Jeremiah 7-20
New Catholic Bible
Prophecies Mainly in the Days of Jehoiakim
Chapter 7
True Worship.[a] 1 This is the word of the Lord that was delivered to Jeremiah: 2 Stand at the gate of the house of the Lord, and proclaim there this message: Hear the word of the Lord, all you people of Judah who enter through these gates to worship the Lord. 3 This is the message that the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, proclaims to you: Amend your ways and your deeds so that I may remain with you in this place. 4 Do not place your trust in these deceptive words: This is the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord.
5 However, if you truly amend your ways and your deeds, if you are upright in your dealings with your neighbor; 6 if you do not oppress the alien, the orphan, and the widow; if you do not shed innocent blood in this place; and if you do not follow other gods and thereby cause your own destruction, 7 then I will allow you to live in this place, in the land that I gave as a permanent gift to your fathers long ago.
8 You have been placing your trust in deceitful words that are completely worthless. 9 Will you steal, murder, commit adultery, engage in perjury, burn incense to Baal, and follow other gods about whom you know nothing, 10 and then come and stand before me in this house which bears my name and say, “We are safe,” all the while intending to continue doing these abominable deeds? 11 Has this house which bears my name become in your eyes a den of thieves? Be assured that I am fully aware of what you are doing, says the Lord.
12 Go now to my shrine of Shiloh which I originally designated as the dwelling place of my name. There you can observe what I did to it as the result of the wickedness of my people Israel.[b] 13 And now, because you have done all these things, says the Lord, and refused to listen when I spoke to you continuously, and would not answer when I called you, 14 I therefore will do to the house that bears my name, to this house in which you trust, and to this place which I gave to you and your fathers, just what I did to Shiloh. 15 And I will cast you out of my sight, just as I cast out all your kinsfolk, all the offspring of Ephraim.
16 Abuses in Worship. For your part, Jeremiah, do not intercede for this people, do not raise a plea or a prayer on their behalf, and do not intercede with me, for I will not listen to you. 17 Do you not observe what they are doing in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem? 18 The children gather up the wood, their fathers light the fire, and the women knead dough to make cakes for the queen of heaven. And to arouse my anger, they pour out drink offerings to other gods.
19 But am I the one whom they hurt? asks the Lord. Is it not rather themselves, to their own shame? 20 Therefore, says the Lord God, my anger and wrath will pour forth on this place, on man and beast, on the trees of the field and the fruits of the earth, and burn without being quenched.
21 Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Add your burnt offerings to your sacrifices and consume all the flesh yourselves. 22 For when I brought forth your ancestors out of the land of Egypt, I gave them no commands in regard to burnt offerings and sacrifices. 23 What I commanded them was this: Listen to my voice, and I will be your God, and you will be my people. If you follow all the ways that I command you, then you will prosper.
24 However, they did not obey or pay heed to my words. Rather, they persisted in following their own evil inclinations with stubborn hearts and turned their backs to me, not their faces. 25 From the day your ancestors left Egypt until today, I unfailingly sent all my servants the prophets to them. 26 Yet they have not listened to me or paid attention; instead they stiffened their necks and proved to be worse than their ancestors.
27 When you speak all these words to them, they will not listen to you. When you call out to them, they will not answer you. 28 Then you are to say to them: This is the nation that did not obey the Lord, their God, or accept correction. Truth has perished. It no longer issues forth from their mouths.
29 [c]Cut off your hair and cast it away;
raise a lamentation on the barren heights.
For the Lord has rejected and abandoned
the generation that has provoked his wrath.
30 The people of Judah have perpetrated deeds that are evil in my sight, says the Lord. They have defiled the house that bears my name by setting up within it their loathsome idols. 31 Furthermore, they have built the high places of Topheth[d] in the Valley of Ben-hinnom to burn their sons and daughters in the fire—a deed that I never ordered and that never even entered my mind.
32 Therefore, beware, for the days are coming, says the Lord, when the names of Topheth and the Valley of Ben-hinnom will no longer be used. They will rather be referred to as the Valley of Slaughter. Because of a scarcity of space, Topheth will become a burial ground. 33 The corpses of this people will serve as food for the birds of the sky and the animals of the earth, and no one will frighten them away. 34 In the towns of Judah and the streets of Jerusalem I will banish all sounds of joy and gladness and the voices of the bridegroom and bride, for the entire land will have become a desert.
Chapter 8
1 At that time, says the Lord, the bones of the kings and officials of Judah, the bones of its priests and prophets, and the bones of the inhabitants of Jerusalem will be exhumed from their graves. 2 They will be spread out before the sun and the moon and all the host of heaven which they loved and served, and which they followed, consulted, and worshiped. Their bones will not be gathered up and buried but will be left upon the ground like dung. 3 And death will be preferred to life by the survivors of the wicked race in any of the places to which I have banished them, says the Lord of hosts.
Israel’s Infidelity
4 [e]Then you are to say to them,
Thus says the Lord:
When someone falls, does he not stand up again?
If people go astray, do they not turn back?
5 Why then do these people continue to rebel
and persist in their obstinate infidelity?
Why do they continue in their treachery
and refuse to turn back?
6 I have listened to them attentively
but they never utter a truthful word.
Not a single one repents of his wickedness,
saying, “What have I done?”
All of them continue to follow the same course
like a horse charging into battle.
7 Even the stork in the sky
knows its appointed seasons;
turtledoves, swallows, and cranes
are aware when it is time to migrate.
But my people do not know
the ordinances of the Lord.
8 How can you say, “We are wise,
for we have the law of the Lord,”
when that law has been falsified
by the lying pen of the scribes?
9 The wise will be put to shame;
they will be dismayed and caught in errors.
Since they have rejected the word of the Lord,
of what value is their wisdom?
Unrepentant for Their Sins
10 Therefore, I will give their wives to other men
and their fields to new owners.
From the least to the greatest,
everyone is greedy for ill-gotten gain.
All of them practice fraud,
including prophets and priests.
11 They bandage the wound of my people
as though it were a minor injury.
“Peace! Peace!” they say,
when there is no peace.
12 They should be embarrassed at their loathsome deeds,
yet they are not the least bit ashamed;
they do not even know how to blush.
Therefore, they will join the others who have fallen;
when the day of punishment arrives,
they will be thrown down, says the Lord.
A Prophet’s Lament
13 I will gather them all in,
the Lord has promised;
there will be no grapes on the vine,
no figs on the fig trees.
Even the leaves will be withered;
what I have given them
will be taken away from them.
14 Why are we just sitting idly here?
It is time to mobilize.
Let us march into the fortified cities
and perish there.
For the Lord, our God, has doomed us for destruction
and given us poisoned water to drink
because we have sinned against him.
15 We are praying for peace, but to no avail;
for a time of healing,
only to be confronted with terror.
16 The snorting of horses is heard from Dan;
the neighing of his stallions
causes the entire land to quake.
The enemy is advancing to devour the land
and all that it contains,
the city and those who dwell there.
17 Behold, I will send against you
venomous snakes that cannot be charmed,
and they will bite you, says the Lord.
18 There is no cure for my grief,
and my heart is faint within me.
19 Listen to the cry of distress
from my people in a distant land.
“Is the Lord no longer in Zion?
Is her king no longer in their midst?”
(Why do they provoke me with their idols
and with their foreign gods?)
20 “The time of harvest is past,
the summer is at an end,
and we are not saved.”
21 The suffering of my people causes me to suffer too.
I mourn, overcome with terror.
22 Is there no more balm in Gilead?[f]
Can no physician be found there?
Why has there not been any progress
to restore the health of my people?
Chapter 9
A Faithless People
1 Oh, if only my head were a spring of water
and my eyes a fountain of tears
so that I might weep day and night
for the slain of the daughter of my people.
2 Would that I could find in the desert
a wayside shelter for travelers
so that I might depart from my people
and leave them far behind.
For all of them are adulterers,
a faithless mob of traitors.
3 Their tongues are like devious weapons,
bent like a drawn bow.
With falsehood rather than truth
they have gained power in the land.
They commit one crime after another,
but they do not acknowledge me, says the Lord.
4 Each of you should be on guard against your neighbor
and place no trust in a brother.
For everyone seeks to supplant his brother, as Jacob did,
and every friend is a slanderer.
5 They all deceive each other;
no one speaks the truth.
They have trained their tongues in the art of lying;
immersed in iniquity, they cannot repent.
6 With their repeated acts of oppression and deceit,
they refuse to acknowledge me, says the Lord.
7 Therefore, thus says the Lord of hosts:
Now I will refine and test them.
How else should I deal with this people?
8 Their tongue is a deadly arrow;
their mouth utters words of deceit.
They speak cordially with their neighbors,
but inwardly, they are plotting to ambush them.
9 For such deceitful dealings
shall I not punish them, says the Lord,
and shall I not exact vengeance
on such a nation?
Dirge over Zion
10 Raise up cries of weeping and lamentation for the mountains
and chant a dirge for the pasture lands,
because they have been so scorched
that no one passes there,
and the lowing of cattle is not heard.
Birds of the air and the animals:
all have fled and are gone.
11 I will turn Jerusalem into a heap of ruins,
a lair for jackals,
and I will lay waste the towns of Judah
so that no one can live there.
12 Who is wise enough to understand this? Who has been commanded by the Lord to make it known? Why has the land been ravaged and laid waste like a desert through which no one is able to pass? 13 The Lord says, “This was permitted to happen because they have rejected my law which I set before them, and they have not followed it or listened to my voice. 14 Rather, they have stubbornly obeyed the wishes of their own hearts and followed the Baals, as their ancestors had taught them.”
15 Therefore, thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, “Now I will give this people wormwood to eat and poisoned water to drink. 16 I will scatter them among nations that neither they nor their ancestors have known, and I will pursue them with the sword until I have completely annihilated them.”
17 Thus says the Lord of hosts:
Listen to my command! Summon the mourning women;
send for those who are most skilled in this regard.
18 Let them come quickly
and raise a dirge for us
so that our eyes may overflow with tears
and our cheeks may be wet with weeping.
19 May a sound of lamenting be heard in Zion,
“Great is our ruin;
intense is our shame.
We must leave our land;
our homes have been destroyed.”[g]
20 Listen, you women, to the word of the Lord;
let your ears receive the message he imparts.
21 Death has climbed through our windows
and has entered our palaces.
It has cut down the children in the streets
and the young people in the public squares.
22 The corpses of the slain will be strewn
like dung on an open field,
like sheaves left behind by the reaper
with no one to gather them.
True Wisdom
23 Thus says the Lord:
Let not the wise man boast of his wisdom,
or the strong man boast of his strength,
or the rich man boast of his wealth.
24 But if any wish to boast,
let them boast of this:
that they understand and know me.
For I am the Lord who governs the earth
with unfailing love, justice, and righteousness.
In these things I delight,
says the Lord.
25 “Behold, the days are coming,” says the Lord, “when I will demand an account of all those who are circumcised only in the flesh: 26 Egypt, Judah, Edom, the Ammonites, Moab, and all those with shaved temples who dwell in the desert.[h] For all those nations, and the entire house of Israel as well, are uncircumcised in heart.”
Chapter 10
The True God. 1 Listen to the word that the Lord addresses to you, O house of Israel. 2 Thus says the Lord:
Do not adopt the ways of the nations
or become frightened at the signs in the heavens,[i]
even though the nations are terrified of them.
3 For the carved images of the nations are powerless;
they are nothing more than wood cut from a forest,
fashioned with a knife by craftsmen
4 and embellished with silver and gold.
Then they are fastened with hammers and nails
to prevent them from toppling.
5 Like scarecrows in a cucumber field
they are unable to speak,
and they must be carried from place to place
since they cannot walk.
Do not be afraid of them,
for they can do no harm,
nor do they have any power to do good.
6 O Lord, there is no one like you;
you are great,
and great is the might of your name.
7 Who would not fear you,
O King of the nations?
This is your due.
Of all the wisest men in the nations
and throughout all their kingdoms,
there is no one like you.
8 They are all senseless and foolish,
and the idols they venerate are nothing but wood,
9 adorned with beaten silver from Tarshish
and gold from Ophir.
Their idols are the work of craftsmen and goldsmiths
and clothed with violet and purple;
all of them are the product of skilled workers.
10 But the Lord is the true God;
he is the living God and the everlasting King.
When confronted with his wrath the earth quakes,
and no nation can endure his fury.
11 Convey this message to them: The gods who did not make the heavens and the earth will perish from the earth and from under the heavens.
12 The Lord made the earth by his power,
established the world by his wisdom
and spread out the heavens by his understanding.
13 When his voice thunders forth,
the waters in the heavens are in tumult,
and he brings forth clouds
from the most remote areas of the earth.
He causes lightning to flash during the rainfall
and brings forth the wind from his storehouses.
14 Everyone is ignorant and devoid of knowledge;
every goldsmith is put to shame by his idols,
for the figures he molds are fraudulent,
lacking even a semblance of breath.
15 They are worthless, worthy only of mockery;
when the time of judgment comes
they will no longer exist.
16 But not like these is the portion of Jacob,
for he is the Maker of all things,
and Israel is the tribe of his heritage;
the Lord of hosts is his name.
Destruction of Judah[j]
17 Gather up your belongings and depart from the land,
you who are living under siege.
18 For thus says the Lord:
This time I am determined to cast out
the inhabitants of this land,
and I will inflict such distress on them
that they will find it difficult to bear.
19 I face disaster because of my injuries.
My wounds are incurable.
However, I thought, “This is my punishment,
and somehow I must endure it.”
20 My tent has been destroyed,
and all of its ropes are severed.
My children have left me,
and they are no more.
No one remains to help me pitch my tent again
or to put up its curtains.
21 The shepherds have proved to be stupid;
they failed to search for the Lord.
As a result, they have not prospered,
and their entire flock is scattered.
22 Listen! There is a tremendous noise,
and it comes ever closer;
a great uproar from the land of the north;
the towns of Judah will be reduced to a desert
and become a lair for jackals.
Jeremiah’s Prayer
23 I am finally aware, O Lord,
that man is not in control of his destiny
and that it is not in his power
to determine the course of his life.
24 Correct me, O Lord,
but do so with moderation,
and not in your anger,
or you will reduce me to nothing.
25 Pour forth your wrath on the nations
that refuse to acknowledge you,
as well as on the tribes
that refuse to invoke your name.
For they have devoured Jacob;
they have devoured and made an end of him
and laid waste his homeland.
Chapter 11
Plea to Observe the Covenant.[k][l] 1 This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord: 2 Listen to the terms of this covenant, and then relate them to the people of Judah and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem. 3 Say to them: Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: Cursed be anyone who does not observe the terms of this covenant 4 which I enjoined upon your ancestors when I brought them forth from the land of Egypt, from that iron foundry, saying: If you listen to my voice and do everything I command you, then you will be my people, and I will be your God. 5 I will thus fulfill the oath that I swore to your ancestors, when I pledged to give them a land flowing with milk and honey, the land you now possess. Then I answered, “So be it, Lord.”
6 Then the Lord said to me: Proclaim all these words in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem: Hear the words of this covenant and follow them. 7 When I brought your ancestors up out of the land of Egypt, I solemnly warned them, and continued even to this day to do so persistently, urging them to obey my commands. 8 But they refused to listen and did not pay attention to what I said. Rather, each one followed the inclinations of his stubborn and wicked heart. As a result, I inflicted upon them all the curses I had threatened if they did not obey the covenant in accordance with my commands.
9 Then the Lord said to me: There is clearly a conspiracy that exists among the people of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem. 10 They have reverted back to the sins of their ancestors who refused to heed my words. They are following strange gods and serving them. The house of Israel and the house of Judah have broken the covenant that I made with their ancestors.
11 Therefore, thus says the Lord, I will inflict upon them a disaster that they will not be able to escape. Even should they cry out to me, I will refuse to listen to them. 12 Then the cities of Judah and the citizens of Jerusalem will go forth and cry out for help to the gods to whom they make offerings, but these gods will be of absolutely no help to them when disaster strikes.
13 For you have as many gods
as you have towns, O Judah.
And you have as many altars to offer sacrifice to Baal
as there are streets in Jerusalem.
14 Do not intercede for this people or offer a prayer on their behalf, for I will not listen to their cries for help that they will raise during the time of their misfortune.
The Lord Rebukes Judah
15 What right does my beloved have to be in my house
when she perpetrates such vile deeds?
Can vows and sacrificial meat
turn away the disaster that threatens you
and allow you to exult?
16 The Lord once called you a green olive tree
that was filled with leaves and fruit.
But now, with the roar of a mighty storm,
he will set it ablaze,
and its branches will be consumed.
17 The Lord of hosts who planted you has decreed that misfortune will befall you because of the evil done by the house of Israel and the house of Judah, having provoked me to anger by offering sacrifices to Baal.
Jeremiah’s Persecution[m]
18 I was aware of this, O Lord,
because you had made it known to me
then you revealed to me their evil deeds.
19 I had been like a trusting lamb
that was being led to the slaughter.
And I was not aware about the schemes
that they were plotting against me, saying,
“Let us destroy the tree and its fruit;
let us cut him off from the land of the living
so that his name will no longer be remembered.”
20 O Lord of hosts, you who judge righteously
and test the heart and the mind,
allow me to behold your vengeance on them,
for to you I have committed my cause.
21 Therefore, in regard to the people of Anathoth who are determined to end my life and who say, “Do not prophesy in the name of the Lord or we will kill you,” 22 this is what the Lord has to say, “I am about to punish them. Their young men will die by the sword, and their sons and daughters will perish by famine. 23 Not a single one of them will survive. For in the year of reckoning for them, I will bring disaster upon the people of Anathoth.”
Chapter 12
1 You are always in the right, O Lord,
whenever I take a position that conflicts with yours;
nevertheless, let me plead my case before you.
Why does it happen that the wicked prosper
and that treacherous people thrive?
2 When you planted them, they took root,
flourished, and brought forth fruit.
Your name is always on their lips,
but you are far from their hearts.
3 You know me, O Lord, and you see me;
you are aware that my heart is devoted to you.
Drag off the wicked like
sheep for a sacrifice;
set them apart for the day of slaughter.
4 For how long a period must the land be in mourning
and the green grass wither throughout the countryside?
The animals and the birds are perishing
because of the wickedness of those who dwell there
and assert that God is not concerned about them.
God’s Response
5 If you become exhausted in a footrace with men,
how will you compete with horses?
And if you fall headlong in a peaceful land,
how will you fare in the thickets of the Jordan?
6 Even your brothers and your own family
continue to deal treacherously with you
as they pursue you while shouting threats.
Do not trust them
even when they speak gentle words to you.
The Lord’s Lament[n]
7 I have abandoned my house
and forsaken my heritage.
I have given the beloved of my heart
into the hands of her enemies.
8 My own people have become to me
like a lion in the forest;
they have threatened me incessantly,
and therefore, I despise them.
9 Why has my land become a lair for hyenas,
with birds of prey hovering on every side?
Go forth and gather all the wild beasts
so that they may assemble for the feast.
10 My shepherds have ravaged my vineyard
and trampled my heritage underfoot.
They have made the plot of land that is my delight
into a desolate wilderness.
11 They have made it into a wasteland,
the sight of which causes me to mourn.
The entire land has become desolate,
and no one shows the slightest bit of concern.
12 Upon all the barren heights of the desert
those who wreak destruction have arrived.
For the Lord will wield a devouring sword
from one end of the land to the other;
no living thing will remain unscathed.
13 Men have sown wheat only to reap thorns;
they have worked to the point of exhaustion
but have profited nothing.
Their harvests are a source of disappointment
because of the fierce anger of the Lord.
14 Judah’s Evil Neighbors. Thus says the Lord, “As for all my evil neighbors who have seized the inheritance I gave to my people Israel, I will uproot them from their land, and from among them I will uproot the house of Judah. 15 But after I uproot them, I will again take pity on them and bring them back, each one to his own heritage and his own land.
16 “Then, if they carefully adhere to the ways of my people and swear by my name, saying, ‘As the Lord lives,’ just as previously they taught my people to swear by Baal, then they will be reestablished among my people. 17 But if any nation refuses to listen, I will uproot that nation and destroy it completely,” says the Lord.
Chapter 13[o]
Warnings to Judah. 1 The Lord said to me: Go forth and purchase for yourself a loincloth. Wrap it around your loins, but do not dip it in water. 2 I purchased the loincloth as instructed by the Lord and wrapped it around my loins.
3 Then the Lord spoke to me a second time, saying: 4 Take the loincloth that you purchased and are wearing, and go now to the Euphrates and conceal it there in a cleft of the rock. 5 So I went to the Euphrates and hid it as the Lord had commanded me.
6 After a long period of time, the Lord said to me: Go now to the Euphrates and retrieve the loincloth that I instructed you to hide there. 7 And so I returned to the Euphrates and searched for the cleft, and I then retrieved the loincloth from the place where I had hidden it. But the loincloth had now rotted and was good for nothing.
8 Then the word of the Lord came to me: 9 Thus says the Lord: In the same way I will ruin the pride of Judah and the enormous pride of Jerusalem. 10 Because these wicked people refuse to listen to my words and stubbornly follow their own inclinations as they run after other gods to serve them and worship them, they will become like this loincloth, which is good for nothing. 11 For just as a loincloth clings to a man’s loins, so I made the whole house of Israel and the whole house of Judah cling to me, says the Lord, in the hope that they would become my people, my praise, and my pride. But they refused to listen.
12 The Shattered Wineflask. Therefore, proclaim this message to them: Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: Every wineflask should be filled with wine. If they reply, “Do you think we do not know that every wineflask is meant to be filled with wine?” 13 say to them in reply: Thus says the Lord: I will fill all the inhabitants of this land with wine until they are drunk—the kings who sit on David’s throne, the priests, the prophets, and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem. 14 Then I will smash them one against the other, parents and children together, says the Lord. I will show no pity, I will not spare or show compassion, when I destroy them.
A Vision of Exile
15 Listen carefully and suppress your pride,
for it is the Lord who speaks.
16 Give glory to the Lord, your God,
before the darkness descends,
before your feet stumble
on the mountains at twilight,
before the light you hope for
will gradually turn to gloom
and then into thick darkness.
17 If your pride does not allow you to listen,
I will weep in secret for you.
My eyes will be filled with tears
because the Lord’s flock is being led into captivity.
18 [p]Say to the king and the queen mother,
“Descend from your thrones,
since your glorious crowns
have fallen from your heads.”
19 The cities in the Negeb are besieged,
and no one will be able to offer them relief.
All Judah has been taken into exile;
every inhabitant has been led away.
Jerusalem’s Shame
20 Lift up your eyes and behold
those who are coming from the north.
Where is the flock that was entrusted to you,
the sheep that were your pride?
21 What will you say when they appoint as your rulers
those whom you chose as your allies?
Will not pangs seize you
like those of a woman in labor?
22 And if you should ask yourself,
“Why has all this happened to me?”
it is because of your many grievous sins
that your skirts have been stripped away
and you have been violated.
23 Can an Ethiopian change the color of his skin
or a leopard change its spots?
Neither are you able to do good
when you are schooled in evil.
24 I will scatter you like chaff
that is driven by the desert wind.
25 This is your lot, says the Lord,
the portion I have measured out to you,
because you have forgotten me
and placed your trust in false gods.
26 I myself will tear off your skirts
so that your shame will be seen.
27 Your adulteries, your cries of lustful pleasure,
your shameless acts of prostitution:
all these abominable deeds of yours
I have observed on the hills of the countryside.
Woe to you, Jerusalem!
How long will it be
before you are made clean?
Chapter 14
The Great Drought.[q] 1 This is the word of the Lord that was given to Jeremiah during the drought:
2 Judah is in mourning,
and her towns languish.
Her people lie on the ground in mourning;
a cry of anguish goes up from Jerusalem.
3 The nobles send their servants for water,
but when they come to the cisterns
they find no water,
and they return with their jars empty.
Ashamed and in despair
they cover their heads.[r]
4 Because the ground is cracked
due to a total lack of rainfall,
the farmers are desperate,
and they too cover their heads.
5 Even the doe in the open country
abandons her newborn fawn
because there is no grass.
6 Wild donkeys stand on the bare heights
and pant for air like jackals,
while their eyes grow dim
because of a lack of pasture.
7 Even though our sins bear witness against us,
take action, O Lord, for your name’s sake;
forgive us for our many acts of infidelity,
our countless sins against you.
8 O Lord, you are the hope of Israel
and its savior in time of need.
Why are you like a stranger in the land,
like a traveler who only stays for a single night?
9 Why should you be taken unawares,
like a warrior who is powerless to help us?
You are in our midst, O Lord,
and we bear your name.
Do not forsake us!
10 Thus says the Lord about this people:
Truly they have loved to stray
and have not restrained their feet.
Therefore, the Lord no longer takes pleasure in them;
he will now remember their iniquity
and punish their sins.
11 Then the Lord said to me: Do not intercede for this people or pray for their welfare. 12 If they fast, I will not listen to their cry. If they offer holocausts or grain offerings, I will not accept them. Rather, I will destroy them by the sword, famine, and plague.
13 In response I said, “Ah, Lord God, the prophets continue to say to them that they will suffer neither sword nor famine, since you will give them lasting peace in this place.”
14 Then the Lord said to me: The prophets are prophesying lies in my name. I did not send them or give them any orders or speak to them. They are prophesying to you lying visions, worthless divinations, and delusions of their own minds.
15 Therefore, thus says the Lord about the prophets who are prophesying in his name: Although I did not send them, they continue to assert that neither sword nor famine will afflict this land. By sword and famine those same prophets will perish. 16 Furthermore, the people to whom they are prophesying will be thrown out into the streets of Jerusalem, victims of famine and the sword. No one will bury them or their wives, their sons or their daughters. I will pour down on them their own wickedness.
17 This is the message you are to deliver to them:
Let my eyes stream with tears
day and night without ceasing,
for my virgin daughter—my people—
has suffered a crushing blow
and is grievously injured.
18 If I go out into the open fields,
I see those slain by the sword.
If I go into the city,
I behold those who have perished through famine.
Even prophets and priests roam in confusion
in a land they do not know.
19 Have you rejected Judah completely?
Has Zion become loathsome to you?
Why have you afflicted us
to a point where we cannot be healed?
We hope for peace, but to no avail,
for a time of healing, only to encounter terror.
20 O Lord, we acknowledge our wickedness
and the guilt of our fathers;
we have indeed sinned against you.
21 For your name’s sake do not reject us;
do not dishonor your glorious throne.
Remember your covenant with us
and do not break it.
22 Can any worthless idols of the nations bring rain?
Do the heavens send down rain showers on their own?
No, it is you who accomplish all this,
O Lord, our God,
and therefore, we place our hope in you.
Chapter 15
1 The Lord then said to me: Even if Moses and Samuel stood before me, my heart would not have pity on this people. Send them away from my presence! Let them go! 2 And if they should ask you where they should go, say to them: Thus says the Lord:
Those destined for the plague, to plague;
those destined for the sword, to the sword;
those destined for famine, to famine;
those destined for captivity, to captivity.
3 Furthermore, four kinds of destroyers I will send against them, says the Lord: the sword to kill, dogs to drag away, birds of the sky and beasts of the earth to devour and destroy. 4 I will make them an object of horror to all the kingdoms of the earth because of what King Manasseh of Judah, the son of Hezekiah, did in Jerusalem.
5 [s]Who will there be to pity you, O Jerusalem?
Who will mourn for you?
Who will have the slightest concern
to inquire how you are?
6 You have rejected me, says the Lord,
and you have turned your back on me.
Therefore, I have stretched out my hand over you
in order to destroy you;
I am weary of having compassion for you.
7 I have winnowed them with a winnowing fork
at every city gate in the land.
I have brought bereavement and destruction on my people
because they would not abandon their evil ways.
8 I have made their widows more numerous
than the sands of the sea.
I brought a destroyer at noonday
against the mothers of young men.
Without warning, I afflicted them
with anguish and terror.
9 The mother of seven sons will grow faint
and gasp for breath.
Her sun went down while it was still day;
she has been shamed and disgraced.
As for the rest, I will give them to the sword
to perish at the hands of assassins, says the Lord.
Jeremiah’s Call Renewed[t]
10 “O my mother, how I wish
that you had never given birth to me,
a man of strife and contention for the entire land.
I have never borrowed from anyone,
nor have I lent to anyone,
yet everyone curses me.
11 Have I not truly done my best
to serve you, O Lord?
Have I not interceded with you
in times of disaster and times of distress?
12 “Can iron and bronze
break iron from the north?
13 Your wealth and your treasures
I will hand over as plunder, without repayment,
because of all your sins
throughout your territory.
14 I will force you to serve your enemies
in a land you do not know,
for my anger will kindle a fire
that will blaze against you.
15 O Lord, you know me well.
Remember me and visit me
and avenge me on my persecutors.
Continue to be patient with me
and do not cast me aside;
remember the insults I suffer for your sake.
16 “When I discovered your words, I devoured them;
they became a source of joy to me
and the delight of my heart,
because I bore your name,
O Lord, God of hosts.
17 “I have never associated with revelers
or rejoiced in their company;
I sat alone because I felt your hand on me,
and you had filled me with indignation.
18 Why then is my suffering continuous
and my wound incurable, refusing to be healed?
You have indeed become for me a treacherous brook
whose waters cannot be relied upon.”
19 In reply the Lord said to me:
If you repent, I will restore you,
and you will stand in my presence.
If you utter precious words
and not what is worthless,
you will be my spokesman.
This people may turn to you,
but you must not turn to them.
20 I will make you appear in the eyes of this people
to be a fortified wall of bronze.
They will fight against you
but they will not prevail,
for I am with you
to save and deliver you, says the Lord.
21 I will rescue you from the clutches of the wicked
and redeem you from the grasp of the violent.
Chapter 16[u]
Warning to Jeremiah. 1 The following word of the Lord then came to me: 2 You shall not take to yourself a wife or have sons and daughters in this place. 3 For thus says the Lord concerning the sons and daughters who are born in this place, and about the mothers who give birth to them and the fathers who beget them in this land: 4 They shall perish from deadly diseases. Unlamented and unburied, they will be like dung spread over the ground. They will perish by sword and by famine, and their corpses will serve as food for the birds of the sky and the beasts of the earth.
5 The Lord then continued: Do not enter a house of mourning; do not go there to lament or offer words of comfort. For I have withdrawn my blessing from this people, says the Lord, as well as my love and my mercy. 6 Both the powerful and the lowly will perish in this land, without burial or lamentation. There will be no gashing or shaving of the head for them. 7 [v]No one is to break bread with the mourners to comfort them in their bereavement or offer them the cup of consolation to drink for their father or mother.
8 Nor are you to enter a house where people are feasting and sit with them to eat and drink. 9 For thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: In your lifetime, and before your very eyes, I will banish from this place the cries of joy and gladness, the voices of bridegroom and bride.
10 When you relate all these words to the people, they will ask you, “Why has the Lord decreed that all these evils are to befall us? What evil have we done? What sin have we committed against the Lord, our God?” 11 Then you will give them this answer: This will occur because your ancestors abandoned me, says the Lord, and followed other gods and served and worshiped them. They forsook me and did not keep my law. 12 And you have behaved even more wickedly than your ancestors. For each one of you stubbornly follows his own wicked inclinations and refuses to listen to me. 13 Therefore, I will cast you out of this land into a land that is completely unknown to you or your ancestors. There you can serve other gods day and night, for I will show you no further favor.
14 The Israelites Return. However, the days are surely coming, says the Lord, when it will no longer be said, “As the Lord lives who brought the Israelites up out of the land of Egypt,” 15 but rather, “As the Lord lives who brought the Israelites up out of the land of the north and out of all the countries where he had driven them.” For I will bring them back to the land that I gave to their ancestors.
16 Twice the Punishment. Now I will send for many fishermen, says the Lord, and they will catch them. After that, I will send for many hunters, and they will hunt them down from every mountain and every hill, and from the crevices of the rocks. 17 For my eyes are focused on all their ways: they are not hidden from my sight, nor does their iniquity escape my gaze. 18 And I will doubly repay them for their iniquity and their sin, since they have polluted my land with their detestable idols and filled my heritage with their abominations.
The People’s Conversion
19 O Lord, my strength and my stronghold,
my refuge in times of distress,
the nations will come to you
from the ends of the earth and say,
“Our fathers inherited nothing but false gods,
idols that are worthless and without power.”
20 Can men make their own gods?
These are not gods in any way.
21 Therefore, I intend to give my people knowledge;
this time I will teach them
about my power and my might,
and then they will know
that my name is the Lord.
Chapter 17
Judah Punished for Its Idolatry
1 [w]The sin of Judah is written
with an iron stylus,
engraved with a diamond point
on the tablet of their hearts
and on the horns of their altars,
2 while their children remember
their altars and their sacred poles
beside every green tree
and on the high hills,
3 the mountains in the open country.
Your wealth and all your treasures
I will hand over as spoil
in repayment for all your sins
throughout your territory.
4 You will be forced to surrender your heritage
which I gave to you.
I will require you to serve your enemies
in a land you do not know,
for my fiery anger has been kindled by you,
and it will burn forever.
Wisdom Sayings
5 Thus says the Lord:
Cursed is anyone who places his trust in human beings
and relies on human strength
while his heart turns away from the Lord.
6 Such a person is like a shrub in the desert;
when relief comes, he will not be aware of it.
He will continue to live
in the parched areas of the desert,
in an uninhabited salt land.
7 Blessed are those who trust in the Lord
and whose hope is the Lord.
8 They will be like a tree planted by the water
that spreads out its roots to the stream.
When the heat comes, it does not fear;
its leaves stay green.
It is not concerned in a year of drought,
and it never fails to bear fruit.
9 The heart is more deceitful than any other thing,
and it is also perverse.
Who can uncover its secrets?
10 I, the Lord, search the heart
and probe the mind
to reward all according to their conduct
and as their deeds deserve.
11 Like a partridge[x] hatching eggs that it has not laid,
so is the man who amasses riches unjustly.
When his life is half completed,
they will desert him;
and when his life is at an end,
he will prove to have been a fool.
Israel’s True Hope
12 A glorious throne, exalted from the beginning:
such is the shrine of our sanctuary.
13 O Lord, you are the hope of Israel;
all those who abandon you will be put to shame.
Those who turn away from you
will have their names inscribed in the netherworld
because they have forsaken the Lord,
the source of living water.
Prayer for Vengeance
14 Heal me, O Lord, and I will be healed;
save me, and I will be saved;
you are the one whom I praise.
15 People continue to say to me,
“Where is the word of the Lord?
Let it come to pass.”
16 I have never tried to avoid
being a shepherd in your service,
nor have I desired the clay of despair.
Every word that passed my lips
has always been known to you.
17 Do not become a source of terror to me;
you will be my refuge on the day of disaster.
18 Let my persecutors be confounded, and not me;
let them, not me, be terrified.
Bring upon them the day of disaster;
crush them with unending destruction.
19 The Sabbath Observed.[y] Thus said the Lord to me: Go forth and stand at the Gate of Benjamin[z] through which the kings of Judah enter and depart, and stand also at all the other gates of Jerusalem. 20 There you are to say to them: Hear the word of the Lord, you kings of Judah, all you people of Judah as well, and all you inhabitants of Jerusalem who pass through these gates.
21 Thus says the Lord: If you value your lives, take care that you do not carry a burden on the Sabbath day or bring it through the gates of Jerusalem. 22 Bring no burden out of your houses on the Sabbath day, and do no work. You are to keep the Sabbath day holy, as I commanded your ancestors. 23 However, they did not listen or pay attention; rather, they stiffened their necks and would not heed my warnings or accept instruction.
24 But if you listen carefully to me, says the Lord, and carry no burden through the gates of this city on the Sabbath day, keeping the Sabbath holy and doing no work on that day, 25 then kings will come through the gates of this city, kings who will sit on the throne of David. They will come riding in chariots or on horseback, escorted by their officials, the people of Judah, and the citizens of Jerusalem. This city will be inhabited forever.
26 People will come from the towns of Judah and the villages around Jerusalem, from the territory of Benjamin and the foothills, from the hill country and the Negeb, to bring holocausts and sacrifices, grain offerings and incense and thank offerings, to the house of the Lord. 27 However, if you do not listen to my commands to keep the Sabbath day holy and to carry no burden through the gates of Jerusalem on the Sabbath day, then I will set fire to the gates, an unquenchable fire that will consume the palaces of Jerusalem.
Chapter 18
The Potter’s House.[aa] 1 This is the message delivered by the Lord to Jeremiah. 2 “Arise and go forth to the potter’s house, and then I will tell you what I have to say.” 3 Therefore, I proceeded to the potter’s house, where I found him working at his wheel. 4 Whenever the vessel he was making of clay turned out badly in his hands, he would use that clay to remold it into another vessel as he saw fit.
5 Then the word of the Lord came to me: 6 Can I not do to you what this potter does, O house of Israel? Like the clay in the hand of the potter, so are you in my hand, O house of Israel. 7 On occasion I may threaten to uproot, tear down, and destroy a particular nation or kingdom. 8 However, should that nation which I have threatened turn away from its evil ways, I will then relent and not inflict the disaster I had devised. 9 On another occasion I may promise to build up and plant a nation or kingdom. 10 However, if that nation follows an evil path and refuses to obey me, then I will cease to bestow upon it the blessings that I had promised.
11 Therefore, now deliver this message to the people of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem: Thus says the Lord: Be forewarned! I am preparing a disaster for you and designing a plan against you. So now, each one of you, turn away from your evil pursuits and amend your conduct and your actions. 12 However, they will reply, “It is no use. We intend to continue our ways and follow the wicked inclinations of our heart.”
Judah’s Apostasy
13 Therefore, thus says the Lord:
Ask among the nations:
Who has ever heard anything like this?
The virgin Israel has done
a truly horrible thing.
14 Does the snow of Lebanon
ever disappear from its rocky slopes?
Do the torrents of gushing waters
ever cease to flow?
15 Yet my people have forgotten me;
they burn incense to worthless idols,
causing them to stumble
as they forsake ancient roads
to travel along unfamiliar paths.
16 Their land will be laid waste,
an object of unending scorn.
Those who pass by will be appalled on beholding it
and shake their heads.
17 Like the east wind,
I will scatter them before their enemies.
On the day of their downfall
I will show them my back, not my face.
18 Another Prayer for Vengeance. They then raised a cry, “Let us devise a plot against Jeremiah. We will still receive instruction from the priests. Wise men will still offer us counsel, and prophets will still proclaim the word. Therefore, let us bring charges against him and refuse to pay attention to anything he says.”
19 Pay heed to me, O Lord,
and listen to what my adversaries are saying.
20 Should good be repaid with evil?
Now they are digging a pit for me.
Remember how I stood before you,
interceding on their behalf
and begging you to turn away your wrath from them.
21 Therefore, give their children over to famine
and abandon them to the power of the sword.
Let their wives become childless and widowed;
let their men die of pestilence
and their young men be slain by the sword in battle.
22 May screams be heard from their houses
when you bring marauders upon them suddenly.
For they have dug a pit to catch me
and laid snares for my feet.
23 Yet you, O Lord, are fully aware
of all their murderous plots to slay me.
Do not pardon their guilt
or blot out their sin from your sight.
Let them be thrown down before you;
deal with them at the height of your anger.
Chapter 19
Symbol of the Broken Jug. 1 Thus said the Lord: Go forth and purchase a potter’s earthenware jug. Then take along with you some of the elders of the people and some of the priests, 2 and go forth to the Valley of Ben-hinnom,[ab] close to the entrance of the Potsherd Gate. 3 There proclaim the words I tell you: Hear the word of the Lord, O kings of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem. This is the message of the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: I am prepared to bring such disaster upon this place that the ears of everyone who hears of it will tingle.
4 For these people have forsaken me and have profaned this place by offering sacrifices in it to foreign gods whom neither they nor their ancestors nor the kings of Judah ever knew. They have filled this place with the blood of the innocent, 5 building the high places of Baal to sacrifice their sons as burnt offerings to Baal. I never commanded or mentioned such a thing, nor did it ever enter my mind.
6 Therefore, the days are surely coming, says the Lord, when this place will no longer be called Topheth, or the Valley of Ben-hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter. 7 In this place, I will make void the plans of Judah and Jerusalem, and I will make them fall by the sword before their enemies and by the hands of those who are determined to slaughter them. Their corpses I will give as food to the birds of the sky and the beasts of the earth.
8 Moreover, I will make this city an object of horror and a source of derision. Every passerby will be horrified at the sight and be amazed at the disaster it has incurred. 9 I will make them eat the flesh of their sons and daughters, and all will devour one another’s flesh during the siege because of the incredible distress with which they have been afflicted by their enemies and those who seek their lives.
10 Then you are to break the jug in the presence of the men who have accompanied you 11 and say to them: Thus says the Lord of hosts: In the same way I will smash this people and this city, as one smashes a potter’s earthenware jug so that it can never be repaired, and the dead will be buried in Topheth until no further space for burial remains.
12 This is what I am determined to do with this place and its inhabitants, says the Lord. I will make this city like Topheth. 13 And the houses of Jerusalem and those of the kings of Judah will be defiled like this place, Topheth, all of the houses upon whose roofs they burned incense to all the host of heaven and poured out libations to other gods.
14 When Jeremiah returned from Topheth, where the Lord had sent him to prophesy, he stood in the court of the Lord’s house and proclaimed to all the people, 15 “Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: I am now prepared to inflict upon this city and upon all its towns the total disaster with which I threatened it, because they have remained steadfast in their stubbornness and refused to listen to my words.”
Chapter 20
1 When the priest Pashhur, the son of Immer, who was the chief officer in the house of the Lord, heard Jeremiah proclaiming this prophecy, 2 he ordered him to be scourged, and then placed him in the stocks at the Upper Gate of Benjamin in the house of the Lord.
3 The next morning, after Pashhur had released Jeremiah from the stocks, Jeremiah said to him, “The Lord’s name for you is not Pashhur but ‘Terror-on-Every-Side.’ 4 For thus says the Lord, ‘I will make you a terror to yourself and to all your friends. They will fall by the sword of their enemies before your very eyes. And I will deliver all Judah to the king of Babylon, and he will take the people captive and carry them off to Babylon or put them to the sword.
5 “ ‘All the wealth of this city, all of its cherished possessions, and all of the treasures of the kings of Judah I will hand over as plunder to their enemies who will seize it and carry it off to Babylon. 6 Furthermore, you, Pashhur, and all the members of your household will be taken into captivity and led off to Babylon. There you will die, and there you will be buried, you and all your friends, because you have prophesied falsely to them.’ ”
Jeremiah’s Confession[ac]
7 O Lord, you deceived me,
and I allowed myself to be deceived.
You were too powerful for me,
and you have prevailed.
All day long I am an object of ridicule;
everyone mocks me.
8 Whenever I speak, I must cry out;
my message is violence and destruction.
For the word of the Lord has caused me to endure
reproach and derision all day long.
9 If I say, “I will not mention him
or speak any longer in his name,”
within me I experience a fire burning in my heart
and imprisoned in my bones.
I am weary holding it in,
and I can no longer do so.
10 For I hear many whispering,
“Terror surrounds us.
Denounce him! Let us denounce him!”
All those who were my close friends
are waiting for me to stumble, saying,
“Perhaps we can trick him,
and we will be able to prevail
and take our revenge against him.”
11 But the Lord is at my side
like a mighty warrior.
Therefore, my persecutors will stumble,
and they will not prevail.
Because of their failure,
they will be greatly shamed,
and the disgrace that they will endure
will be everlasting and unforgettable.
12 O Lord of hosts, you test the righteous
and probe the mind and the heart.
Let me behold your retribution on them,
for to you I have committed my cause.
13 Sing to the Lord;
praise the Lord.
For he has rescued the life of the poor
from the power of the wicked.
14 Cursed be the day
on which I was born!
May the day when my mother bore me
be forever unblessed.
15 Cursed be the man
who brought the news to my father.
“A child, a son, has been born to you,”
thereby bringing great joy to his heart.
16 Let that man be like the cities
that the Lord overthrew without mercy.
Let him hear the cry of warning in the morning
and shouts of battle at noon
17 because he did not kill me in the womb.
Then my mother would have been my grave,
with her womb confining me forever.
18 Why did I come forth from the womb
to see toil and sorrow
and spend my days in shame?
Footnotes
- Jeremiah 7:1 We are here in the period of Jehoiakim, and there has been a revival of idolatry. But there is another and even more serious danger: the temple and its sacrifices have become a barrier between God and his people. If the people persist in their impious behavior, even offering libations to the goddess of fecundity (v. 18), nothing will be able to save them, and the temple itself will not escape the ruin! The example of another temple, the one in Shiloh, in which even the Ark had rested (see 1 Sam 4:12-18) and the ruin of the entire northern kingdom in 721 B.C. (v. 15) are precedents which ought to make people think.
- Jeremiah 7:12 It is from this verse (and see Jer 26:6) and from Ps 78:60 that we know the end of the sanctuary at Shiloh.
- Jeremiah 7:29 The Valley of Ben-hinnom, where sacrifices of children were offered, would become an open-air charnel house. And in the neighborhood of the city, the desecrated bones of worshipers of the stars (see Jer 8:2) would remain exposed before the gaze of their helpless divinities. The privation of burial and the desecration of graves were curses.
- Jeremiah 7:31 Topheth probably means “furnace, pyre.”
- Jeremiah 8:4 Among the rebukes and threats in this part of the Book is inserted a sorrowful lament: the people do not know the Lord! To know God and heed his word is true wisdom. Because it has preferred its own wisdom, the nation is plunging into ruin.
- Jeremiah 8:22 Gilead: in the Transjordan area, famous for its medicinal spices.
- Jeremiah 9:19 Probably an allusion to a campaign of Nebuchadnezzar in Palestine in 602 or 598 B.C. (see 2 Ki 24:1-10).
- Jeremiah 9:26 Desert: or “desert and who clip the hair by their foreheads,” which would refer to an idolatrous practice.
- Jeremiah 10:2 Signs in the heavens: the allusion is to horoscopes based on the stars.
- Jeremiah 10:17 This lament is a continuation of chapter 9.
- Jeremiah 11:1 In 622 B.C., a “Book of the Law” was discovered in a cupboard in the temple wall during repairs (see 2 Ki 22–23). This codex, which became the nucleus of Deuteronomy (see 2 Chr 34:14f), aided in the national and religious renewal which Josiah promoted after its discovery, for it preached love of God and unity among the Israelites. This renewal meant a genuine restoration of the covenant and would be wholeheartedly pursued by Jeremiah.
- Jeremiah 11:1 The editor played an important part in the formulation of these two oracles. The first passage proclaims the discovery of the law (vv. 1-8), but already added to it is a reflection on the failure of this attempt to renew the covenant (vv. 9-14). In fact, the reform was not continued after the death of Josiah.
- Jeremiah 11:18 Threatened with death, Jeremiah raises the thorny problem of the just who suffer and the wicked who prosper; this was a scandal to which traditional teaching on retribution had no valid answer. And in fact, it is not possible to rise above the scandal without a very radical act of faith. God himself promises Jeremiah ever harder trials in which he must be bold enough to trust solely in the Lord. Modern readers may perhaps be put off by the vindictive sentiments of the prophet, but these must be seen in the setting of the times. There was still no idea of retribution in a future life or even of a resurrection; therefore, the call for revenge seemed the only way of expressing faith in the justice of God. The image of the lamb led to slaughter (Jer 11:19) will later be applied by Second Isaiah (Isa 53:7) to the suffering Servant and, in the New Testament, to Jesus.
- Jeremiah 12:7 An editor has linked to the prophet’s call for vengeance (v. 3) the following two oracles, both of which speak of the judgment of God. The passage is probably an echo of the repression that was followed by the rebellion of Jehoiakim against his sovereign (Nebuchadnezzar). With the approval of the king of Babylon, some neighboring peoples engaged in a series of raids against Judah in about 599 B.C. (see 2 Ki 24:13). An accounting for their cruelty will be demanded of them, as well as the possibility of entering into the saving covenant, provided they renounce their false god, Baal, and follow the Lord. This marks the beginning of the call to universal salvation.
- Jeremiah 13:1 Judah, which should be a source of renown and glory for the Lord (v. 11), has become intoxicated by its title of chosen people. The oracles collected here by the editor denounce this pride; the prophecies are filled with threats to be carried out in the very near future. The oracles certainly preceded the first deportation in 598 B.C.
- Jeremiah 13:18 The king is certainly Jehoiachin, son of Jehoiakim; he was a young man of 18 and would ascend the throne only to be led away a prisoner (see 2 Ki 24:8).
- Jeremiah 14:1 In some memorable circumstances, Moses had become the advocate for his people (Ex 32:11; Num 14:13). In the hour of catastrophe, Jeremiah does the same, but the Lord refuses to be softened.
- Jeremiah 14:3 Cover their heads: a sign of mourning.
- Jeremiah 15:5 This oracle may date from a little after the events of 598 B.C.
- Jeremiah 15:10 The prophet has spent himself without reservation to maintain the covenant and be a witness of the Lord. He has gotten in return only misunderstanding, hostility, and isolation. The words he speaks in the depths of his suffering sound blasphemous. For this reason, the Lord has not given him even a single word of approval. The prophet has departed from the right way: he must return to it! Verses 12-14 were very clumsily inserted into this passage by a copyist.
- Jeremiah 16:1 Like Hosea’s marriage (see Hos 1:3), Jeremiah’s celibacy had fed the public’s curiosity. The prophet lived alone and took part in neither funerals nor festivities. He wanted to make it understood that this was no longer a time for establishing families or for gathering for feasts. In order to temper the severity of this oracle, an editor has introduced a more comforting passage regarding the return of those who would be scattered (v. 14f); these verses have their more appropriate setting in Jer 23:7-8. And in order to end on an optimistic note, three verses have been added (vv. 19-21) that foretell the conversion of the nations and are inspired by Isa 45:14.
- Jeremiah 16:7 The practices described here were connected with mourning.
- Jeremiah 17:1 According to Jeremiah, a prophet of the interior life, relations with God are formed in the human heart; so too the source of sin is in the heart.
- Jeremiah 17:11 The partridge that hatches the eggs of another bird will see itself abandoned by these chicks.
- Jeremiah 17:19 This vehement defense of the law concerning the Sabbath rest is not in Jeremiah’s style. The passage must therefore have been introduced after the Exile. The same idea is found in Neh 13:15-22: the happy or unhappy future of the nation depends on fidelity to this observance.
- Jeremiah 17:19 Gate of Benjamin: (Jer 37:13; 38:7), this was the most used gate; it faced north toward the lands of the tribe of Benjamin. One gate of the temple had the same name (Jer 20:2).
- Jeremiah 18:1 A visit to a potter suggests to the prophet Jeremiah the idea that God manipulates history as a potter does the clay: he softens and shapes it with the motion of the wheel, and he casts aside the waste.
- Jeremiah 19:2 The Valley of Ben-hinnom: the scene of the prophet’s symbolic action (see Jer 7:32—8:2) had been declared unholy by King Josiah and had begun to be the rubbish dump for the city. It would later be known as the Valley of Gehenna.
- Jeremiah 20:7 These pages from the prophet’s personal diary were scrupulously preserved by his disciples and slipped, here and there, in his book. We have already met these “confessions” of the prophet (Jer 11:18—12:6; 15:10-21; 17:12-18; 18:18-23); here, three of the most direct and effective passages are introduced.
