Jeremias 19

1 Then said the Lord to me, Go and get an earthen bottle, the work of the potter, and you shall bring [some] of the elders of the people, and of the priests;

This is what the LORD says: “Go and buy a clay jar from a potter. Take some of the elders of the people and leaders of the priests,

2 and you shall go forth to the burial-place of the sons of their children, which is at the entrance of the gate of Charsith; and do you read there all these words which I shall speak to you:

and go out to the Valley of Ben-hinnom near the entrance of the Potsherd Gate. Proclaim there the words I speak to you,

3 and you shall say to them, Hear you the word of the Lord, you kings of Juda, and men of Juda, and the dwellers in Jerusalem, and they that enter in by these gates; thus says the Lord God of Israel; Behold, I [will] bring evil upon this place, so that the ears of every one that hears it shall tingle.

saying, ‘Hear the word of the LORD, O kings of Judah and residents of Jerusalem. This is what the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel, says: I am going to bring such disaster on this place that the ears of all who hear of it will ring,

4 Because they forsook me, and profaned this place, and burnt incense in it to strange gods, which they and their fathers knew not; and the kings of Juda have filled this place with innocent blood,

because they have abandoned Me and made this a foreign place. They have burned incense in this place to other gods that neither they nor their fathers nor the kings of Judah have ever known. They have filled this place with the blood of the innocent.

5 and built high places for Baal, to burn their children in the fire, which things I commanded not, neither did I design [them] in my heart:

They have built high places to Baal on which to burn their children in the fire as offerings to Baal—something I never commanded or mentioned, nor did it even enter My mind.

6 Therefore, behold, the days come, says the Lord, when this place shall no more be called, The fall and burial-place of the son of Ennom, but, The burial-place of slaughter.

So behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when this place will no longer be called Topheth or the Valley of Ben-hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter.

7 And I will destroy the counsel of Juda and the counsel of Jerusalem in this place; and I will cast them down with the sword before their enemies, and by the hands of them that seek their lives: and I will give their dead bodies for food to the birds of the sky and to the wild beasts of the earth.

And in this place I will ruin the plans of Judah and Jerusalem. I will make them fall by the sword before their enemies, by the hands of those who seek their lives, and I will give their carcasses as food to the birds of the air and the beasts of the earth.

8 And I will bring this city to desolation and [make it] a hissing; every one that passes by it shall scowl, and hiss because of all her plague.

I will make this city a desolation and an object of scorn. All who pass by will be appalled and will scoff at all her wounds.

9 And they shall eat the flesh of their sons, and the flesh of their daughters; and they shall eat every one the flesh of his neighbour in the blockade, and in the siege wherewith their enemies shall besiege them.

I will make them eat the flesh of their sons and daughters, and they will eat one another’s flesh in the siege and distress inflicted on them by their enemies who seek their lives.’

10 And you shall break the bottle in the sight of the men that go forth with you,

Then you are to shatter the jar in the presence of the men who accompany you,

11 and you shall say, Thus says the Lord, Thus will I break in pieces this people, and this city, even as an earthen vessel is broken in pieces which can’t be mended again.

and you are to proclaim to them that this is what the LORD of Hosts says: I will shatter this nation and this city, like one shatters a potter’s jar that can never again be repaired. They will bury the dead in Topheth until there is no more room to bury them.

12 Thus will I do, says the Lord, to this place, and to the inhabitants of it, that this city may be given up, as one that is falling to ruin.

This is what I will do to this place and to its residents, declares the LORD. I will make this city like Topheth.

13 And the houses of Jerusalem, and the houses of the kings of Juda shall be as a ruinous place, because of their uncleannesses in all the houses, wherein they burnt incense upon their roofs to all the host of heaven, and poured drink-offerings to strange gods.

The houses of Jerusalem and the houses of the kings of Judah will be defiled like that place, Topheth—all the houses on whose rooftops they burned incense to all the host of heaven and poured out drink offerings to other gods.”

14 And Jeremias came from [the place] of the Fall, whither the Lord had sent him to prophesy; and he stood in the court of the Lord's house: and said to all the people, Thus says the Lord;

Then Jeremiah returned from Topheth, where the LORD had sent him to prophesy, and he stood in the courtyard of the house of the LORD and proclaimed to all the people,

15 Behold I bring upon this city, and upon all the cities belonging to it, and upon the villages of it, all the evils which I have spoken against it, because they have hardened their neck, [that they might not] listen to my commands.

“This is what the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel, says: ‘Behold, I am about to bring on this city and on all the villages around it every disaster I have pronounced against them, because they have stiffened their necks so as not to heed My words.’”