⁶ For thus says Yahweh concerning the house of the king of Judah: You are Gilead to me, [and] the head of Lebanon; [yet] surely I will make you a wilderness, [and] cities which are not inhabited.

¹¹ Then I said, "Lord, how long?" He answered, "Until cities are waste without inhabitant, And houses without man, And the land becomes utterly waste,

³⁴ And a fruitful land into a salt waste, For the wickedness of those who dwell in it.

¹² Therefore Zion for your sake will be plowed like a field, And Jerusalem will become heaps of rubble, And the mountain of the temple like the high places of a forest.

¹⁰ For the fortified city is solitary, a habitation deserted and forsaken, like the wilderness: there shall the calf feed, and there shall he lie down, and consume the branches of it.

¹⁸ Micah the Morashtite prophesied in the days of Hezekiah king of Judah; and he spoke to all the people of Judah, saying, Thus says Yahweh of Hosts: Zion shall be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps, and the mountain of the house as the high places of a forest.

¹¹ I will make Jerusalem heaps, a dwelling-place of jackals; and I will make the cities of Judah a desolation, without inhabitant.

³⁴ Then will I cause to cease from the cities of Judah, and from the streets of Jerusalem, the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride; for the land shall become a waste.

²⁵ They sat down to eat bread, and they lifted up their eyes and looked, and saw a caravan of Ishmaelites was coming from Gilead, with their camels bearing spices and balm and myrrh, going to carry it down to Egypt.

²⁷ Thus shall you tell them, Thus says the Lord Yahweh: As I live, surely those who are in the waste places shall fall by the sword; and him who is in the open field will I give to the animals to be devoured; and those who are in the strongholds and in the caves shall die of the pestilence.

²⁸ I will make the land a desolation and an astonishment; and the pride of her power shall cease; and the mountains of Israel shall be desolate, so that none shall pass through.

⁶ then will I make this house like Shiloh, and will make this city a curse to all the nations of the earth.

⁷ The priests and the prophets and all the people heard Jeremiah speaking these words in the house of Yahweh.

⁸ It happened, when Jeremiah had made an end of speaking all that Yahweh had commanded him to speak to all the people, that the priests and the prophets and all the people laid hold on him, saying, You shall surely die.

⁹ Why have you prophesied in the name of Yahweh, saying, This house shall be like Shiloh, and this city shall be desolate, without inhabitant? All the people were gathered to Jeremiah in the house of Yahweh.

⁹ behold, I will send and take all the families of the north, says Yahweh, and [I will send] to Nebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon, my servant, and will bring them against this land, and against the inhabitants of it, and against all these nations round about; and I will utterly destroy them, and make them an astonishment, and a hissing, and perpetual desolations.

¹⁰ Moreover I will take from them the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, the sound of the millstones, and the light of the lamp.

²⁴ As I live, says Yahweh, though Coniah the son of Jehoiakim king of Judah were the signet on my right hand, yet would I pluck you there;

¹⁴ I will punish you according to the fruit of your doings, says Yahweh; and I will kindle a fire in her forest, and it shall devour all that is round about her.

¹¹ Touching the house of the king of Judah, hear you the word of Yahweh:

⁷ I will make void the counsel of Judah and Jerusalem in this place; and I will cause them to fall by the sword before their enemies, and by the hand of those who seek their life: and their dead bodies will I give to be food for the birds of the sky, and for the animals of the earth.

⁸ I will make this city an astonishment, and a hissing; everyone who passes thereby shall be astonished and hiss because of all the plagues of it.

²⁰ Destruction on destruction is cried; for the whole land is laid waste: suddenly are my tents destroyed, [and] my curtains in a moment.

¹ Behold, Yahweh makes the earth empty, and makes it waste, and turns it upside down, and scatters abroad the inhabitants of it.

² It shall be, as with the people, so with the priest; as with the servant, so with his master; as with the maid, so with her mistress; as with the buyer, so with the seller; as with the creditor, so with the debtor; as with the taker of interest, so with the giver of interest to him.

³ The earth shall be utterly emptied, and utterly laid waste; for Yahweh has spoken this word.

⁴ The earth mourns and fades away, the world languishes and fades away, the lofty people of the earth do languish.

⁵ The earth also is polluted under the inhabitants of it; because they have transgressed the laws, violated the statutes, broken the everlasting covenant.

⁶ Therefore has the curse devoured the earth, and those who dwell therein are found guilty: therefore the inhabitants of the earth are burned, and few men left.

¹⁵ His legs are like pillars of marble set on sockets of fine gold. His appearance is like Lebanon, excellent as the cedars.

²⁵ Please let me go over and see the good land that is beyond the Jordan, that goodly mountain, and Lebanon.