Jeremiah

¹ and my eyes a fountain of tears! I would weep day and night for the slain of my people.

² a lodging place for travelers, so that I might leave my people and go away from them; for they are all adulterers, a crowd of unfaithful people.

³ like a bow, to shoot lies; it is not by truth that they triumph in the land. They go from one sin to another; they do not acknowledge me,” declares the Lord.

⁴ do not trust your brothers. For every brother is a deceiver, and every friend a slanderer.

⁵ and no one speaks the truth. They have taught their tongues to lie; they weary themselves with sinning.

⁶ in their deceit they refuse to acknowledge me,” declares the Lord.

⁷ “See, I will refine and test them, for what else can I do because of the sin of my people?

⁸ it speaks with deceit. With his mouth each speaks cordially to his neighbor, but in his heart he sets a trap for him.

⁹ declares the Lord. “Should I not avenge myself on such a nation as this?”

¹⁰ and take up a lament concerning the desert pastures. They are desolate and untraveled, and the lowing of cattle is not heard. The birds of the air have fled and the animals are gone.

¹¹ a haunt of jackals; and I will lay waste the towns of Judah so no one can live there.”

¹² What man is wise enough to understand this? Who has been instructed by the Lord and can explain it? Why has the land been ruined and laid waste like a desert that no one can cross?

¹³ The Lord said, “It is because they have forsaken my law, which I set before them; they have not obeyed me or followed my law.

¹⁴ Instead, they have followed the stubbornness of their hearts; they have followed the Baals, as their fathers taught them.”

¹⁵ Therefore, this is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says: “See, I will make this people eat bitter food and drink poisoned water.

¹⁶ I will scatter them among nations that neither they nor their fathers have known, and I will pursue them with the sword until I have destroyed them.”

¹⁷ “Consider now! Call for the wailing women to come; send for the most skillful of them.

¹⁸ and wail over us till our eyes overflow with tears and water streams from our eyelids.

¹⁹ ‘How ruined we are! How great is our shame! We must leave our land because our houses are in ruins.’”

²⁰ open your ears to the words of his mouth. Teach your daughters how to wail; teach one another a lament.

²¹ and has entered our fortresses; it has cut off the children from the streets and the young men from the public squares.

²² “‘The dead bodies of men will lie like refuse on the open field, like cut grain behind the reaper, with no one to gather them.’”

²³ “Let not the wise man boast of his wisdom or the strong man boast of his strength or the rich man boast of his riches,

²⁴ that he understands and knows me, that I am the Lord, who exercises kindness, justice and righteousness on earth, for in these I delight,” declares the Lord.

²⁵ “The days are coming,” declares the Lord, “when I will punish all who are circumcised only in the flesh—

²⁶ Egypt, Judah, Edom, Ammon, Moab and all who live in the desert in distant places. For all these nations are really uncircumcised, and even the whole house of Israel is uncircumcised in heart.”