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For among my people are found wicked men. They watch, as fowlers lie in wait. They set a trap. They catch men.

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As a cage is full of birds, so are their houses full of deceit. Therefore they have become great, and grew rich.

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They have grown fat. They shine; yes, they excell in deeds of wickedness. They don’t plead the cause, the cause of the fatherless, that they may prosper; and they don’t judge the right of the needy.

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“Shall I not punish for these things?” says Yahweh. “Shall not my soul be avenged on such a nation as this?

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“An astonishing and horrible thing has happened in the land.

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The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests rule by their own authority; and my people love to have it so. What will you do in the end of it?

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“Flee for safety, you children of Benjamin, out of the midst of Jerusalem, and blow the trumpet in Tekoa, and raise up a signal on Beth Haccherem; for evil looks forth from the north, and a great destruction.

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The comely and delicate one, the daughter of Zion, will I cut off.

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Shepherds with their flocks shall come to her; they shall pitch their tents against her all around; they shall feed everyone in his place.”

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“Prepare war against her; arise, and let us go up at noon. Woe to us! For the day declines, for the shadows of the evening are stretched out.

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Arise, and let us go up by night, and let us destroy her palaces.”

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For Yahweh of Armies said, “Cut down trees, and cast up a mound against Jerusalem: this is the city to be visited; she is wholly oppression in the midst of her.

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As a well casts forth its waters, so she casts forth her wickedness: violence and destruction is heard in her; before me continually is sickness and wounds.

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Be instructed, Jerusalem, lest my soul be alienated from you; lest I make you a desolation, a land not inhabited.”

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Thus says Yahweh of Armies, “They shall thoroughly glean the remnant of Israel like a vine. Turn again your hand as a grape gatherer into the baskets.”

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To whom shall I speak and testify, that they may hear? Behold, their ear is uncircumcised, and they can’t listen. Behold, the word of Yahweh has become a reproach to them. They have no delight in it.

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Therefore I am full of the wrath of Yahweh. I am weary with holding in. “Pour it out on the children in the street, and on the assembly of young men together; for even the husband with the wife shall be taken, the aged with him who is full of days.

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Their houses shall be turned to others, their fields and their wives together; for I will stretch out my hand on the inhabitants of the land, says Yahweh.”

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“For from the least of them even to the greatest of them, everyone is given to covetousness; and from the prophet even to the priest, everyone deals falsely.

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They have healed also the hurt of my people superficially, saying, ‘Peace, peace!’ when there is no peace.

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Were they ashamed when they had committed abomination? No, they were not at all ashamed, neither could they blush. Therefore they shall fall among those who fall; at the time that I visit them, they shall be cast down,” says Yahweh.

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Thus says Yahweh, “Stand in the ways and see, and ask for the old paths, ‘Where is the good way?’ and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls. But they said, ‘We will not walk in it.’

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I set watchmen over you, saying, ‘Listen to the sound of the trumpet!’ But they said, ‘We will not listen!’

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Therefore hear, you nations, and know, congregation, what is among them.

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Hear, earth! Behold, I will bring evil on this people, even the fruit of their thoughts, because they have not listened to my words; and as for my law, they have rejected it.

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To what purpose comes there to me frankincense from Sheba, and the sweet cane from a far country? your burnt offerings are not acceptable, nor your sacrifices pleasing to me.”

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Therefore thus says Yahweh, “Behold, I will lay stumbling blocks before this people. The fathers and the sons together shall stumble against them. The neighbor and his friend shall perish.”

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Thus says Yahweh, “Behold, a people comes from the north country. A great nation shall be stirred up from the uttermost parts of the earth.

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They take hold of bow and spear. They are cruel, and have no mercy. Their voice roars like the sea, and they ride on horses, everyone set in array, as a man to the battle, against you, daughter of Zion.”

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We have heard its report; our hands wax feeble: anguish has taken hold of us, [and] pangs as of a woman in travail.

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Don’t go forth into the field, nor walk by the way; for the sword of the enemy, [and] terror, are on every side.

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Daughter of my people, clothe yourself with sackcloth, and wallow in ashes! Mourn, as for an only son, most bitter lamentation; for the destroyer shall suddenly come on us.

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“I have made you a tester of metals [and] a fortress among my people; that you may know and try their way.

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They are all grievous rebels, going about with slanders; they are brass and iron: they all of them deal corruptly.

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The bellows blow fiercely; the lead is consumed of the fire: in vain do they go on refining; for the wicked are not plucked away.

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Men will call them rejected silver, because Yahweh has rejected them.”

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The word that came to Jeremiah from Yahweh, saying,

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“Stand in the gate of Yahweh’s house, and proclaim there this word, and say, ‘Hear the word of Yahweh, all you of Judah, who enter in at these gates to worship Yahweh.

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Thus says Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel, Amend your ways and your doings, and I will cause you to dwell in this place.

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Don’t trust in lying words, saying, The temple of Yahweh, the temple of Yahweh, the temple of Yahweh, are these.

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For if you thoroughly amend your ways and your doings; if you thoroughly execute justice between a man and his neighbor;

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if you don’t oppress the foreigner, the fatherless, and the widow, and don’t shed innocent blood in this place, neither walk after other gods to your own hurt:

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then will I cause you to dwell in this place, in the land that I gave to your fathers, from of old even forevermore.

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Behold, you trust in lying words, that can’t profit.

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Will you steal, murder, and commit adultery, and swear falsely, and burn incense to Baal, and walk after other gods that you have not known,

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and come and stand before me in this house, which is called by my name, and say, We are delivered; that you may do all these abominations?

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Is this house, which is called by my name, become a den of robbers in your eyes? Behold, I, even I, have seen it, says Yahweh.

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But go now to my place which was in Shiloh, where I caused my name to dwell at the first, and see what I did to it for the wickedness of my people Israel.

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Now, because you have done all these works, says Yahweh, and I spoke to you, rising up early and speaking, but you didn’t hear; and I called you, but you didn’t answer:

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therefore will I do to the house which is called by my name, in which you trust, and to the place which I gave to you and to your fathers, as I did to Shiloh.

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I will cast you out of my sight, as I have cast out all your brothers, even the whole seed of Ephraim.

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Therefore don’t pray for this people, neither lift up a cry nor prayer for them, neither make intercession to me; for I will not hear you.

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Don’t you see what they do in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem?

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The children gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead the dough, to make cakes to the queen of the sky, and to pour out drink offerings to other gods, that they may provoke me to anger.

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Do they provoke me to anger? says Yahweh; [do they] not [provoke] themselves, to the confusion of their own faces?

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Therefore thus says the Lord Yahweh: Behold, my anger and my wrath shall be poured out on this place, on man, and on animal, and on the trees of the field, and on the fruit of the ground; and it shall burn, and shall not be quenched.

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Thus says Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel: Add your burnt offerings to your sacrifices, and eat meat.

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For I didn’t speak to your fathers, nor command them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices:

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but this thing I commanded them, saying, Listen to my voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be my people; and walk in all the way that I command you, that it may be well with you.

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But they didn’t listen nor turn their ear, but walked in [their own] counsels [and] in the stubbornness of their evil heart, and went backward, and not forward.

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Since the day that your fathers came forth out of the land of Egypt to this day, I have sent to you all my servants the prophets, daily rising up early and sending them:

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yet they didn’t listen to me, nor inclined their ear, but made their neck stiff: they did worse than their fathers.

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You shall speak all these words to them; but they will not listen to you: you shall also call to them; but they will not answer you.

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You shall tell them, This is the nation that has not listened to the voice of Yahweh their God, nor received instruction: truth is perished, and is cut off from their mouth.

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Cut off your hair, [Jerusalem], and cast it away, and take up a lamentation on the bare heights; for Yahweh has rejected and forsaken the generation of his wrath.

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For the children of Judah have done that which is evil in my sight, says Yahweh: they have set their abominations in the house which is called by my name, to defile it.

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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; which I didn’t command, nor did it come into my mind.

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Therefore, behold, the days come, says Yahweh, that it shall no more be called Topheth, nor The valley of the son of Hinnom, but The valley of Slaughter: for they shall bury in Topheth, until there be no place [to bury].

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The dead bodies of this people shall be food for the birds of the sky, and for the animals of the earth; and none shall frighten them away.

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Then will I cause to cease from the cities of Judah, and from the streets of Jerusalem, the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride; for the land shall become a waste.

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At that time, says Yahweh, they shall bring out the bones of the kings of Judah, and the bones of his princes, and the bones of the priests, and the bones of the prophets, and the bones of the inhabitants of Jerusalem, out of their graves;

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and they shall spread them before the sun, and the moon, and all the army of the sky, which they have loved, and which they have served, and after which they have walked, and which they have sought, and which they have worshiped: they shall not be gathered, nor be buried, they shall be for dung on the surface of the earth.

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Death shall be chosen rather than life by all the residue that remain of this evil family, that remain in all the places where I have driven them, says Yahweh of Armies.

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Moreover you shall tell them, Thus says Yahweh: Shall men fall, and not rise up again? Shall one turn away, and not return?

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Why then is this people of Jerusalem slidden back by a perpetual backsliding? they hold fast deceit, they refuse to return.

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I listened and heard, but they didn’t speak aright: no man repents him of his wickedness, saying, What have I done? everyone turns to his course, as a horse that rushes headlong in the battle.

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Yes, the stork in the sky knows her appointed times; and the turtledove and the swallow and the crane observe the time of their coming; but my people don’t know Yahweh’s law.

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How do you say, We are wise, and the law of Yahweh is with us? But, behold, the false pen of the scribes has worked falsely.

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The wise men are disappointed, they are dismayed and taken: behold, they have rejected the word of Yahweh; and what kind of wisdom is in them?

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Therefore will I give their wives to others, and their fields to those who shall possess them: for everyone from the least even to the greatest is given to covetousness; from the prophet even to the priest every one deals falsely.

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They have healed the hurt of the daughter of my people slightly, saying, Peace, peace; when there is no peace.

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Were they ashamed when they had committed abomination? nay, they were not at all ashamed, neither could they blush: therefore shall they fall among those who fall; in the time of their visitation they shall be cast down, says Yahweh.

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I will utterly consume them, says Yahweh: no grapes shall be on the vine, nor figs on the fig tree, and the leaf shall fade; and [the things that] I have given them shall pass away from them.

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Why do we sit still? Assemble yourselves, and let us enter into the fortified cities, and let us be silent there; for Yahweh our God has put us to silence, and given us water of gall to drink, because we have sinned against Yahweh.

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We looked for peace, but no good came; [and] for a time of healing, and behold, dismay!

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The snorting of his horses is heard from Dan: at the sound of the neighing of his strong ones the whole land trembles; for they are come, and have devoured the land and all that is in it; the city and those who dwell therein.

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For, behold, I will send serpents, adders, among you, which will not be charmed; and they shall bite you, says Yahweh.

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Oh that I could comfort myself against sorrow! My heart is faint within me.

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Behold, the voice of the cry of the daughter of my people from a land that is very far off: isn’t Yahweh in Zion? Isn’t her King in her? Why have they provoked me to anger with their engraved images, and with foreign vanities?

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The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved.

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For the hurt of the daughter of my people am I hurt: I mourn; dismay has taken hold on me.

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Is there no balm in Gilead? is there no physician there? why then isn’t the health of the daughter of my people recovered?

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Oh that my head were waters, and my eyes a spring of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people!

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Oh that I had in the wilderness a lodging place of wayfaring men; that I might leave my people, and go from them! for they are all adulterers, an assembly of treacherous men.

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They bend their tongue, [as it were] their bow, for falsehood; and they are grown strong in the land, but not for truth: for they proceed from evil to evil, and they don’t know me, says Yahweh.

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Take heed everyone of his neighbor, and don’t trust in any brother; for every brother will utterly supplant, and every neighbor will go about with slanders.

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They will deceive everyone his neighbor, and will not speak the truth: they have taught their tongue to speak lies; they weary themselves to commit iniquity.

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Your habitation is in the midst of deceit; through deceit they refuse to know me, says Yahweh.

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Therefore thus says Yahweh of Armies, Behold, I will melt them, and try them; for how [else] should I do, because of the daughter of my people?

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Their tongue is a deadly arrow; it speaks deceit: one speaks peaceably to his neighbor with his mouth, but in his heart he lays wait for him.