Jeremiah 19
19
1The Lord said to Jeremiah, “Go and buy a clay jar from a potter. Take along some of the elders of the people. Also tell some of the priests to go with you. 2Go out to the Valley of Ben Hinnom. Stand near the entrance of the gate where broken pieces of pottery are thrown away. There announce the message I give you. 3Tell the people, ‘Listen to the Lord’s message, you kings of Judah and people of Jerusalem. The Lord who rules over all is the God of Israel. He says, “Listen! I am going to bring trouble on Jerusalem. It will be so horrible that it will make the ears of everyone who hears about it ring. 4My people have deserted me. They have made this city a place where other gods are worshiped. They have burned incense to them here. They, their people of long ago and the kings of Judah had never known these gods. My people have also filled this place with the blood of those who aren’t guilty. 5They have built the high places where they worship Baal. There they sacrifice their children in the fire as offerings to Baal. That is something I did not command or talk about. It did not even enter my mind. 6So watch out!” announces the Lord. “The days are coming when people will not call this place Topheth anymore. And they will not call it the Valley of Ben Hinnom either. Instead, they will call it the Valley of Death.
7“ ‘ “In this place I will make the plans of Judah and Jerusalem as useless as a broken jar. I will use their enemies to kill my people by swords. They will die at the hands of those who want to take their lives. I will give their dead bodies as food to the birds and the wild animals. 8I will completely destroy this city. I will make it a horrible thing. People will make fun of it. All those who pass by it will be shocked. They will laugh at its people because of all their wounds. 9I will make the people of this city eat their sons and daughters. And they will eat one another. They will do this because things will be so bad during the attack. The enemies who want to take their lives will bring all this trouble on them.” ’
10“Jeremiah, break the jar while those who go with you are watching. 11Tell them, ‘Here is what the Lord who rules over all says. “This potter’s jar is smashed and can’t be repaired. And I will smash this nation and this city. People will bury their dead in Topheth. But they will run out of room. 12Here is what I will do to Jerusalem and those who live here,” ’ announces the Lord. ‘ “I will make this city like Topheth. 13The houses in Jerusalem will be made ‘unclean’ like Topheth. So will the houses of the kings of Judah. All these people burned incense on their roofs to all the stars. They poured out drink offerings to other gods.” ’ ”
14Then Jeremiah returned from Topheth. That’s where the Lord had sent him to prophesy. Jeremiah stood in the courtyard of the Lord’s temple. He spoke to all the people. He said, 15“The Lord who rules over all is the God of Israel. He says, ‘Listen! I am going to punish this city and all the villages around it. I am going to bring against them all the trouble I have announced. That’s because my people were stubborn. They would not listen to what I said.’ ”
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Jeremiah 19: NIrV
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Holy Bible, New International Reader’s Version®, NIrV®
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Jeremiah 19
19
1 Thus says the Lord: "Go, and take a potter's earthen bottle from the elders of the people and from the elders of the priests.
2 And go out to the valley of the son of Hinnom, which is near the entrance to the earthen gate, and there you shall proclaim the words that I will speak to you.
3 And you shall say: Listen to the word of the Lord, O kings of Judah, and you inhabitants of Jerusalem. Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Behold, I will lead an affliction over this place, so much so that it will ring in the ears of all who hear about it.
4 For they have abandoned me, and they have made this place foreign, and they have offered libations in it to foreign gods, whom neither they, nor their fathers, nor the kings of Judah have known. And they have filled this place with the blood of the innocent.
5 And they have built the exalted places of Baal, in order to burn their children with fire as a holocaust to Baal, something that I did not instruct or speak of, nor did it enter into my heart.
6 Because of this, behold, the days are approaching, says the Lord, when this place will no longer be called Topheth, or the valley of the son of Hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter.
7 And I will scatter the counsel of Judah and of Jerusalem in this place. And I will overthrow them with the sword, in the sight of their enemies and by the hand of those who seek their lives. And I will give their carcasses to the birds of the air and to the beasts of the land as food.
8 And I will set this city amid stupor and hissing. Everyone who passes by it will be stupefied, and they will hiss over all its wounds.
9 And I will feed them with the flesh of their sons and with the flesh of their daughters. And each one of them will eat the flesh of his friend during the blockade and the embargo by which their enemies, and those who seek their lives, will enclose them.
10 And you shall crush the bottle in the sight of the men who will go with you.
11 And you shall say to them: Thus says the Lord of hosts: In the same way, I will crush this people and this city, just as the potter's vessel was crushed and cannot be made whole again. And they will be buried at Topheth, because there will be no other place for burial.
12 So will I do to this place and to its inhabitants, says the Lord. And I will make this city to be like Topheth.
13 And the houses of Jerusalem and the houses of the kings of Judah will be unclean, just like the place of Topheth: all the houses on whose roofs they sacrificed to all the armies of heaven and poured out libations to strange gods."
14 Then Jeremiah arrived from Topheth, where the Lord had sent him to prophesy, and he stood in the atrium of the house of the Lord, and he said to all the people:
15 "Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Behold, I will lead over this community, and over all its cities, all the evils that I have spoken against it. For they have hardened their necks, so that they would not heed my words."
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