Jeremiah 19

1 This is another message that Yahweh gave [to me]: “Go and buy a clay jar from a man who makes them. Then take with you some of the elders of the people and leaders of the priests.

Thus said the LORD, “Go, and buy a potter’s earthen container, and take some of the elders of the people and of the elders of the priests;

2 Go out [of the city] past the Gate of Broken Pots, to the place [overlooking the dump for broken pottery in] the Ben-Hinnom Valley. Then give them a message.

and go out to the valley of the son of Hinnom, which is by the entry of the gate Harsith, and proclaim there the words that I will tell you.

3 Say to them, ‘[This message is for] you kings of Judah and [other] people of Jerusalem. Listen to what Yahweh is saying! The Commander of the armies of angels says that he will cause there to be a terrible disaster in [Jerusalem]. Those who hear about it will be stunned/shocked [IDM].

Say, ‘Hear the LORD’s word, kings of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem: The LORD of Armies, the God of Israel says, “Behold, I will bring evil on this place, which whoever hears, his ears will tingle.

4 [That will happen] because [you Israeli] people have stopped worshiping me, and have caused this place to be a place where [you worship] foreign gods. You burn sacrifices to gods that neither you nor your ancestors nor [even] the kings of Judah ever heard about. And you have filled this place with the blood of innocent people [whom you have killed].

Because they have forsaken me, and have defiled this place, and have burned incense in it to other gods that they did not know—they, their fathers, and the kings of Judah—and have filled this place with the blood of innocents,

5 You have built shrines to honor [your god] Baal, and at those shrines you have [killed] your own children and offered them to be sacrifices to Baal. I never commanded you to do that, I never spoke about doing that, I never even thought about anyone doing that.

and have built the high places of Baal to burn their children in the fire for burnt offerings to Baal, which I did not command, nor speak, which did not even enter into my mind.

6 So, beware, [because I, ] Yahweh, say that there will be a time when this garbage dump will no longer be called Topheth or Ben-Hinnom Valley; it will be called Slaughter Valley.

Therefore, behold, the days come,” says the LORD, “that this place will no more be called ‘Topheth’, nor ‘The Valley of the son of Hinnom’, but ‘The valley of Slaughter’.

7 In this place I will ruin the plans of [you people who live in] Jerusalem and in [other places in] Judah. I will allow your enemies who want to kill you to kill [many of] you with their swords. [Then] I will allow your corpses to remain on the ground to be food for vultures and wild animals.

“‘“I will make the counsel of Judah and Jerusalem void in this place. I will cause them to fall by the sword before their enemies, and by the hand of those who seek their life. I will give their dead bodies to be food for the birds of the sky and for the animals of the earth.

8 I will [completely destroy] Jerusalem and cause it to become a heap of ruins that people will despise. All the people who pass by will be appalled, and they will be shocked when they see that the city has been destroyed.

I will make this city an astonishment and a hissing. Everyone who passes by it will be astonished and hiss because of all its plagues.

9 I will enable your enemies who want to kill you to surround the city for a long time. [Then the food will be all gone, and you people will be extremely hungry, with the result that] you people in the city will eat the flesh of your own children and your neighbors’ children.’

I will cause them to eat the flesh of their sons and the flesh of their daughters. They will each eat the flesh of his friend in the siege and in the distress with which their enemies, and those who seek their life, will distress them.”’

10 [Jeremiah, after you tell that to them], while the people who are with you are watching, smash the jar [that you brought].

“Then you shall break the container in the sight of the men who go with you,

11 Then say to them, ‘This is what the Commander of the armies of angels says: “Just like this jar has been smashed and cannot be repaired, I will smash this city of Jerusalem and other places in Judah. You will bury some of your corpses here in this dump, until there is no more space to bury any more corpses.

and shall tell them, ‘The LORD of Armies says: “Even so I will break this people and this city as one breaks a potter’s vessel, that cannot be made whole again. They will bury in Topheth until there is no place to bury.

12 That is what I will do to this city and to you people who live here. I will cause this city to be desecrated, like [King Josiah caused Topheth to be] a place that was unfit for people to worship me there.

This is what I will do to this place,” says the LORD, “and to its inhabitants, even making this city as Topheth.

13 The houses in Jerusalem and the palaces of the kings of Judah will be desecrated like this place will be. All the houses where you burned incense on the rooftops to honor the stars [that you worshiped], and where you poured out wine [to be an offering] to your gods, will become (desecrated/unacceptable places for people to worship me).”’”

The houses of Jerusalem and the houses of the kings of Judah, which are defiled, will be as the place of Topheth, even all the houses on whose roofs they have burned incense to all the army of the sky and have poured out drink offerings to other gods.”’”

14 Then I returned from the garbage dump where Yahweh had sent me to tell them that message. Then I stood in the courtyard of Yahweh’s temple and said this to all the people [who were there]:

Then Jeremiah came from Topheth, where the LORD had sent him to prophesy, and he stood in the court of the LORD’s house, and said to all the people:

15 “This is what the Commander of the armies of angels says: ‘I will cause there to be a disaster in this city and in the villages around it like I promised, because you people have stubbornly [IDM] refused to pay attention to what I said to you.’”

“The LORD of Armies, the God of Israel says, ‘Behold, I will bring on this city and on all its towns all the evil that I have pronounced against it, because they have made their neck stiff, that they may not hear my words.’”