Jeremiah 7

1The word that came to Yirmeyahu from the LORD, saying:

2Stand in the gate of the house of Yahweh, and proclaim there this word, and say, “Hear the word of Yahweh, all Judah, who enter through these gates to worship Yahweh.”

3Thus says Yahweh of hosts, the God of Israel: Make your ways and your deeds good, and I will let you dwell in this place.

4Do not trust in deceptive words, saying, “The temple of Yahweh, the temple of Yahweh, the temple of Yahweh are these.”

5For if you truly make your ways and your deeds good, if you truly do justice between a man and his neighbor,

6Do not oppress the foreigner, the fatherless, and the widow; do not shed innocent blood in this place; and do not go after other gods to your own harm.

7then I will let you dwell in this place, in the land that I gave to your fathers from of old and forever.

8Look, you are trusting in deceptive words to no benefit.

9Will you steal, murder, commit adultery, swear falsely, burn incense to Baal, and go after other gods that you have not known—

10Then you come and stand before me in this house, which is called by my name, and say, ‘We are delivered!’—so that you may do all these abominations.

11Has this house, which is called by my name, become a den of robbers in your eyes? Even I myself, look, I have seen it, declares Yahweh.

12For go now to my place that was in Shiloh, where I made my name dwell at first, and see what I did to it because of the evil of my people Israel.

13And now, because you have done all these deeds, declares Yahweh, and I spoke to you, rising early and speaking, but you did not listen, and I called to you, but you did not answer,

14So I will do to the house that is called by my name, in which you trust, and to the place that I gave to you and to your fathers, just as I did to Shiloh.

15And I will cast you out from before me, just as I cast out all your brothers, all the offspring of Ephraim.

16But as for you, do not pray for this people, and do not lift up a cry or prayer on their behalf, and do not intercede with me, for I am not listening to you.

17Do you not see what they are doing in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem?

18The children gather wood, the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead dough to make cakes for the Queen of Heaven and to pour out drink offerings to other gods, so as to provoke me to anger.

19Is it I whom they are provoking? declares Yahweh. Is it not themselves, to the shame of their own faces?

20Therefore thus says the Lord GOD: Behold, my anger and my wrath are being 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 will not be quenched.

21Thus says Yahweh of hosts, the God of Israel: Add your burnt offerings to your sacrifices, and eat the flesh.

22For I did not speak to your fathers or command them on the day I brought them out of the land of Egypt concerning burnt offering and sacrifice.

23But this command I gave them: ‘Listen to my voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be my people; and walk in all the way that I command you, so that it may go well with you.’

24But they did not listen, and they did not incline their ear, but walked in their own counsels, in the stubbornness of their evil heart, and they went backward and not forward.

25From the day your fathers came out of the land of Egypt until this day, I have sent to you all my servants the prophets, day after day, rising early and sending them.

26Yet they did not listen to me, and they did not incline their ear, but they stiffened their neck; they acted more wickedly than their fathers.

27You shall speak all these words to them, but they will not listen to you; you shall call to them, but they will not answer you.

28Then you shall say to them, ‘This is the nation that did not listen to the voice of Yahweh its God and did not accept correction. Faithfulness has perished; it has been cut off from their mouth.’

29Cut off your hair and throw it away, and raise a lament on the bare heights, for Yahweh has rejected and abandoned the generation of his wrath.

30For the sons of Judah have done what is evil in my sight, declares Yahweh. They have put their abominations in the house that is called by my name, to defile it.

31They 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—something I did not command, nor did it come up in my heart.

32Therefore, look, days are coming, declares the LORD, when it will no longer be called Topheth and the Valley of Ben-hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter; and they will bury in Topheth because there is no place left.

33The corpses of this people will become food for the birds of the heavens and for the beasts of the earth, with no one to frighten them away.

34And I will put an end, from the cities of Judah and from the streets of Jerusalem, to the sound of joy and the sound of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, for the land will become a ruin.