Bible-Reading.comJeremiah 19
1Thus said the LORD, “Go, and buy a potter’s earthen container, and take some of the elders of the people and of the elders of the priests;
2and go out to the valley of the son of Hinnom, which is by the entry of the gate Harsith, and proclaim there the words that I will tell you.
3Say, ‘Hear the LORD’s word, kings of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem: The LORD of Armies, the God of Israel says, “Behold, I will bring evil on this place, which whoever hears, his ears will tingle.
4Because they have forsaken me, and have defiled this place, and have burned incense in it to other gods that they didn’t know—they, their fathers, and the kings of Judah—and have filled this place with the blood of innocents,
5and have built the high places of Baal to burn their children in the fire for burnt offerings to Baal, which I didn’t command, nor speak, which didn’t even enter into my mind.
6Therefore, behold, the days come,” says the LORD, “that this place will no more be called ‘Topheth’, nor ‘The Valley of the son of Hinnom’, but ‘The valley of Slaughter’.
7“‘“I will make the counsel of Judah and Jerusalem void in this place. I will cause them to fall by the sword before their enemies, and by the hand of those who seek their life. I will give their dead bodies to be food for the birds of the sky and for the animals of the earth.
8I will make this city an astonishment and a hissing. Everyone who passes by it will be astonished and hiss because of all its plagues.
9I will cause them to eat the flesh of their sons and the flesh of their daughters. They will each eat the flesh of his friend in the siege and in the distress with which their enemies, and those who seek their life, will distress them.”’
10“Then you shall break the container in the sight of the men who go with you,
11and shall tell them, ‘The LORD of Armies says: “Even so I will break this people and this city as one breaks a potter’s vessel, that can’t be made whole again. They will bury in Topheth until there is no place to bury.
12This is what I will do to this place,” says the LORD, “and to its inhabitants, even making this city as Topheth.
13The houses of Jerusalem and the houses of the kings of Judah, which are defiled, will be as the place of Topheth, even all the houses on whose roofs they have burned incense to all the army of the sky and have poured out drink offerings to other gods.”’”
14Then Jeremiah came from Topheth, where the LORD had sent him to prophesy, and he stood in the court of the LORD’s house, and said to all the people:
15“The LORD of Armies, the God of Israel says, ‘Behold, I will bring on this city and on all its towns all the evil that I have pronounced against it, because they have made their neck stiff, that they may not hear my words.’”
Jeremiah 20
1Now Pashhur, the son of Immer the priest, who was chief officer in the LORD’s house, heard Jeremiah prophesying these things.
2Then Pashhur struck Jeremiah the prophet and put him in the stocks that were in the upper gate of Benjamin, which was in the LORD’s house.
3On the next day, Pashhur released Jeremiah out of the stocks. Then Jeremiah said to him, “The LORD has not called your name Pashhur, but Magormissabib.
4For the LORD says, ‘Behold, I will make you a terror to yourself and to all your friends. They will fall by the sword of their enemies, and your eyes will see it. I will give all Judah into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he will carry them captive to Babylon, and will kill them with the sword.
5Moreover I will give all the riches of this city, and all its gains, and all its precious things, yes, I will give all the treasures of the kings of Judah into the hand of their enemies. They will make them captives, take them, and carry them to Babylon.
6You, Pashhur, and all who dwell in your house will go into captivity. You will come to Babylon, and there you will die, and there you will be buried, you, and all your friends, to whom you have prophesied falsely.’”
7LORD, you have persuaded me, and I was persuaded. You are stronger than I, and have prevailed. I have become a laughingstock all day. Everyone mocks me.
8For as often as I speak, I cry out; I cry, “Violence and destruction!” because the LORD’s word has been made a reproach to me, and a derision, all day.
9If I say that I will not make mention of him, or speak any more in his name, then there is in my heart as it were a burning fire shut up in my bones. I am weary with holding it in. I can’t.
10For I have heard the defaming of many: “Terror on every side! Denounce, and we will denounce him!” say all my familiar friends, those who watch for my fall. “Perhaps he will be persuaded, and we will prevail against him, and we will take our revenge on him.”
11But the LORD is with me as an awesome mighty one. Therefore my persecutors will stumble, and they won’t prevail. They will be utterly disappointed because they have not dealt wisely, even with an everlasting dishonor which will never be forgotten.
12But the LORD of Armies, who tests the righteous, who sees the heart and the mind, let me see your vengeance on them, for I have revealed my cause to you.
13Sing to the LORD! Praise the LORD, for he has delivered the soul of the needy from the hand of evildoers.
14Cursed is the day in which I was born. Don’t let the day in which my mother bore me be blessed.
15Cursed is the man who brought news to my father, saying, “A boy is born to you,” making him very glad.
16Let that man be as the cities which the LORD overthrew, and didn’t repent. Let him hear a cry in the morning, and shouting at noontime,
17because he didn’t kill me from the womb. So my mother would have been my grave, and her womb always great.
18Why did I come out of the womb to see labor and sorrow, that my days should be consumed with shame?