Jeremiah 31

¹ When that time comes – it is Yahweh who speaks – I will be the God of all the clans of Israel: they shall be my people.

² Yahweh says this: They have found pardon in the wilderness, those who have survived the sword. Israel is marching to his rest.

³ Yahweh has appeared to him from afar: I have loved you with an everlasting love, so I am constant in my affection for you.

⁴ I build you once more; you shall be rebuilt, virgin of Israel. Adorned once more, and with your tambourines, you will go out dancing gaily.

⁵ You will plant vineyards once more on the mountains of Samaria (the planters have done their planting: they will gather the fruit).

⁶ Yes, a day will come when the watchmen shout on the mountains of Ephraim, ‘Up! Let us go up to Zion, to Yahweh our God!’

⁷ For Yahweh says this: Shout with joy for Jacob! Hail the chief of nations! Proclaim! Praise! Shout: ‘Yahweh has saved his people, the remnant of Israel!’

⁸ See, I will bring them back from the land of the North and gather them from the far ends of earth; all of them: the blind and the lame, women with child, women in labour: a great company returning here.

⁹ They had left in tears, I will comfort them as I lead them back; I will guide them to streams of water, by a smooth path where they will not stumble. For I am a father to Israel, and Ephraim is my first-born son.

¹⁰ Listen, nations, to the word of Yahweh. Tell this to the distant islands, ‘He who scattered Israel gathers him, he guards him as a shepherd guards his flock’.

¹¹ For Yahweh has ransomed Jacob, rescued him from a hand stronger than his own.

¹² They will come and shout for joy on the heights of Zion, they will throng towards the good things of Yahweh: corn and oil and wine, sheep and oxen; their soul will be like a watered garden, they will sorrow no more.

¹³ The virgin will then take pleasure in the dance, young men and old will be happy; I will change their mourning into gladness, comfort them, give them joy after their troubles,

¹⁴ refresh my priests with rich food, and see my people have their fill of my good things – it is Yahweh who speaks.

¹⁵ Thus speaks Yahweh: A voice is heard in Ramah, lamenting and weeping bitterly: it is Rachel [*a] weeping for her children, refusing to be comforted for her children, because they are no more.

¹⁶ Yahweh says this: Stop your weeping, dry your eyes, your hardships will be redressed: they shall come back from the enemy country.

¹⁷ There is hope for your descendants: your sons will come home to their own lands.

¹⁸ I plainly hear the grieving of Ephraim, ‘You have disciplined me, I accepted the discipline like a young bull untamed. Bring me back, let me come back, for you are Yahweh my God!

¹⁹ Yes, I turned away, but have since repented; I understood, I beat my breast. I was deeply ashamed, covered with confusion; yes, I still bore the disgrace of my youth’.

²⁰ Is Ephraim, then, so dear a son to me, a child so favoured, that after each threat of mine I must still remember him, still be deeply moved for him, and let my tenderness yearn over him? It is Yahweh who speaks.

²¹ Set up signposts, raise landmarks; mark the road well, the way by which you went. Come home, virgin of Israel, come home to these towns of yours.

²² How long will you hesitate, disloyal daughter? For Yahweh is creating something new on earth: the Woman sets out to find her Husband again.

²³ Yahweh Sabaoth, the God of Israel, says this: In the land of Judah and in its towns, they will use these words again, once I have restored their fortunes: ‘Yahweh grant you his blessing, you pasture of justice, you holy mountain!’

²⁴ Judah and all his towns, the farmers and those who tend the flock will live in this land.

²⁵ For I refresh the wearied soul and satisfy every sorrowing soul.

²⁶ And hence:[*b] I awoke and was refreshed, and my sleep was peaceful.

²⁷ See, the days are coming – it is Yahweh who speaks – when I am going to sow the seed of men and cattle on the House of Israel and on the House of Judah.

²⁸ And as I once watched them to tear up, to knock down, to overthrow, destroy and bring disaster, so now I shall watch over them to build and to plant. It is Yahweh who speaks.

²⁹ In those days people will no longer say: ‘The fathers have eaten unripe grapes; the children’s teeth are set on edge’.

³⁰ But each is to die for his own sin. Every man who eats unripe grapes is to have his own teeth set on edge.

³¹ See, the days are coming – it is Yahweh who speaks – when I will make a new covenant with the House of Israel (and the House of Judah),

³² but not a covenant like the one I made with their ancestors on the day I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt. They broke that covenant of mine, so I had to show them who was master. It is Yahweh who speaks.

³³ No, this is the covenant I will make with the House of Israel when those days arrive – it is Yahweh who speaks. Deep within them I will plant my Law, writing it on their hearts. Then I will be their God and they shall be my people.

³⁴ There will be no further need for neighbour to try to teach neighbour, or brother to say to brother, ‘Learn to know Yahweh!’ No, they will all know me, the least no less than the greatest – it is Yahweh who speaks – since I will forgive their iniquity and never call their sin to mind.

³⁵ Yahweh who provides the sun for light by day, the moon and stars for light by night, who stirs the sea, making its waves roar, he whose name is Yahweh Sabaoth, says this:

³⁶ Were this established order ever to pass away from my presence – it is Yahweh who speaks – only then would the race of Israel also cease to be a nation in my presence for ever.

³⁷ Were the heavens above ever to be measured, the foundations of the earth below ever to be fathomed, only then would I reject the race of Israel for all that they have done. It is Yahweh who speaks.

³⁸ See, the days are coming – it is Yahweh who speaks – when the city of Yahweh will be rebuilt from the Tower of Hananel to the Gate of the Corner.

³⁹ Then once again the measuring line will stretch straight to the Hill of Gareb, turning then to Goah.[*c]

⁴⁰ And the whole valley, with its dead and its ashes, and all the fields beside the wadi Kidron as far as the corner of the Horse Gate, eastwards, will be consecrated to Yahweh. It shall never again be destroyed, or laid under the ban.