies, and they that seek their lives, shall straiten them.

¹⁰And thou shalt break the bottle in the sight of the men that shall go with thee.

¹¹And thou shalt say to them: Thus saith the Lord of hosts: Even so will I break this people, and this city, as the potter’s vessel is broken, which cannot be made whole again: and they shall be buried in Topheth, because there is no other place to bury in.

¹²Thus will I do to this place, saith the Lord, and to the inhabitants thereof: and I will make this city as Topheth.

¹³And the houses of Jerusalem, and the houses of the kings of Juda shall be unclean as the place of Topheth: all the houses upon whose roofs they have sacrificed to all the host of heaven, and have poured out drink offerings to strange gods.

¹⁴Then Jeremias came from Topheth, whither the Lord had sent him to prophesy, and he stood in the court of the house of the Lord, and said to all the people:

¹⁵Thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Behold I will bring in upon this city, and upon all the cities thereof all the evils that I have spoken against it: because they have hardened their necks, that they might not hear my words.

Chapter 20

Now Phassur the son of Emmer, the priest, who was appointed chief in the house of the Lord, heard Jeremias prophesying these words.

²And Phassur struck Jeremias the prophet, and put him in the stocks, that were in the upper gate of Benjamin, in the house of the Lord.

³And when it was light the next day, Phassur brought Jeremias out of the stocks. And Jeremias said to him: The Lord hath not called thy name Phassur, but fear on every side.

⁴For thus saith the Lord: Behold I will deliver thee up to fear, thee and all thy friends: and they shall fall by the sword of their enemies, and thy eyes shall see it, and I will give all Juda into the hand of the king of Babylon: and he shall carry them away to Babylon, and shall strike them with the sword.

⁵And I will give all the substance of this city, and all its labour, and every precious thing thereof, and all the treasures of the kings of Juda will I give into the hands of their enemies: and they shall pillage them, and take them away, and carry them to Babylon.

⁶But thou Phassur, and all that dwell in thy house, shall go into captivity, and thou shalt go to Babylon, and there thou shalt die, and there thou shalt be buried, thou and all thy friends, to whom thou hast prophesied a lie.

⁷Thou hast deceived me, O Lord, and I am deceived: thou hast been stronger than I, and thou hast prevailed. I am become a laughingstock all the day, all scoff at me.

⁸For I am speaking now this long time, crying out against iniquity, and I often proclaim devastation: and the word of the Lord is made a reproach to me, and a derision all the day.

⁹Then I said: I will not make mention of him, nor speak any more in his name: and there came in my heart as a burning fire, shut up in my bones, and I was wearied, not being able to bear it.

¹⁰For I heard the reproaches of many, and terror on every side: Persecute him, and let us persecute him: from all the men that were my familiars, and continued at my side: if by any means he may be deceived, and we may prevail against him, and be revenged on him.

¹¹But the Lord is with me as a strong warrior: therefore they that persecute me shall fall, and shall be weak: they shall be greatly confounded, because they have not understood the everlasting reproach, which never shall be effaced.

¹²And thou, O Lord of hosts, prover of the just, who seest the reins and the heart: let me see, I beseech thee, thy vengeance on them: for to thee I have laid open my cause.

¹³Sing ye to the Lord, praise the Lord: because he hath delivered the soul of the poor out of the hand of the wicked.

¹⁴Cursed be the day wherein I was born: let not the day in which my mother bore me, be blessed.

¹⁵Cursed be the man that brought the tidings to my father, saying: A man child is born to thee: and made him greatly rejoice.

¹⁶Let that man be as the cities which the Lord hath overthrown, and hath not repented: let him hear a cry in the morning, and howling at noontide:

¹⁷Who slew me not from the womb, that my mother might have been my grave, and her womb an everlasting conception.

¹⁸Why came I out of the womb, to see labour and sorrow, and that my days should be spent in confusion?

Chapter 21

The word that came to Jeremias from the Lord, when king Sedecias sent unto him Phassur, the son of Melchias, and Sophonias, the son of Maasias the priest, saying:

²Inquire of the Lord for us, for Nabuchodonosor king of Babylon maketh war against us: if so be the Lord will deal with us according to all his wonderful works, that he may depart from us.

³And Jeremias said to them: Thus shall you say to Sedecias:

⁴Thus saith the Lord, the God of Israel: Behold I will turn back the weapons of war that are in your hands, and with which you fight against the king of Babylon, and the Chaldeans, that besiege you round about the walls: and I will gather them together in the midst of this city.

⁵And I myself will fight against you with an outstretched hand, and with a strong arm, and in fury, and in indignation, and in great wrath.

⁶And I will strike the inhabitants of this city, men and beasts shall die of a great pestilence.

⁷And after this, saith the Lord, I will give Sedecias the king of Juda, and his servants, and his people, and such as are left in this city from the pestilence, and the sword, and the famine, into the hand of Nabuchodonosor the king of Babylon, and into the hand of their enemies, and into the hand of them that seek their life, and he shall strike them with the edge of the sword, and he shall not be moved to pity, nor spare them, nor shew mercy to them.

⁸And to this people thou shalt say: Thus saith the Lord: Behold I set before you the way of life, and the way of death.

⁹He that shall abide in this city, shall die by the sword, and by the famine, and by the pestilence: but he that shall go out and flee over to the Chaldeans, that besiege you, shall live, and his life shall be to him as a spoil.

¹⁰For I have set my face against this city for evil, and not for good, saith the Lord: it shall be given into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he shall burn it with fire.

¹¹And to the house of the king of Juda: Hear ye the word of the Lord,

¹²O house of David, thus saith the Lord: Judge ye judgment in the morning, and deliver him that is oppressed by violence out of the hand of the oppressor: lest my indignation go forth like a fire, and be kindled, and there be none to quench it, because of the evil of your ways.

¹³Behold I come to thee that dwellest in a valley upon a rock above a plain, saith the Lord: and you say: Who shall strike us and who shall enter into our houses?

¹⁴But I will visit upon you according to the fruit of your doings, saith the Lord: and I will kindle a fire in the forest thereof: and it shall devour all things round about it.

Chapter 22

Thus saith the Lord: Go down to the house of the king of Juda, and there thou shalt speak this word,

²And thou shalt say: Hear the word of the Lord, king of Juda, that sittest upon the throne of David: thou and thy servants, and thy people, who enter in by these gates.

³Thus saith the Lord: Execute judgment and justice, and deliver him that is oppressed out of the hand of the oppressor: and afflict not the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow, nor oppress them unjustly: and shed not innocent blood in this place.

⁴For if you will do this thing indeed, then shall there enter in by the gates of this house, kings of the race of David sitting upon his throne, and riding in chariots and on horses, they and their servants, and their people.

⁵But if you will not hearken to these words: I swear by myself, saith the Lord, that this house shall become a desolation.

⁶For thus saith the Lord to the house of the king of Juda: Thou art to me Galaad the head of Libanus: yet surely I will make thee a wilderness, and cities not habitable.

⁷And I will prepare against thee the destroyer and his weapons: and they shall cut down thy chosen cedars, and shall cast them headlong into the fire.

⁸And many…