NET Bible | Christian Standard Bible |
1The LORD told Jeremiah, "Go and buy a clay jar from a potter. Take with you some of the leaders of the people and some of the leaders of the priests. | 1This is what the LORD says: "Go, buy a potter's clay jar. Take some of the elders of the people and some of the leading priests |
2Go out to the part of the Hinnom Valley which is near the entrance of the Potsherd Gate. Announce there what I tell you. | 2and go out to Ben Hinnom Valley near the entrance of the Potsherd Gate. Proclaim there the words I speak to you. |
3Say, 'Listen to what the LORD says, you kings of Judah and citizens of Jerusalem! The LORD God of Israel who rules over all says, "I will bring a disaster on this place that will make the ears of everyone who hears about it ring! | 3Say, 'Hear the word of the LORD, kings of Judah and residents of Jerusalem. This is what the LORD of Armies, the God of Israel, says: I am going to bring such disaster on this place that everyone who hears about it will shudder |
4I will do so because these people have rejected me and have defiled this place. They have offered sacrifices in it to other gods which neither they nor their ancestors nor the kings of Judah knew anything about. They have filled it with the blood of innocent children. | 4because they have abandoned me and made this a foreign place. They have burned incense in it to other gods that they, their fathers, and the kings of Judah have never known. They have filled this place with the blood of the innocent. |
5They have built places here for worship of the god Baal so that they could sacrifice their children as burnt offerings to him in the fire. Such sacrifices are something I never commanded them to make! They are something I never told them to do! Indeed, such a thing never even entered my mind! | 5They have built high places to Baal on which to burn their children in the fire as burnt offerings to Baal, something I have never commanded or mentioned; I never entertained the thought. |
6So I, the LORD, say: "The time will soon come that people will no longer call this place Topheth or the Hinnom Valley. But they will call this valley the Valley of Slaughter! | 6"'Therefore, look, the days are coming--this is the LORD's declaration--when this place will no longer be called Topheth and Ben Hinnom Valley, but Slaughter Valley. |
7In this place I will thwart the plans of the people of Judah and Jerusalem. I will deliver them over to the power of their enemies who are seeking to kill them. They will die by the sword at the hands of their enemies. I will make their dead bodies food for the birds and wild beasts to eat. | 7I will spoil the plans of Judah and Jerusalem in this place. I will make them fall by the sword before their enemies, by the hand of those who intend to take their life. I will provide their corpses as food for the birds of the sky and for the wild animals of the land. |
8I will make this city an object of horror, a thing to be hissed at. All who pass by it will be filled with horror and will hiss out their scorn because of all the disasters that have happened to it. | 8I will make this city desolate, an object of scorn. Everyone who passes by it will be appalled and scoff because of all its wounds. |
9I will reduce the people of this city to desperate straits during the siege imposed on it by their enemies who are seeking to kill them. I will make them so desperate that they will eat the flesh of their own sons and daughters and the flesh of one another."'" | 9I will make them eat the flesh of their sons and their daughters, and they will eat each other's flesh in the distressing siege inflicted on them by their enemies who intend to take their life.' |
10The LORD continued, "Now break the jar in front of those who have come here with you. | 10"Then you are to shatter the jar in the presence of the people going with you, |
11Tell them the LORD who rules over all says, 'I will do just as Jeremiah has done. I will smash this nation and this city as though it were a potter's vessel which is broken beyond repair. The dead will be buried here in Topheth until there is no more room to bury them.' | 11and you are to proclaim to them, 'This is what the LORD of Armies says: I will shatter these people and this city, like one shatters a potter's jar that can never again be mended. They will bury the dead in Topheth because there is no other place for burials. |
12I, the LORD, say: 'That is how I will deal with this city and its citizens. I will make it like Topheth. | 12That is what I will do to this place--this is the declaration of the LORD--and to its residents, making this city like Topheth. |
13The houses in Jerusalem and the houses of the kings of Judah will be defiled by dead bodies just like this place, Topheth. For they offered sacrifice to the stars and poured out drink offerings to other gods on the roofs of those houses.'" | 13The houses of Jerusalem and the houses of the kings of Judah will become impure like that place Topheth--all the houses on whose rooftops they have burned incense to all the stars in the sky and poured out drink offerings to other gods.'" |
14Then Jeremiah left Topheth where the LORD had sent him to give that prophecy. He went to the LORD's temple and stood in its courtyard and called out to all the people. | 14Jeremiah returned from Topheth, where the LORD had sent him to prophesy, stood in the courtyard of the LORD's temple, and proclaimed to all the people, |
15"The LORD God of Israel who rules over all says, 'I will soon bring on this city and all the towns surrounding it all the disaster I threatened to do to it. I will do so because they have stubbornly refused to pay any attention to what I have said!'" | 15"This is what the LORD of Armies, the God of Israel, says: 'I am about to bring on this city--and on all its cities--every disaster that I spoke against it, for they have become obstinate, not obeying my words.'" |
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