Jeremiah 20

The Word of God to Pashhur

20Now ^aPashhur the son of ^bImmer, the priest who was also chief governor in the house of the Lord, heard that Jeremiah prophesied these things. ²Then Pashhur struck Jeremiah the prophet, and put him in the stocks that were in the high ^cgate of Benjamin, which was by the house of the Lord.

³And it happened on the next day that Pashhur brought Jeremiah out of the stocks. Then Jeremiah said to him, “The Lord has not called your name Pashhur, but ¹Magor-Missabib. ⁴For thus says the Lord: ‘Behold, I will make you a terror to yourself and to all your friends; and they shall fall by the sword of their enemies, and your eyes shall see it. I will ^dgive all Judah into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he shall carry them captive to Babylon and slay them with the sword. ⁵Moreover I ^ewill deliver all the wealth of this city, all its produce, and all its precious things; all the treasures of the kings of Judah I will give into the hand of their enemies, who will plunder them, seize them, and ^fcarry them to Babylon. ⁶And you, Pashhur, and all who dwell in your house, shall go into captivity. You shall go to Babylon, and there you shall die, and be buried there, you and all your friends, to whom you have ^gprophesied lies.’ ”

Jeremiah’s Unpopular Ministry

⁷O Lord, You ²induced me, and I was persuaded;

^hYou are stronger than I, and have prevailed.

ⁱI am ³in derision daily;

Everyone mocks me.

⁸For when I spoke, I cried out;

^jI shouted, “Violence and plunder!”

Because the word of the Lord was made to me

A reproach and a derision daily.

⁹Then I said, “I will not make mention of Him,

Nor speak anymore in His name.”

But His word was in my heart like a ^kburning fire

Shut up in my bones;

I was weary of holding it back,

And ^lI could not.

^10mFor I heard many ⁴mocking:

“Fear on every side!”

“Report,” they say, “and we will report it!”

ⁿAll my acquaintances watched for my stumbling, saying,

“Perhaps he can be induced;

Then we will prevail against him,

And we will take our revenge on him.”

¹¹But the Lord is ^owith me as a mighty, awesome One.

Therefore my persecutors will stumble, and will not ^pprevail.

They will be greatly ashamed, for they will not prosper.

Their ^qeverlasting confusion will never be forgotten.

¹²But, O Lord of hosts,

You who ^rtest the righteous,

And see the ⁵mind and heart,

^sLet me see Your vengeance on them;

For I have pleaded my cause before You.

¹³Sing to the Lord! Praise the Lord!

For ^tHe has delivered the life of the poor

From the hand of evildoers.

^14uCursed be the day in which I was born!

Let the day not be blessed in which my mother bore me!

¹⁵Let the man be cursed

Who brought news to my father, saying,

“A male child has been born to you!”

Making him very glad.

¹⁶And let that man be like the cities

Which the Lord—^voverthrew, and did not relent;

Let him ^whear the cry in the morning

And the shouting at noon,

^17xBecause he did not kill me from the womb,

That my mother might have been my grave,

And her womb always enlarged with me.

^18yWhy did I come forth from the womb to ^zsee ⁶labor and sorrow,

That my days should be consumed with shame?