1THUS said the LORD to me, Go and buy a potters earthen jug, and take with you some of the elders of the people and some of the elderly priests; 2And go out to the valley of the son of Hinnom which is by the entrance of the east gate, and proclaim there the words that I shall tell you, 3And say, Hear the word of the LORD, O kings of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem; Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: Behold, I will bring evil upon this place, such that whosoever hears of it his ears shall tingle. 4Because they have forsaken me and have polluted this place and have burned incense in it to other gods whom neither they nor their fathers nor the kings of Judah have known; and have filled this place with the blood of the innocents; 5They have built also the high places of Baal to burn their sons with fire as burnt offerings to Baal, which I did not command; nor did I speak of it, neither came it into my mind; 6Therefore, behold, the days are coming, says the LORD, when this place shall no more be called Taphat, nor the valley of the son of Hinnom, but the valley of slaughter. 7And 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 lives; and their corpses will I give as food for the fowls of the air and for the wild beasts of the earth. 8And I will make this city desolate and a hissing; so that every one who passes by it shall be horrified and hiss because of all its catastrophes. 9And I will cause them to eat the flesh of their sons and the flesh of their daughters, and they shall eat every one the flesh of his neighbors in the siege and in the affliction with which their enemies and those who seek their lives shall inflict upon them.

10Then you shall break a pot in the sight of the men who go with you, 11And say to them, Thus says the LORD of hosts: Even so will I break this people and this city, as this potter's vessel is broken, so that it cannot be mended again; and they shall bury the dead in Taphat because of the lack of burial space. 12Thus will I do to this place and to its inhabitants, says the LORD, and even make this city like Taphat; 13And the houses of Jerusalem and the houses of the kings of Judah shall be defiled like the place of Taphat; and likewise all the houses upon whose roofs they have burned incense to all the host of heaven and have poured out drink offerings to other gods.

14Then Jeremiah came from Taphat, where the LORD had sent him to prophesy; and he stood in the court of the LORD'S house, and said to all the people, 15Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: Behold, I will bring upon this city and upon all its towns all the evil that I have pronounced against it, because they have hardened their necks that they might not hear my words.