Jeremiah 3–4

Chapter 3

¹“If a man divorces his wife and she goes from him

and becomes another man’s wife,

will he return to her?

Would not that land be greatly polluted?

You have played the harlot with many lovers;

and would you return to me?

says the Lord.

²Lift up your eyes to the bare heights, and see!

Where have you not been lain with?

By the waysides you have sat awaiting lovers

like an Arab in the wilderness.

You have polluted the land

with your vile harlotry.

³Therefore the showers have been withheld,

and the spring rain has not come;

yet you have a harlot’s brow,

you refuse to be ashamed.

⁴Have you not just now called to me,

‘My father, thou art the friend of my youth—

⁵will he be angry for ever,

will he be indignant to the end?’

Behold, you have spoken,

but you have done all the evil that you could.”

⁶The Lord said to me in the days of King Josiah: “Have you seen what she did, that faithless one, Israel, how she went up on every high hill and under every green tree, and there played the harlot? ⁷And I thought, ‘After she has done all this she will return to me’; but she did not return, and her false sister Judah saw it. ⁸She saw that for all the adulteries of that faithless one, Israel, I had sent her away with a decree of divorce; yet her false sister Judah did not fear, but she too went and played the harlot. ⁹Because harlotry was so light to her, she polluted the land, committing adultery with stone and tree. ¹⁰Yet for all this her false sister Judah did not return to me with her whole heart, but in pretense, says the Lord.”

¹¹And the Lord said to me, “Faithless Israel has shown herself less guilty than false Judah. ¹²Go, and proclaim these words toward the north, and say,

‘Return, faithless Israel,

says the Lord.

I will not look on you in anger,

for I am merciful,

says the Lord;

I will not be angry for ever.

¹³Only acknowledge your guilt,

that you rebelled against the Lord your God

and scattered your favors among strangers under every green tree,

and that you have not obeyed my voice,

says the Lord.

¹⁴Return, O faithless children,

says the Lord;

for I am your master;

I will take you, one from a city and two from a family,

and I will bring you to Zion.

¹⁵“ ‘And I will give you shepherds after my own heart, who will feed you with knowledge and understanding. ¹⁶And when you have multiplied and increased in the land, in those days, says the Lord, they shall no more say, “The ark of the covenant of the Lord.” It shall not come to mind, or be remembered, or missed; it shall not be made again. ¹⁷At that time Jerusalem shall be called the throne of the Lord, and all nations shall gather to it, to the presence of the Lord in Jerusalem, and they shall no more stubbornly follow their own evil heart. ¹⁸In those days the house of Judah shall join the house of Israel, and together they shall come from the land of the north to the land that I gave your fathers for a heritage.

¹⁹“ ‘I thought

how I would set you among my sons,

and give you a pleasant land,

a heritage most beauteous of all nations.

And I thought you would call me, My Father,

and would not turn from following me.

²⁰Surely, as a faithless wife leaves her husband,

so have you been faithless to me, O house of Israel,

says the Lord.’ ”

²¹A voice on the bare heights is heard,

the weeping and pleading of Israel’s sons,

because they have perverted their way,

they have forgotten the Lord their God.

²²“Return, O faithless sons,

I will heal your faithlessness.”

“Behold, we come to thee;

for thou art the Lord our God.

²³Truly the hills are a delusion,

the orgies on the mountains.

Truly in the Lord our God

is the salvation of Israel.

²⁴“But from our youth the shameful thing has devoured all for which our fathers labored, their flocks and their herds, their sons and their daughters. ²⁵Let us lie down in our shame, and let our dishonor cover us; for we have sinned against the Lord our God, we and our fathers, from our youth even to this day; and we have not obeyed the voice of the Lord our God.”

Chapter 4

¹“If you return, O Israel,

says the Lord,

to me you should return.

If you remove your abominations from my presence,

and do not waver,

²and if you swear, ‘As the Lord lives,’

in truth, in justice, and in uprightness,

then nations shall bless themselves in him,

and in him shall they glory.”

³For thus says the Lord to the men of Judah and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem:

“Break up your fallow ground,

and sow not among thorns.

⁴Circumcise yourselves to the Lord,

remove the foreskin of your hearts,

O men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem;

lest my wrath go forth like fire,

and burn with none to quench it,

because of the evil of your doings.”

⁵Declare in Judah, and proclaim in Jerusalem, and say,

“Blow the trumpet through the land;

cry aloud and say,

‘Assemble, and let us go

into the fortified cities!’

⁶Raise a standard toward Zion,

flee for safety, stay not,

for I bring evil from the north,

and great destruction.

⁷A lion has gone up from his thicket,

a destroyer of nations has set out;

he has gone forth from his place

to make your land a waste;

your cities will be ruins

without inhabitant.

⁸For this gird you with sackcloth,

lament and wail;

for the fierce anger of the Lord

has not turned back from us.”

⁹“In that day, says the Lord, courage shall fail both king and princes; the priests shall be appalled and the prophets astounded.” ¹⁰Then I said, “Ah, Lord GOD, surely thou hast utterly deceived this people and Jerusalem, saying, ‘It shall be well with you’; whereas the sword has reached their very life.”

¹¹At that time it will be said to this people and to Jerusalem, “A hot wind from the bare heights in the desert toward the daughter of my people, not to winnow or cleanse, ¹²a wind too full for this comes for me. Now it is I who speak in judgment upon them.”

¹³Behold, he comes up like clouds,

his chariots like the whirlwind;

his horses are swifter than eagles—

woe to us, for we are ruined!

¹⁴O Jerusalem, wash your heart from wickedness,

that you may be saved.

How long shall your evil thoughts

lodge within you?

¹⁵For a voice declares from Dan

and proclaims evil from Mount Ephraim.

¹⁶Warn the nations that he is coming;

announce to Jerusalem,

“Besiegers come from a distant land;

they shout against the cities of Judah.

¹⁷Like keepers of a field are they against her round about,

because she has rebelled against me,

says the Lord.

¹⁸Your ways and your doings

have brought this upon you.

This is your doom, and it is bitter;

it has reached your very heart.”

¹⁹My anguish, my anguish! I writhe in pain!

Oh, the walls of my heart!

My heart is beating wildly;

I cannot keep silent;

for I hear the sound of the trumpet,

the alarm of war.

²⁰Disaster follows hard on disaster,

the whole land is laid waste.

Suddenly my tents are destroyed,

my curtains in a moment.

²¹How long must I see the standard,

and hear the sound of the trumpet?

²²“For my people are foolish,

they know me not;

they are stupid children,

they have no understanding.

They are skilled in doing evil,

but how to do good they know not.”

²³I looked on the earth, and lo, it was waste and void;

and to the heavens, and they had no light.

²⁴I looked on the mountains, and lo, they were quaking,

and all the hills moved to and fro.

²⁵I looked, and lo, there was no man,

and all the birds of the air had fled.

²⁶I looked, and lo, the fruitful land was a desert,

and all its cities were laid in ruins

before the Lord, before his fierce anger.

²⁷For thus says the Lord, “The whole land shall be a desolation; yet I will not make a full end.

²⁸For this the earth shall mourn,

and the heavens above be black;

for I have spoken, I have purposed;

I have not relented nor will I turn back.”

²⁹At the noise of horseman and archer

every city takes to flight;

they enter thickets; they climb among rocks;

all the cities are forsaken,

and no man dwells in them.

³⁰And you, O desolate one,

what do you mean that you dress in scarlet,

that you deck yourself with ornaments of gold,

that you enlarge your eyes with paint?

In vain you beautify yourself.

Your lovers despise you;

they seek your life.

³¹For I heard a cry as of a woman in travail,

anguish as of one bringing forth her first child,

the cry of the daughter of Zion gasping for breath,

stretching out her hands,

“Woe is me! I am fainting before murderers.”