Study Desk

Let a cry for help go up from their houses, when you send an armed band on them suddenly: for they have made a hole in which to take me, and have put nets for my feet secretly.

This is what the Lord has said: Go and get for money a potter's bottle made of earth, and take with you some of the responsible men of the people and of the priests;

For this cause, see, a time is coming, says the Lord, when this place will no longer be named Topheth, or, The valley of the son of Hinnom, but, The valley of Death.

I will make the purpose of Judah and Jerusalem come to nothing in this place; I will have them put to the sword by their haters, and by the hands of those who have designs on their life; and their dead bodies I will give to be food for the birds of heaven and the beasts of the earth.

I will make them take the flesh of their sons and the flesh of their daughters for food, they will be making a meal of one another, because of their bitter need and the cruel grip of their haters and those who have made designs against their life.

For the Lord has said, See, I will make you a cause of fear to yourself and to all your friends: they will come to their death by the sword of their haters, and your eyes will see it: and I will give all Judah into the hands of the king of Babylon, and he will take them away prisoners into Babylon and put them to the sword.

For every word I say is a cry for help; I say with a loud voice, Violent behaviour and wasting: because the word of the Lord is made a shame to me and a cause of laughing all the day.

For numbers of them say evil secretly in my hearing (there is fear on every side): they say, Come, let us give witness against him; all my nearest friends, who are watching for my fall, say, It may be that he will be taken by deceit, and we will get the better of him and give him punishment.

But the Lord is with me as a great one, greatly to be feared: so my attackers will have a fall, and they will not overcome me: they will be greatly shamed, because they have not done wisely, even with an unending shame, kept in memory for ever.

But, O Lord of armies, testing the upright and seeing the thoughts and the heart, let me see your punishment come on them; for I have put my cause before you.

Make melody to the Lord, give praise to the Lord: for he has made the soul of the poor man free from the hands of the evil-doers.

May that man be like the towns overturned by the Lord without mercy: let a cry for help come to his ears in the morning, and the sound of war in the middle of the day;

Because he did not put me to death before my birth took place: so my mother's body would have been my last resting-place, and she would have been with child for ever.

Will you get directions from the Lord for us; for Nebuchadrezzar, king of Babylon, is making war against us; it may be that the Lord will do something for us like all the wonders he has done, and make him go away from us.

For my face is turned to this town for evil and not for good, says the Lord: it will be given into the hands of the king of Babylon, and he will have it burned with fire.

For if you truly do this, then there will come in through the doors of this house kings seated on the seat of David, going in carriages and on horseback, he and his servants and his people

For this is what the Lord has said about the family of the king of Judah: You are Gilead to me, and the top of Lebanon: but, truly, I will make you waste, with towns unpeopled.

And I will make ready those who will send destruction on you, everyone armed for war: by them your best cedar-trees will be cut down and put in the fire.

Let there be no weeping for the dead, and make no songs of grief for him: but make bitter weeping for him who has gone away, for he will never come back or see again the country of his birth.

For this is what the Lord has said about Shallum, the son of Josiah, king of Judah, who became king in place of Josiah his father, who went out from this place: He will never come back there again: