Jeremiah 31

1 The cities of the south are shut up, and there is none to open them: all Juda is carried away captive with an entire captivity. 2 Lift up your eyes, and see, you that come from the north: where is the flock that is given thee, thy beautiful cattle? 3 What wilt thou say when he shall visit thee? for thou hast taught them against thee, and instructed them against thy own head: shall not sorrows lay hold on thee, as a woman in labour? 4 And if thou shalt say in thy heart: Why are these things come upon me? For the greatness of thy iniquity, thy nakedness is discovered, the soles of thy feet are defiled. 5 If the Ethiopian can change his skin, or the leopard his spots: you also may do well, when you have learned evil. 6 And I will scatter them as stubble, which is carried away by the wind in the desert. 7 This is thy lot, and the portion of thy measure from me, saith the Lord, because thou hast forgotten me, and hast trusted in falsehood. 8 Wherefore I have also bared thy thighs against thy face, and thy shame hath appeared. 9 I have seen thy adulteries, and thy neighing, the wickedness of thy fornication: and thy abominations, upon the hills in the field. Woe to thee, Jerusalem, wilt thou not be made clean after me: how long yet? 11 The word of the Lord that came to Jeremiah concerning the words of the drought. 12 Judea hath mourned, and the gates thereof are fallen, and are become obscure on the ground, and the cry of Jerusalem is gone up. 13 The great ones sent their inferiors to the water: they came to draw, they found no water, they carried back their vessels empty: they were confounded and afflicted, and covered their heads. 14 For the destruction of the land, because there came no rain upon the earth, the husbandman were confounded, they covered their heads. 15 Yea, the hind also brought forth in the field, and left it, because there was no grass. 16 And the wild asses stood upon the rocks, they snuffed up the wind like dragons, their eyes failed, because there was no grass. 17 If our iniquities have testified against us, O Lord, do thou it for thy name’s sake, for our rebellions are many, we have sinned against thee. 18 O expectation of Israel, the Saviour thereof in time of trouble: why wilt thou be as a stranger in the land, and as a wayfaring man turning in to lodge? 19 Why wilt thou be as a wandering man, as a mighty man that cannot save? but thou, O Lord, art among us, and thy name is called upon by us, forsake us not. 20 Thus saith the Lord to this people, that have loved to move their feet, and have not rested, and have not pleased the Lord: He will now remember their iniquities, and visit their sins. 21 And the Lord said to me: Pray not for this people for their good. 22 When they fast I will not hear their prayers: and if they offer holocausts and victims, I will not receive them: for I will consume them by the sword, and by famine, and by the pestilence. 23 And I said: Ah, ah, ah, O Lord God, the prophets say to them: You shall not see the sword, and there shall be no famine among you, but he will give you true peace in this place. 24 And the Lord said to me: The prophets prophesy falsely in my name: I sent them not, neither have I commanded them, nor have I spoken to them: they prophesy unto you a lying vision, and divination and deceit, and the seduction of their own heart. 25 Therefore thus saith the Lord concerning the prophets that prophesy in my name, whom I did not send, that say: Sword and famine shall not be in this land: By sword and famine shall those prophets be consumed. 26 And the people to whom they prophesy, shall be cast out in the streets of Jerusalem because of the famine and the sword, and there shall be none to bury them: they and their wives, their sons and their daughters, and I will pour out their own wickedness upon them. 27 And thou shalt speak this word to them: Let my eyes shed down tears night and day, and let them not cease, because the virgin daughter of my people is afflicted with a great affliction, with an exceeding grievous evil. 28 If I go forth into the fields, behold the slain with the sword: and if I enter into the city, behold them that are consumed with famine. The prophet also and the priest are gone into a land which they knew not. 29 Hast thou utterly cast away Juda, or hath thy soul abhorred Sion? why then hast thou struck us, so that there is no healing for us? we have looked for peace, and there is no good: and for the time of healing, and behold trouble. 30 We acknowledge, O Lord, our wickedness, the iniquities of our fathers, because we have sinned against thee. 31 Give us not to be a reproach, for thy name’s sake, and do not disgrace in us the throne of thy glory: remember, break not thy covenant with us. 32 Are there any among the graven things of the Gentiles that can send rain? or can the heavens give showers? art not thou the Lord our God, whom we have looked for? for thou hast made all these things. 34 And the Lord said to me: If Moses and Samuel shall stand before me, my soul is not towards this people: cast them out from my sight, and let them go forth. 35 And if they shall say unto thee: Whither shall we go forth? thou shalt say to them: Thus saith the Lord: Such as are for death, to death: and such as are for the sword, to the sword: and such as are for famine, to famine: and such as are for captivity, to captivity. 36 And I will visit them with four kinds, saith the Lord: The sword to kill, and the dogs to tear, and the fowls of the air, and the beasts of the earth, to devour and to destroy. 37 And I will give them up to the rage of all the kingdoms of the earth: because of Manasses the son of Ezechias the king of Juda, for all that he did in Jerusalem. 38 For who shall have pity on thee, O Jerusalem? or who shall bemoan thee? or who shall go to pray for thy peace? 39 Thou hast forsaken me, saith the Lord, thou art gone backward: and I will stretch out my hand against thee, and I will destroy thee: I am weary of entreating thee. 40 And I will scatter them with a fan in the gates of the land: I have killed and destroyed my people, and yet they are not returned from their ways.