Jeremiah 7

Hear the word of the Lord, all Ioudaia.

Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: Set right your ways and your practices, and I will make you dwell in this place.

Do not trust in yourselves, in lying words, saying, It is the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord; for they will profit you nothing at all.

For if you thoroughly set right your ways and your practices, and truly execute judgment between a man and his neighbor,

and do not oppress the sojourner and the orphan and the widow, and do not shed innocent blood in this place, and do not go after foreign gods to your own harm,

then I will make you dwell in this place, in the land that I gave to your fathers from age to age.

But if you trust in lying words, from which you will gain no profit,

and you murder and commit adultery and steal and swear falsely, and you were burning incense to Baal and going after foreign gods whom you do not know, to your own hurt,

and then you came and stood before me in the house upon which my name has been called, and said, We have kept ourselves from doing all these abominations!

Is my house, upon which my name has been called, a den of robbers there before you? And I, behold, I have seen it, says the Lord.

For go to my place that is in Selom, where I made my name to dwell there formerly, and see what I did to it because of the wickedness of my people Israel.

And now, because you did all these works, and I spoke to you and you did not listen to me, and I called you and you did not answer,

therefore I will do to this house, upon which my name has been called, in which you trust, and to the place that I gave to you and to your fathers, just as I did to Selom.

And I will cast you away from my face, just as I cast away your brothers, all the seed of Ephraim.

And you, do not pray for this people, and do not ask that they be shown mercy, and do not make entreaty, and do not approach me concerning them, for I will not listen.

Do you not see what they are doing in the cities of Iouda and in the streets of Ierousalem?

Their sons gather wood, and their fathers kindle fire, and their women knead dough to make cakes for the host of heaven; and they poured out drink offerings to foreign gods, so as to provoke me to anger.

Is it me they provoke to anger, says the Lord? Is it not themselves, so that their own faces may be put to shame?

Therefore thus says the Lord: Behold, my anger and my wrath is being poured out upon this place, and upon the people, and upon the cattle, and upon every tree of their field, and upon all the produce of the land; and it shall burn and shall not be quenched.

Thus says the Lord: Add your whole burnt offerings to your sacrifices and eat meat.

For I did not speak to your fathers, nor command them, on the day I brought them up out of the land of Egypt, concerning whole burnt offerings and sacrifice.

But rather this word I commanded them, saying: Listen to my voice, and I will be God to you, and you shall be a people to me; and walk in all my ways that I command you, so that it may be well with you.

But they did not listen to me, and their ear did not attend, but they walked in the devisings of their evil heart, and they went backward and not forward.

From the day their fathers went out of the land of Egypt even to this day, I also sent out to you all my servants the prophets, by day and at dawn I sent them.

But they did not listen to me, and their ear did not attend, and they stiffened their neck more than their fathers.

And you shall say to them this word: This is the nation that did not listen to the voice of the Lord, nor receive instruction; faithfulness has vanished from their mouth.

Shear your head and cast it away, and take up a lament upon your lips; for the Lord has rejected and thrust away the generation that does these things.

For the sons of Iouda have done what is evil before me, says the Lord; they set their abominations in the house upon which my name has been called, to defile it.

And they built the altar of Tapheth, which is in the ravine of the son of Ennom, to burn up their sons and their daughters in fire, which I did not command them, nor did I consider it in my heart.

Therefore behold, days are coming, says the Lord, when they shall no longer say the altar of Tapheth and the ravine of the son of Ennom, but rather the ravine of the slain; and they shall bury in Tapheth because there is no room.

And the corpses of this people shall become food for the birds of the sky and for the beasts of the earth, and there shall be none to scare them away.

And I will abolish from the cities of Iouda and from the thoroughfares of Ierousalem the voice of those who make merry and the voice of those who rejoice, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride; for the whole land shall become a desolation.