Jeremiah 19
19
The Broken Jar
1The Lord said to me, “Jeremiah, go and buy a clay jar from a potter. Take some of the elders of the people and some priests with you. 2Go out to the Valley of Ben Hinnom, near the front of the Potsherd Gate.#19:2 Potsherd Gate The exact location of this gate is not known, though it was probably at the southwestern part of the city. I have a message I want you to announce there. 3Say to those who are with you, ‘King of Judah and people of Jerusalem, listen to this message from the Lord! This is what the Lord All-Powerful, the God of the people of Israel, says: I will soon make a terrible thing happen to this place! Everyone who hears about it will be amazed and full of fear. 4I will do these things because the people of Judah have stopped following me. They have made this a place for foreign gods. The people of Judah have burned sacrifices in this place to other gods. The people long ago did not worship those gods. Their ancestors did not worship them. These are new gods from other countries. The kings of Judah filled this place with the blood of innocent children. 5The kings of Judah built high places for the god Baal. They use those places to burn their sons in the fire. They burned their sons as burnt offerings to the god Baal. I did not tell them to do that. I did not ask them to offer their sons as sacrifices. I never even thought of such a thing. 6Now people call this place Topheth and the Valley of Hinnom. But I give you this warning. This message is from the Lord: The days are coming, when people will call this place the Valley of Slaughter. 7At this place, I will ruin the plans of the people of Judah and Jerusalem. The enemy will chase them, and I will let the people of Judah be killed with swords in this place. I will make their dead bodies food for the birds and wild animals. 8I will completely destroy this city. People will whistle and shake their heads when they pass by Jerusalem. They will be shocked when they see how the city was destroyed. 9The enemy will bring its army around the city. That army will not let people go out to get food, so the people in the city will begin to starve. They will become so hungry that they will eat the bodies of their own sons and daughters, and then they will begin to eat each other.’
10“Jeremiah, tell this to the people, and while they are watching, break the jar. 11Then say this: ‘The Lord All-Powerful says, I will break the nation of Judah and the city of Jerusalem, just as someone breaks a clay jar! And like a broken jar, the nation of Judah cannot be put together again. It will be the same for the nation of Judah. The dead people will be buried here in Topheth until there is no more room. 12I will do this to these people and to this place. I will make this city like Topheth.’ This message is from the Lord. 13‘The houses in Jerusalem will become as “dirty” as this place, Topheth. The kings’ palaces will be ruined like this place, Topheth, because the people worshiped false gods on the roofs of their houses.#19:13 roofs of their houses People built their houses with flat roofs that were used as an extra room. They worshiped the stars and burned sacrifices to honor them. They gave drink offerings to false gods.’”
14Then Jeremiah left Topheth where the Lord had told him to speak. Jeremiah went to the Lord’s Temple and stood in the courtyard of the Temple. Jeremiah said to all the people: 15“This is what the Lord All-Powerful, the God of Israel says: ‘I said I would bring many disasters to Jerusalem and the villages around it. I will soon make this happen because the people are very stubborn. They refuse to listen and obey me.’”
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© 1987, 2004 Bible League International
Jeremiah 19
19
The Broken Jar
1The LORD told me to go and buy a clay jar. He also told me to take some of the elders of the people and some of the older priests, 2#2 Kgs 23.10; Jer 7.30–32; 32.34–35and to go through Potsherd Gate out to the Valley of Hinnom. There I was to proclaim the message that he would give me. 3The LORD told me to say, “Kings of Judah and people of Jerusalem, listen to what I, the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, have to say. I am going to bring such a disaster on this place that everyone who hears about it will be stunned. 4I am going to do this because the people have abandoned me and defiled this place by offering sacrifices here to other gods — gods that neither they nor their ancestors nor the kings of Judah have known anything about. They have filled this place with the blood of innocent people, 5#Lev 18.21and they have built altars for Baal in order to burn their children in the fire as sacrifices. I never commanded them to do this; it never even entered my mind. 6So then, the time will come when this place will no longer be called Topheth or the Valley of Hinnom. Instead, it will be known as the Valley of Slaughter. 7In this place I will frustrate all the plans of the people of Judah and Jerusalem. I will let their enemies triumph over them and kill them in battle. I will give their corpses to the birds and the wild animals as food. 8I will bring such terrible destruction on this city that everyone who passes by will be shocked and amazed. 9The enemy will surround the city and try to kill its people. The siege will be so terrible that the people inside the city will eat one another and even their own children.”
10Then the LORD told me to break the jar in front of those who had gone with me 11and to tell them that the LORD Almighty had said, “I will break this people and this city, and it will be like this broken clay jar that cannot be put together again. People will bury their dead even in Topheth because there will be nowhere else to bury them. 12I promise that I will make this city and its inhabitants like Topheth. 13The houses of Jerusalem, the houses of the kings of Judah, and indeed all the houses on whose roofs incense has been burnt to the stars and where wine has been poured out as an offering to other gods — they will all be as unclean as Topheth.”
14Then I left Topheth, where the LORD had sent me to proclaim his message. I went and stood in the court of the Temple and told all the people 15that the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, had said, “I am going to bring on this city and on every nearby town all the punishment that I said I would, because you are stubborn and will not listen to what I say.”
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Good News Bible with Deuterocanonicals/Apocrypha. Scripture taken from the Good News Bible (r) (Today's English Version Second Edition, UK/British Edition). Copyright © 1992 British & Foreign Bible Society. Used by permission.