Jeremiah 7
7
Jeremiah speaks in the temple
(Jeremiah 26.1-6)
1-3The LORD told me to stand by the gate of the temple#7.1-3 temple: The Hebrew text has “house of the LORD”, another name for the temple. and to tell the people who were going in that the LORD All-Powerful, the God of Israel, had said:
Pay attention, people of Judah! Change your ways and start living right, then I will let you keep on living in your own country.#7.1-3 let you…own country: Or “live here with you”. 4Don't fool yourselves! My temple is here in Jerusalem, but that doesn't mean I will protect you. 5I will keep you safe only if you change your ways. Be fair and honest with each other. 6Stop taking advantage of foreigners, orphans, and widows. Don't kill innocent people. And stop worshipping other gods. 7Then I will let you enjoy a long life in this land I gave your ancestors.
8But just look at what is happening! You put your trust in worthless lies. 9You steal and murder; you lie in court and are unfaithful in marriage. You worship idols and offer incense to Baal, when these gods have never done anything for you. 10And then you come into my temple and worship me! Do you think I will protect you so that you can go on sinning? 11You are thieves, and you have made my temple your hideout. But I've seen everything you have done.#Mt 21.13; Mk 11.17; Lk 19.46.
12Go to Shiloh, where my sacred tent once stood. Take a look at what I did there. My people Israel sinned, and so I destroyed Shiloh!#Js 18.1; Ps 78.60; Jr 26.6.
13While you have been sinning, I have been trying to talk to you, but you refuse to listen. 14Don't think this temple will protect you. Long ago I told your ancestors to build it and worship me here, but now I have decided to tear it down, just as I destroyed Shiloh. 15And as for you, people of Judah, I'm going to send you away from my land, just as I sent away the people of Ephraim and the other northern tribes.
Punishment for worshipping other gods
16Jeremiah, don't pray for these people! I, the LORD, would refuse to listen. 17Do you see what the people of Judah are doing in their towns and in the streets of Jerusalem? 18Children gather firewood, their fathers build fires, and their mothers mix dough to bake bread for the goddess they call the Queen of Heaven.#7.18 Queen of Heaven: Probably another name for the goddess Astarte. They even offer wine sacrifices to other gods, just to insult me.#Jr 44.17-19. 19But they are not only insulting me; they are also insulting themselves by doing these shameful things.
20And now, I, the LORD All-Powerful, will flood Judah with my fiery anger until nothing is left—no people or animals, no trees or crops.
It is useless to offer sacrifices
21The LORD told me to say to the people of Judah:
I am the LORD All-Powerful, the God of Israel, but I won't accept sacrifices from you. So don't even bother bringing them to me. You might as well just cook the meat for yourselves.
22At the time I brought your ancestors out of Egypt, I didn't command them to offer sacrifices to me. 23Instead, I told them, “If you listen to me and do what I tell you, I will be your God, you will be my people, and all will go well for you.” 24But your ancestors refused to listen. They were stubborn, and whenever I wanted them to go one-way, they always went the other. 25Ever since your ancestors left Egypt, I have been sending my servants the prophets to speak for me. 26But you have ignored me and become even more stubborn and sinful than your ancestors ever were!
Slaughter Valley
The LORD said:
27Jeremiah, no matter what you do, the people won't listen. 28So you must say to them:
People of Judah, I am the LORD your God, but you have refused to obey me, and you didn't change when I punished you. And now, you no longer even pretend to be faithful to me.
29Shave your head bald
and throw away the hair.
Sing a funeral song
on top of a barren hill.
You people have made me angry,
and I have abandoned you.
30You have disobeyed me by putting your disgusting idols in my temple, and now the temple itself is disgusting to me. 31At Topheth in Hinnom Valley you have built altars where you kill your children and burn them as sacrifices to other gods. I would never think of telling you to do this.#2 K 23.10; Jr 32.35; Lv 18.21. 32So watch out! Some day that place will no longer be called Topheth or Hinnom Valley. It will be called Slaughter Valley, because you will bury your dead there until you run out of room, 33and then bodies will lie scattered on the ground. Birds and wild animals will come and eat, and no one will be around to scare them off. 34When I have finished with your land, there will be deathly silence in the empty ruins of Jerusalem and the towns of Judah—no happy voices, no sounds of parties or wedding celebrations.#Jr 16.9; 25.10; Rev 18.23.
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© British and Foreign Bible Society 2012
Jeremiah 7
7
Jeremiah Proclaims God's Judgment on the Nation
1The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord: 2Stand in the gate of the Lord's house, and proclaim there this word, and say, Hear the word of the Lord, all you people of Judah, you that enter these gates to worship the Lord. 3Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Amend your ways and your doings, and let me dwell with you#7.3 Or and I will let you dwell in this place. 4Do not trust in these deceptive words: “This is#7.4 Heb They are the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord.”
5For if you truly amend your ways and your doings, if you truly act justly one with another, 6if you do not oppress the alien, the orphan, and the widow, or shed innocent blood in this place, and if you do not go after other gods to your own hurt, 7then I will dwell with you in this place, in the land that I gave of old to your ancestors forever and ever.
8Here you are, trusting in deceptive words to no avail. 9Will you steal, murder, commit adultery, swear falsely, make offerings to Baal, and go after other gods that you have not known, 10and then come and stand before me in this house, which is called by my name, and say, “We are safe!”—only to go on doing all these abominations? 11Has this house, which is called by my name, become a den of robbers in your sight? You know, I too am watching, says the Lord. 12Go now to my place that was in Shiloh, where I made my name dwell at first, and see what I did to it for the wickedness of my people Israel. 13And now, because you have done all these things, says the Lord, and when I spoke to you persistently, you did not listen, and when I called you, you did not answer, 14therefore 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 ancestors, just what I did to Shiloh. 15And I will cast you out of my sight, just as I cast out all your kinsfolk, all the offspring of Ephraim.
The People's Disobedience
16As for you, do not pray for this people, do not raise a cry or prayer on their behalf, and do not intercede with me, for I will not hear you. 17Do you not see what they are doing in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem? 18The children gather wood, the fathers kindle fire, and the women knead dough, to make cakes for the queen of heaven; and they pour out drink offerings to other gods, to provoke me to anger. 19Is it I whom they provoke? says the Lord. Is it not themselves, to their own hurt? 20Therefore thus says the Lord God: My anger and my wrath shall be poured out on this place, on human beings and animals, on the trees of the field and the fruit of the ground; it will burn and not be quenched.
21Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Add your burnt offerings to your sacrifices, and eat the flesh. 22For in the day that I brought your ancestors out of the land of Egypt, I did not speak to them or command them concerning burnt offerings and sacrifices. 23But this command I gave them, “Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be my people; and walk only in the way that I command you, so that it may be well with you.” 24Yet they did not obey or incline their ear, but, in the stubbornness of their evil will, they walked in their own counsels, and looked backward rather than forward. 25From the day that your ancestors came out of the land of Egypt until this day, I have persistently sent all my servants the prophets to them, day after day; 26yet they did not listen to me, or pay attention, but they stiffened their necks. They did worse than their ancestors did.
27So you 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. 28You shall say to them: This is the nation that did not obey the voice of the Lord their God, and did not accept discipline; truth has perished; it is cut off from their lips.
29Cut off your hair and throw it away;
raise a lamentation on the bare heights,#7.29 Or the trails
for the Lord has rejected and forsaken
the generation that provoked his wrath.
30For the people of Judah have done evil in my sight, says the Lord; they have set their abominations in the house that is called by my name, defiling it. 31And they go on building the high place#7.31 Gk Tg: Heb high places of Topheth, which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire—which I did not command, nor did it come into my mind. 32Therefore, the days are surely coming, says the Lord, when it will no more be called Topheth, or the valley of the son of Hinnom, but the valley of Slaughter: for they will bury in Topheth until there is no more room. 33The corpses of this people will be food for the birds of the air, and for the animals of the earth; and no one will frighten them away. 34And I will bring to an end the sound of mirth and gladness, the voice of the bride and bridegroom in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem; for the land shall become a waste.
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New Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright © 1989 Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA. Used by permission. All rights reserved.