Jeremiah 21-24

Common English Bible

Verdict against king and city

21 Jeremiah received the Lord’s word when King Zedekiah sent Pashhur, Malchiah’s son, and the priest Zephaniah, Maaseiah’s son, to him with an appeal: ²“Speak to the Lord on our behalf because Babylon’s King Nebuchadnezzar^[a] is attacking us. Perhaps the Lord will perform one of his mighty deeds and force him to withdraw from us.”

³Jeremiah answered them: This is what you should tell Zedekiah: ⁴The Lord, the God of Israel, says: I’m going to turn your own weapons against you, yes, the weapons you are using to fight the king of Babylon and the Babylonians^[b] who have surrounded you! I will round them up in the center of the city. ⁵Then I myself will fight against you with an outstretched hand and strong arm in fierce anger and rage. ⁶I will strike down those within this city—both people and animals—and they will die of a terrible plague. ⁷Afterward, declares the Lord, I will deliver Judah’s King Zedekiah, his servants, and those in this city who have survived plague, war, and famine to Babylon’s King Nebuchadnezzar^[c] and to their enemies who seek to do them harm. He will put them to the sword without pity, mercy, or compassion.

⁸This is what you should tell this people: The Lord says: I’m setting before you the way of life and the way of death. ⁹Whoever stays in the city will die by the sword, famine, and disease. But whoever leaves the city and surrenders to the Babylonians^[d] will live; yes, their lives will be spared. ¹⁰I have set my face against this city for harm and not for good, declares the Lord; it will be delivered to the king of Babylon, who will set it on fire.

Judah: Hear the Lord’s word

¹¹House of Judah! This is what the Lord says:
¹²House of David! The Lord proclaims:
Begin each morning by administering justice,
    rescue from their oppressor
        those who have been robbed,
    or else my anger will spread like a wildfire,
        with no one to put it out,
        because of your evil deeds.
¹³I am against you,
    you who live in the valley,^[e]
        like a rock of the plain,
            declares the Lord,
    and who say, “Who will come down to attack us?
        Who will breach our fortresses?”
¹⁴I will punish you based on what you have done,
    declares the Lord.
I will set your^[f] forests on fire;
    the flames will engulf
        everything around you.^[g]

Oracles against the kings

22 The Lord proclaims: Go down to the palace of the king of Judah and declare this message: ²Listen to the Lord’s word, king of Judah, you who sit on David’s throne—you and your attendants, and all those who go through these gates. ³The Lord proclaims: Do what is just and right; rescue the oppressed from the power of the oppressor. Don’t exploit or mistreat the refugee, the orphan, and the widow. Don’t spill the blood of the innocent in this place. ⁴If you obey this command, then through the gates of this palace will come kings who occupy the throne of David, riding on chariots and horses along with their entourage and subjects. ⁵But if you ignore these words, I swear by myself, declares the Lord, that this palace will become a ruin. ⁶The Lord proclaims concerning the palace of the king of Judah:

Though you are like Gilead to me,
    like the summit of Lebanon,
    I will turn you into a desert—uninhabited cities.
⁷I will summon destroyers against you,
    who will use their weapons
        to cut down your finest cedars
        and hurl them into the fire.

⁸People from many nations will pass by this city and ask each other: “Why has the Lord treated that great city like this?” ⁹And the answer will be, “Because they abandoned the covenant with the Lord their God and worshipped and served other gods.”

¹⁰Don’t weep or lament for the dead king.^[h]
Weep instead for the one who has gone away,
for he will never return to see his native soil.

¹¹This is what the Lord says about Shallum son of Judah’s King Josiah, who succeeded his father Josiah as king but who is now gone from this place: He will never return! ¹²He will die where he’s been exiled and never see this land again.

¹³How terrible for Jehoiakim, who builds his house with corruption
    and his upper chambers with injustice,
        working his countrymen for nothing,
        refusing to give them their wages.
¹⁴He says, “I’ll build myself a grand palace,
    with huge upper chambers,
        ornate windows,
        cedar paneling,
        and rich red decor.”
¹⁵Is this what makes you a king,
    having more cedar than anyone else?
Didn’t your father eat and drink
    and still do what was just and right?
Then it went well for him!
¹⁶    He defended the rights of the poor and needy;
        then it went well.
Isn’t that what it means to know me?
    declares the Lord.
¹⁷But you set your eyes and heart
    on nothing but unjust gain;
    you spill the blood of the innocent;
        you practice cruelty;
        you oppress your subjects.

¹⁸Therefore, this is what the Lord says to Jehoiakim son of Judah’s King Josiah:

They won’t grieve for him, saying, “My brother, my sister!”
    They won’t grieve for him, saying, “My master, my majesty!”
¹⁹They will give him a donkey’s burial,
    dragging him outside the gates of Jerusalem
        and dumping him there.

²⁰Go up to Lebanon and cry out,
    lift up your voice in Bashan,
    cry out from Abarim,
        because all your lovers have been ravished.
²¹I spoke to you when you felt safe and secure,
    but you said, “I won’t listen.”
You have been that way since your youth:
    not listening to a word I say.
²²Your shepherds will be tossed to the wind,
    your lovers taken off to exile.
Then you will be embarrassed and humiliated
    by all your wickedness.
²³You who live in Lebanon,
        nestled in cedar,
    who will pity you^[i]
        when you are overcome in pain,
        like that of childbirth?

²⁴As surely as I live, declares the Lord, even if Coniah,^[j] King Jehoiakim’s son from Judah were a signet ring on my right hand, I would still remove you from there. ²⁵I would hand you over to those who seek to kill you, those you dread, even Babylon’s King Nebuchadnezzar and his army.^[k] ²⁶I will banish you and your mother who bore you to a land far from your native soil, and there the two of you will die. ²⁷You^[l] will never return to the land you^[m] long to go back to.

²⁸Is this man Coniah
    merely a defiled and broken pottery jar
        that no one wants?
Why then have he and his children been hurled out
    and cast into an unfamiliar land?
²⁹Land, land, land,
    hear the Lord’s word:
³⁰The Lord proclaims:
Mark this man as childless;
    he will not prosper during his lifetime.
        None of his children
        will sit on David’s throne
        and rule again in Judah.

Promise of restoration

23 Watch out, you shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture, declares the Lord. ²This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, proclaims about the shepherds who “tend to” my people: You are the ones who have scattered my flock and driven them away. You haven’t attended to their needs, so I will take revenge on you for the terrible things you have done to them, declares the Lord. ³I myself will gather the few remaining sheep from all the countries where I have driven them. I will bring them back to their pasture, and they will be fruitful and multiply. ⁴I will place over them shepherds who care for them. Then they will no longer be afraid or dread harm, nor will any be missing, declares the Lord.

Promise of a righteous and just king

⁵The time is coming, declares the Lord, when I will raise up a righteous descendant^[n] from David’s line, and he will rule as a wise king. He will do what is just and right in the land. ⁶During his lifetime, Judah will be saved and Israel will live in safety. And his name will be The Lord Is Our Righteousness.^[o]

⁷So the time is coming, declares the Lord, when no one will say, “As the Lord lives who brought up the Israelites from the land of Egypt.” ⁸Instead, they will say, “As the Lord lives who brought up the descendants of the people of Israel from the land of the north and from all the lands where he^[p] has banished them so that they can live in their own land.”

Oracles against the prophets

⁹As for the prophets:
My heart inside me is broken;
    my body aches.^[q]
I stagger like a drunk
    who has had too much wine to drink,
        because of the Lord
        and because of God’s holy words.
¹⁰Because the country teems
    with adulterers,
    because of them,^[r]
        yes, because their might isn’t right
        and their way is evil,
        the land dries up,
        and the grazing areas in the wilderness wither.^[s]
¹¹Both prophet and priest are godless;
    I even find their evil in my temple,
        declares the Lord.
¹²Therefore, they will find themselves on slippery ground
    and will be thrust into darkness,
    where they will collapse.
I will bring disaster upon them,
    when their time comes, declares the Lord.
¹³In the prophets of Samaria
    I saw something shocking:
    They prophesied by Baal
        and led astray my people Israel.
¹⁴In the prophets of Jerusalem
    I saw something horrible:
    They commit adultery and tell lies.
    They encourage evildoers
        so that no one turns from their wickedness.
In my eyes, they are no better than Sodom;
    its people are like Gomorrah.

¹⁵Therefore, this is what the Lord of heavenly forces proclaims concerning the prophets:

    I’m going to feed them bitter food
        and give them poison to drink.
Wickedness has spread from the prophets of Jerusalem
    throughout the land.

¹⁶The Lord proclaims:
Don’t listen to the prophets
    who are speaking to you;
        they are deceiving you.
    Their visions come from their own hearts,
        not from the Lord’s mouth.
¹⁷They keep saying to those who scorn God’s message,
        “All will go well for you,”
    and to those who follow their own willful hearts,
        “Nothing bad will happen to you.”
¹⁸But who has stood in the Lord’s council
    to listen to God’s word?
        Who has paid attention to his word and announced it?
¹⁹Look! The Lord’s angry storm breaks out;
    it whirls around the heads of the wicked.
²⁰The Lord’s fierce anger
    won’t turn back
    until it accomplishes all that he has planned.
In the days to come,
    you will understand what this means.

²¹I didn’t send the prophets,
    yet they ran anyway.
I didn’t speak to them,
    yet they prophesied anyway.
²²If they had stood in my council,
    they would have proclaimed
    my words to my people;
        they would have turned them
        from their evil ways and deeds.
²³The Lord declares, Am I a God
    who is only nearby and not far off?
²⁴Can people hide themselves in secret places
    so I might not see them?
        Don’t I fill heaven and earth?

²⁵I have heard the prophets prophesying lies in my name. They claim, “I’ve had a dream; I’ve had a dream!” ²⁶How long will deceitful prophecies dominate the minds of the prophets? Those prophets are treacherous. ²⁷They scheme to make my people forget me by their dreams that people tell each other, just as their ancestors forgot me because of Baal. ²⁸Let the prophet who has a dream declare it, but let the one who has my word proclaim it faithfully.

What a difference between straw and wheat!
        declares the Lord.
²⁹Isn’t my word like fire
    and like a hammer that shatters rock?
        declares the Lord.
³⁰Therefore, I’m against the prophets
    who steal my words from each other,
        declares the Lord.
³¹I’m against the prophets
    who carelessly deliver oracles,^[t]
        declares the Lord.
³²I’m against the prophets who dream up lies
    and then proclaim them,
        declares the Lord.
With their reckless lies,
    they lead my people astray.
I didn’t send them;
    I didn’t commission them.
They are completely useless to these people,
        declares the Lord.

³³When these people or a prophet or a priest asks you, “What is the Lord’s message?”^[u] say to them, “What message? I will cast you off, declares the Lord.” ³⁴I will punish anyone, including prophet or priest, who says, “This is the Lord’s message.” ³⁵This is what you should ask each other: “What has the Lord said?” “What has the Lord declared?” ³⁶But you are no longer to mention the Lord’s message, because everyone thinks they have received a message from the Lord. You destroy the very word of the living God, the Lord of heavenly forces, our God. ³⁷So this is what you should say to the prophet: “What has the Lord said to you?” “What has the Lord declared?” ³⁸But if you insist on saying, “This is the Lord’s message,” the Lord says to you: Because you have made this claim—this is the Lord’s message—when I told you not to proclaim the Lord’s message, ³⁹I will lift you up^[v] and cast you out of my presence, together with the city that I gave to your ancestors. ⁴⁰I will make you an object of disgrace and enduring shame that no one will ever forget.

Good and bad figs

24 After Babylon’s King Nebuchadnezzar had deported Judah’s King Jeconiah, King Jehoiakim’s son, and the Judean officials, as well as the craftsmen and metalworkers from Jerusalem to Babylon, the Lord showed me two baskets of figs set in front of the Lord’s temple. ²One basket was filled with fresh and ripe figs; the other basket was filled with rotten figs—too rotten to eat. ³And the Lord asked me: “What do you see, Jeremiah?”

I replied: “Figs! Some good ones and others very bad—so bad that they can’t be eaten.”

⁴Then the Lord said to me: ⁵The Lord, the God of Israel, proclaims: Just as with these good figs, I will treat kindly the Judean exiles that I have sent from this place to Babylon. ⁶I regard them as good, and I will bring them back to this land. I will build them up and not pull them down; I will plant them and not dig them up. ⁷I will give them a heart to know me, for I am the Lord. They will be my people, and I will be their God, for they will return to me with all their heart. ⁸And just like the rotten figs that are so bad that they can’t be eaten, the Lord says, I will do to Judah’s King Zedekiah and his officials, as well as the remaining few in Jerusalem and those who are living in Egypt. ⁹I will make them an object of horror and evil to all the kingdoms of the earth. Wherever I scatter them, they will be disgraced and insulted, mocked and cursed. ¹⁰I will send the sword, famine, and disease against them until they vanish from the fertile land that I gave to their ancestors.