Jeremiah 9-10

Jeremiah 9

¹Oh that my head were waters, and mine eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people!

²Oh that I had in the wilderness a lodging place of wayfaring men; that I might leave my people, and go from them! for they be all adulterers, an assembly of treacherous men.

³And 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 know not me, saith the LORD.

⁴Take ye heed every one of his neighbour, and trust ye not in any brother: for every brother will utterly supplant, and every neighbour will go about with slanders.

⁵And they will deceive every one his neighbour, and will not speak the truth: they have taught their tongue to speak lies; they weary themselves to commit iniquity.

⁶Thine habitation is in the midst of deceit; through deceit they refuse to know me, saith the LORD.

⁷Therefore thus saith the LORD of hosts, Behold, I will melt them, and try them; for how else should I do, because of the daughter of my people?

⁸Their tongue is a deadly arrow; it speaketh deceit: one speaketh peaceably to his neighbour with his mouth, but in his heart he layeth wait for him.

⁹Shall I not visit them for these things? saith the LORD: shall not my soul be avenged on such a nation as this?

¹⁰For the mountains will I take up a weeping and wailing, and for the pastures of the wilderness a lamentation, because they are burned up, so that none passeth through; neither can men hear the voice of the cattle; both the fowl of the heavens and the beast are fled, they are gone.

¹¹And I will make Jerusalem heaps, a dwelling place of jackals; and I will make the cities of Judah a desolation, without inhabitant.

¹²Who is the wise man, that may understand this? and who is he to whom the mouth of the LORD hath spoken, that he may declare it? wherefore is the land and perished burned up like a wilderness, so that none passeth through?

¹³And the LORD saith, Because they have forsaken my law which I set before them, and have not obeyed my voice, neither walked therein;

¹⁴but have walked after the stubbornness of their own heart, and after the Baalim, which their fathers taught them:

¹⁵therefore thus saith the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, Behold, I will feed them, even this people, with wormwood, and give them water of gall to drink.

¹⁶I will scatter them also among the nations, whom neither they nor their fathers have known: and I will send the sword after them, till I have consumed them.

¹⁷Thus saith the LORD of hosts, Consider ye, and call for the mourning women, that they may come; and send for the cunning women, that they may come:

¹⁸and let them make haste, and take up a wailing for us, that our eyes may run down with tears, and our eyelids gush out with waters.

¹⁹For a voice of wailing is heard out of Zion, How are we spoiled! we are greatly confounded, because we have forsaken the land, because they have cast down our dwellings.

²⁰Yet hear the word of the LORD, O ye women, and let your ear receive the word of his mouth, and teach your daughters wailing, and every one her neighbour lamentation.

²¹For death is come up into our windows, it is entered into our palaces; to cut off the children from without, and the young men from the streets.

²²Speak, Thus saith the LORD, The carcases of men shall fall as dung upon the open field, and as the handful after the harvestman, and none shall gather them.

²³Thus saith the LORD, Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, neither let the mighty man glory in his might, let not the rich man glory in his riches:

²⁴but let him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth, and knoweth me, that I am the LORD which exercise lovingkindness, judgment, and righteousness, in the earth: for in these things I delight, saith the LORD.

²⁵Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will punish all them which are circumcised in their uncircumcision;

²⁶Egypt, and Judah, and Edom, and the children of Ammon, and Moab, and all that have the corners of their hair polled, that dwell in the wilderness: for all the nations are uncircumcised, and all the house of Israel are uncircumcised in heart.

Jeremiah 10

¹Hear ye the word which the LORD speaketh unto you, O house of Israel:

²thus saith the LORD, Learn not the way of the nations, and be not dismayed at the signs of heaven; for the nations are dismayed at them.

³For the customs of the peoples are vanity: for one cutteth a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman with the axe.

⁴They deck it with silver and with gold; they fasten it with nails and with hammers, that it move not.

⁵They are like a palm tree, of turned work, and speak not: they must needs be borne, because they cannot go. Be not afraid of them; for they cannot do evil, neither is it in them to do good.

⁶There is none like unto thee, O LORD; thou art great, and thy name is great in might.

⁷Who would not fear thee, O King of the nations? for to thee doth it appertain: forasmuch as among all the wise men of the nations, and in all their royal estate, there is none like unto thee.

⁸But they are together brutish and foolish: the instruction of idols, it is but a stock.

⁹There is silver beaten into plates which is brought from Tarshish, and gold from Uphaz, the work of the artificer and of the hands of the goldsmith; blue and purple for their clothing; they are all the work of cunning men.

¹⁰But the LORD is the true God; he is the living God, and an everlasting king: at his wrath the earth trembleth, and the nations are not able to abide his indignation.

¹¹Thus shall ye say unto them, The gods that have not made the heavens and the earth, these shall perish from the earth, and from under the heavens.

¹²He hath made the earth by his power, he hath established the world by his wisdom, and by his understanding hath he stretched out the heavens:

¹³when he uttereth his voice, there is a tumult of waters in the heavens, and he causeth the vapours to ascend from the ends of the earth; he maketh lightnings for the rain, and bringeth forth the wind out of his treasuries.

¹⁴Every man is become brutish and is without knowledge; every goldsmith is put to shame by his graven image: for his molten image is falsehood, and there is no breath in them.

¹⁵They are vanity, a work of delusion: in the time of their visitation they shall perish.

¹⁶The portion of Jacob is not like these; for he is the former of all things; and Israel is the tribe of his inheritance: the LORD of hosts is his name.

¹⁷Gather up thy wares out of the land, O thou that abidest in the siege.

¹⁸For thus saith the LORD, Behold, I will sling out the inhabitants of the land at this time, and will distress them, that they may feel it.

¹⁹Woe is me for my hurt! my wound is grievous: but I said, Truly this is my grief, and I must bear it.

²⁰My tent is spoiled, and all my cords are broken: my children are gone forth of me, and they are not: there is none to stretch forth my tent any more, and to set up my curtains.

²¹For the shepherds are become brutish, and have not inquired of the LORD: therefore they have not prospered, and all their flocks are scattered.

²²The voice of a rumour, behold it cometh, and a great commotion out of the north country, to make the cities of Judah a desolation, a dwelling place of jackals.

²³O LORD, I know that the way of man is not in himself: it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps.

²⁴O LORD, correct me, but with judgment; not in thine anger, lest thou bring me to nothing.

²⁵Pour out thy fury upon the heathen that know thee not, and upon the families that call not on thy name: for they have devoured Jacob, yea, they have devoured him and consumed him, and have laid waste his habitation.