Jeremiah 7

VIN^{(i) 1} This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD: ² "Stand at the gate of the LORD's house and proclaim there this word: 'Hear the word of the LORD, all you of Judah who enter by these gates to worship the LORD! ³ So says the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, Amend your ways and your doings, and I will let you dwell in this place. ⁴ "'"Do not trust in deceptive words. They say: 'This is the Temple of the LORD, the Temple of the LORD, and the Temple of the LORD. ⁵ For if you thoroughly amend your ways and your pursuits, and actually execute judgment between man and man: ⁶ if you do not oppress the foreigner, the fatherless, and the widow, and do not shed innocent blood in this place, neither walk after other gods to your own hurt: ⁷ then I will let you dwell in this place, in the land that I gave to your ancestors forever and ever. ⁸ "Look, you're trusting in deceptive words that cannot benefit. ⁹ Will you steal, murder, commit adultery, swear falsely, burn incense to Baal, and walk after other gods that you have not known, ¹⁰ and then come and stand before Me in this house which is called by My name, and say, We are delivered to do all these abominations? ¹¹ "Has this house, called by my name, become a den of robbers in your sight? Behold, I, even I, have seen it," declares the LORD. ¹² "But go to my place in Shiloh, where I made my name dwell from the beginning, and see what I did to it because of the wickedness of my people Israel. ¹³ Now, because you have done all these things," declares the LORD, "I spoke to you over and over again, but you didn't listen. I called to you, but you didn't answer. ¹⁴ Just as I did to Shiloh, I'll do to the house in which you trust and which is called by my name, the place that I gave to you and your ancestors. ¹⁵ And I will drive you from my presence, as I have driven out your brethren, the whole seed of Ephraim. ¹⁶ "As for you, don't pray on behalf of this people, don't cry or offer a petition for them, and don't plead with me, for I won't listen to you. ¹⁷ Do you not see what they are doing in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem? ¹⁸ The children gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead the dough, to make cakes to the queen of heaven, and to pour out drink offerings to other gods, that they may provoke me to anger. ¹⁹ Are they provoking me?" asks the LORD. "Is it not themselves, and to their own shame?" ²⁰ Therefore the Sovereign LORD says: "My anger and my wrath will be poured out on this place, on man and on beast, on the trees of the field and on the fruit of the ground. It will burn and not be quenched." ²¹ Thus says the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, "Add your burnt offerings to your sacrifices, and eat the flesh. ²² But when I brought your fathers out of Egypt, I spake no word unto them of burnt offerings and sacrifices: ²³ but I did give them this command: Obey me and I'll be your God, and you will be my people. Walk in all the ways that I command you so it will go well for you. ²⁴ But they did not listen, nor bow their ear, but walked in their own plans, in the stubbornness of their evil heart, and went backward and not forward. ²⁵ From the day your ancestors left the land of Egypt to this present time, I've sent all my servants, the prophets, to you, again and again. ²⁶ Yet they did not listen to Me nor bow their ear, but they stiffened their neck. They did more evil than their fathers. ²⁷ And speak thou to them all these words, and they will not hear to thee: and call to them, and they will not answer. ²⁸ "You will say to them: 'This is the nation that did not obey the voice of the LORD their God or accept correction. Truth has perished and truth has been removed from their mouth. ²⁹ Cut off your hair, and throw it away, and take up a lamentation on the bare heights; for the LORD has rejected and forsaken the generation of his wrath.'" ³⁰ "For the people of Judah have done evil in my eyes," declares the LORD. "They have put their detestable idols in the house that is called by my name in order to defile it. ³¹ They have built the high places of Topheth, which is in the Valley of Ben Hinnom, to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire; which I did not command, nor did it come into my mind. ³² Therefore look, days are about to come," declares the LORD, "and it will no longer be called Topheth or the Valley of Ben Hinnom, but the Valley of the Slaughter, and they will bury in Topheth until there is no more place. ³³ And the carcasses of this people shall be for food for the birds of the air and the wild beasts of the earth; and there shall be none to scare them away. ³⁴ "I will cause the voice of joy and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride to cease from the cities of Judah and from the streets of Jerusalem. The land will become a ruin."