Jeremiah 15

¹ Yahweh said to me, ‘Even if Moses and Samuel were standing in my presence I could not warm to this people! Drive them out of my sight; away with them!

² And if they ask you, “Where shall we go?” tell them this, “Yahweh says this: Those for the plague, to the plague; those for the sword, to the sword; those for famine, to famine; those for captivity, into captivity!”

³ Four kinds of doom I consign them to: the sword to kill, the dogs to drag away, the birds of heaven and beasts of earth to devour and to destroy.

⁴ I will make them an object of horror to all the kingdoms of the earth, because of Manasseh son of Hezekiah, king of Judah, for his misdeeds in Jerusalem.

⁵ ‘Who is there to pity you, Jerusalem, who to grieve for you, who to pause and ask how you are?

⁶ You yourself have rejected me – it is Yahweh who speaks – you have turned your back on me; so I have stretched my hand over you to destroy you. I am tired of relenting.

⁷ And so I have winnowed them with a fork in the towns of their land. I deprive my people of children, I exterminate them since they refuse to leave their ways.

⁸ Their widows have become more than the sand of the seas. On the mothers of young warriors I bring the destroyer in broad daylight. Suddenly I bring down anguish and terror on them.

⁹ The mother of seven sons grows faint, and breathes her last. It is still day, but already her sun has set, shame and disgrace are hers…And the remainder of them I shall hand over to their enemies to be cut to pieces – it is Yahweh who speaks.’

¹⁰ Woe is me, my mother, for you have borne me to be a man of strife and of dissension for all the land. I neither lend nor borrow, yet all of them curse me.

¹¹ Truthfully, Yahweh, have I not done my best to serve you, interceded with you for my enemy in the time of his disaster, his distress?

¹² Can a man break iron, iron from the north, or bronze?

¹³ ‘Your wealth and your treasures I will hand over to plunder, as payment for all your sins throughout your territory.

¹⁴ I will enslave you to your enemies in a country which you do not know, for my anger has kindled a fire that will burn you up.’

¹⁶ When your words came, I devoured them: your word was my delight and the joy of my heart; for I was called by your name, Yahweh, God of Sabaoth.

¹⁷ I never took pleasure in sitting in scoffers’ company; with your hand on me I held myself aloof, since you had filled me with indignation.

¹⁸ Why is my suffering continual, my wound incurable, refusing to be healed? Do you mean to be for me a deceptive stream with inconstant waters?

¹⁹ To which Yahweh replied, ‘If you come back, I will take you back into my service; and if you utter noble, not despicable, thoughts, you shall be as my own mouth. They will come back to you, but you must not go back to them.

²⁰ I will make you a bronze wall fortified against this people. They will fight against you but they will not overcome you, because I am with you to save you and to deliver you – it is Yahweh who speaks.

²¹ I mean to deliver you from the hands of the wicked and redeem you from the clutches of the violent.’