Jeremiah 10

¹⁵Listen and give heed. Do not be arrogant, for the Lord has spoken.

¹⁶Give glory to the Lord your God before He brings darkness, before your feet stumble on the dusky mountains. You wait for light, but He turns it into deep gloom and thick darkness.

¹⁵then hear the word of the Lord, O remnant of Judah! This is what the Lord of Hosts, the God of Israel, says: ‘If you are determined to go to Egypt and reside there,

¹³And we continually thank God because, when you received the word of God that you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men, but as it truly is, the word of God, which is also now at work in you who believe.

¹Hear the word of the Lord, O children of Israel, for the Lord has a case against the people of the land: “There is no truth, no loving devotion, and no knowledge of God in the land!

²⁹He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.

¹⁶Now, therefore, hear the word of the Lord. You say: ‘Do not prophesy against Israel; do not preach against the house of Isaac.’

²³You must not follow the statutes of the nations I am driving out before you. Because they did all these things, I abhorred them.

³You must not follow the practices of the land of Egypt, where you used to live, and you must not follow the practices of the land of Canaan, into which I am bringing you. You must not walk in their customs.

²⁵There will be signs in the sun and moon and stars, and on the earth dismay among the nations, bewildered by the roaring of the sea and the surging of the waves.

²⁶Men will faint from fear and anxiety over what is coming upon the earth, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken.

³²When you say, ‘Let us be like the nations, like the peoples of the lands, serving wood and stone,’ what you have in mind will never come to pass.

³⁰be careful not to be ensnared by their ways after they have been destroyed before you. Do not inquire about their gods, asking, “How do these nations serve their gods? I will do likewise.”

³¹You must not worship the Lord your God in this way, because they practice for their gods every abomination which the Lord hates. They even burn their sons and daughters in the fire as sacrifices to their gods.

¹²So take your stand with your spells and with your many sorceries, with which you have wearied yourself from your youth. Perhaps you will succeed; perhaps you will inspire terror!

¹³You are wearied by your many counselors; let them come forward now and save you—your astrologers who observe the stars, who monthly predict your fate.

¹⁸For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life you inherited from your forefathers,

⁹All makers of idols are nothing, and the things they treasure are worthless. Their witnesses fail to see or comprehend, so they are put to shame.

¹⁰Who fashions a god or casts an idol which profits him nothing?

³⁰You must keep My charge not to practice any of the abominable customs that were practiced before you, so that you do not defile yourselves by them. I am the Lord your God.”

⁸But they are altogether senseless and foolish, instructed by worthless idols made of wood!

²¹For although they knew God, they neither glorified Him as God nor gave thanks to Him, but they became futile in their thinking and darkened in their foolish hearts.

⁷And when you pray, do not babble on like pagans, for they think that by their many words they will be heard.

⁷They lift it to their shoulder and carry it along; they set it in its place, and there it stands, not budging from that spot. They cry out to it, but it does not answer; it saves no one from his troubles.

¹⁹To an idol that a craftsman casts and a metalworker overlays with gold and fits with silver chains?

²⁰One lacking such an offering chooses wood that will not rot. He seeks a skilled craftsman to set up an idol that will not topple.

⁶Each one helps the other and says to his brother, “Be strong!”

⁷The craftsman encourages the goldsmith, and he who wields the hammer cheers him who strikes the anvil, saying of the welding, “It is good.” He nails it down so it will not be toppled.

¹²The blacksmith takes a tool and labors over the coals; he fashions an idol with hammers and forges it with his strong arms. Yet he grows hungry and loses his strength; he fails to drink water and grows faint.

⁴Their idols are silver and gold, made by the hands of men.

¹⁵The idols of the nations are silver and gold, made by the hands of men.

⁷They lift it to their shoulder and carry it along; they set it in its place, and there it stands, not budging from that spot. They cry out to it, but it does not answer; it saves no one from his troubles.

²You know that when you were pagans, you were influenced and led astray to mute idols.

⁵They have mouths, but cannot speak; they have eyes, but cannot see;

⁶they have ears, but cannot hear; they have noses, but cannot smell;

²³Tell us the things that are to come, so that we may know that you are gods. Yes, do something good or evil, that we may look on together in dismay.

²⁴Behold, you are nothing and your work is of no value. Anyone who chooses you is detestable.

⁴So about eating food sacrificed to idols: We know that an idol is nothing at all in the world, and that there is no God but one.

¹⁹Woe to him who says to wood, ‘Awake!’ or to silent stone, ‘Arise!’ Can it give guidance? Behold, it is overlaid with gold and silver, yet there is no breath in it at all.”

⁴For great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised; He is to be feared above all gods.

¹¹Who among the gods is like You, O Lord? Who is like You—majestic in holiness, revered with praises, performing wonders?

¹A song. A Psalm of the sons of Korah. Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised in the city of our God, His holy mountain.

²⁶“There is none like the God of Jeshurun, who rides the heavens to your aid, and the clouds in His majesty.

⁶Cry out and sing, O citizen of Zion, for great among you is the Holy One of Israel.”

³Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised; His greatness is unsearchable.

⁴Who will not fear You, O Lord, and glorify Your name? For You alone are holy. All nations will come and worship before You, for Your righteous acts have been revealed.”

²⁸For dominion belongs to the Lord and He rules over the nations.

⁶There is none like You, O Lord. You are great, and Your name is mighty in power.

⁶For who in the skies can compare with the Lord? Who among the heavenly beings is like the Lord?

²²Do you not fear Me?” declares the Lord. “Do you not tremble before Me, the One who set the sand as the boundary for the sea, an enduring barrier it cannot cross? The waves surge, but they cannot prevail. They roar but cannot cross it.

¹⁹For it is written: “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate.”

²⁰Where is the wise man? Where is the scribe? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?

¹⁴Every man is senseless and devoid of knowledge; every goldsmith is put to shame by his idols. For his molten images are a fraud, and there is no breath in them.

²For idols speak deceit and diviners see illusions; they tell false dreams and offer empty comfort. Therefore the people wander like sheep, oppressed for lack of a shepherd.

¹⁸Those who make them become like them, as do all who trust in them.

⁸Those who make them become like them, as do all who trust in them.

¹⁷Every man is senseless and devoid of knowledge; every goldsmith is put to shame by his idols. For his molten images are a fraud, and there is no breath in them.

¹⁸They are worthless, a work to be mocked. In the time of their punishment they will perish.

²⁹See, they are all a delusion; their works amount to nothing; their images are as empty as the wind.

⁴Their idols are silver and gold, made by the hands of men.

⁵I lifted up my eyes, and behold, there was a certain man dressed in linen, with a belt of fine gold from Uphaz around his waist.

¹⁹To an idol that a craftsman casts and a metalworker overlays with gold and fits with silver chains?

²²For the king had the ships of Tarshish at sea with Hiram’s fleet, and once every three years the ships of Tarshish would arrive bearing gold, silver, ivory, apes, and peacocks.

¹²Tarshish was your merchant because of your great wealth of goods; they exchanged silver, iron, tin, and lead for your wares.

⁴He is the Rock, His work is perfect; all His ways are just. A God of faithfulness without injustice, righteous and upright is He.

¹⁵For thus says the One who is high and lifted up, who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: “I dwell in a high and holy place, and with the oppressed and humble in spirit, to restore the spirit of the lowly and revive the heart of the contrite.

⁶Who can withstand His indignation? Who can endure His burning anger? His wrath is poured out like fire; even rocks are shattered before Him.

⁷You alone are to be feared. When You are angry, who can stand before You?

³²He looks on the earth, and it trembles; He touches the mountains, and they smolder.

⁷Then the earth shook and quaked, and the foundations of the mountains trembled; they were shaken because He burned with anger.

⁵For all the gods of the nations are idols, but it is the Lord who made the heavens.

¹⁸and the idols will vanish completely.

¹⁸They are worthless, a work to be mocked. In the time of their punishment they will perish.

¹⁵They are worthless, a work to be mocked. In the time of their punishment they will perish.

⁶⁶You will pursue them in anger and exterminate them from under Your heavens, O Lord.

¹¹The Lord will be terrifying to them when He starves all the gods of the earth. Then the nations of every shore will bow in worship to Him, each in its own place.

¹In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

⁸He alone stretches out the heavens and treads on the waves of the sea.

¹⁹The Lord founded the earth by wisdom and established the heavens by understanding.

²²He sits enthroned above the circle of the earth; its dwellers are like grasshoppers. He stretches out the heavens like a curtain, and spreads them out like a tent to dwell in.

³Through Him all things were made, and without Him nothing was made that has been made.

²For He has founded it upon the seas and established it upon the waters.

⁷He causes the clouds to rise from the ends of the earth. He generates the lightning with the rain and brings forth the wind from His storehouses.

²²Have you entered the storehouses of snow or observed the storehouses of hail,

¹³The Lord thundered from heaven; the voice of the Most High resounded—hailstones and coals of fire.

³⁴Can you command the clouds so that a flood of water covers you?

³⁵Can you send the lightning bolts on their way? Do they report to you, ‘Here we are’?

³The voice of the Lord is over the waters; the God of glory thunders; the Lord is heard over many waters.

⁴The voice of the Lord is powerful; the voice of the Lord is majestic.

²Listen closely to the thunder of His voice and the rumbling that comes from His mouth.

³He unleashes His lightning beneath the whole sky and sends it to the ends of the earth.

¹⁶They have mouths, but cannot speak; they have eyes, but cannot see;

¹⁷they have ears, but cannot hear; nor is there breath in their mouths.

⁴Their idols are silver and gold, made by the hands of men.

⁵They have mouths, but cannot speak; they have eyes, but cannot see;

⁷They lift it to their shoulder and carry it along; they set it in its place, and there it stands, not budging from that spot. They cry out to it, but it does not answer; it saves no one from his troubles.

⁸Remember this and be brave; take it to heart, you transgressors!

¹⁸What use is an idol, that a craftsman should carve it—or an image, a teacher of lies? For its maker trusts in his own creation; he makes idols that cannot speak.

¹⁹Woe to him who says to wood, ‘Awake!’ or to silent stone, ‘Arise!’ Can it give guidance? Behold, it is overlaid with gold and silver, yet there is no breath in it at all.”

¹⁸They do not comprehend or discern, for He has shut their eyes so they cannot see and closed their minds so they cannot understand.

¹⁹And no one considers in his heart, no one has the knowledge or insight to say, “I burned half of it in the fire, and I baked bread on its coals; I roasted meat and I ate. Shall I make something detestable with the rest of it? Shall I bow down to a block of wood?”

²²Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools,

²³and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images of mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.

²⁴Behold, you are nothing and your work is of no value. Anyone who chooses you is detestable.

²²Can the worthless idols of the nations bring rain? Do the skies alone send showers? Is this not by You, O Lord our God? So we put our hope in You, for You have done all these things.

¹⁸They are worthless, a work to be mocked. In the time of their punishment they will perish.

¹²Are they ashamed of the abomination they have committed? No, they have no shame at all; they do not even know how to blush. So they will fall among the fallen; when I punish them, they will collapse, says the Lord.

⁸Those who cling to worthless idols forsake His loving devotion.

¹⁸and the idols will vanish completely.

¹⁹Men will flee to caves in the rocks and holes in the ground, away from the terror of the Lord and from the splendor of His majesty, when He rises to shake the earth.

⁹But the Lord’s portion is His people, Jacob His allotted inheritance.

¹⁸You show loving devotion to thousands but lay the iniquity of the fathers into the laps of their children after them, O great and mighty God whose name is the Lord of Hosts,

³⁵Thus says the Lord, who gives the sun for light by day, who sets in order the moon and stars for light by night, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar—the Lord of Hosts is His name:

⁵⁷The Lord is my portion; I have promised to keep Your words.

¹²The Lord made the earth by His power; He established the world by His wisdom and stretched out the heavens by His understanding.

¹⁹The Portion of Jacob is not like these, for He is the Maker of all things, and of the tribe of His inheritance—the Lord of Hosts is His name.

³Therefore, son of man, pack your bags for exile. In broad daylight, set out from your place and go to another as they watch. Perhaps they will understand, though they are a rebellious house.

⁴Bring out your baggage for exile by day, as they watch. Then in the evening, as they watch, go out like those who go into exile.

¹“Run for cover, O sons of Benjamin; flee from Jerusalem! Sound the ram’s horn in Tekoa; send up a signal over Beth-haccherem, for disaster looms from the north, even great destruction.

¹⁰Arise and depart, for this is not your place of rest, because its defilement brings destruction—a grievous destruction!

¹⁵So when you see standing in the holy place ‘the abomination of desolation,’ spoken of by the prophet Daniel (let the reader understand),

¹³Behold, I am against you who dwell above the valley, atop the rocky plateau—declares the Lord—you who say, “Who can come against us? Who can enter our dwellings?”

²⁹And should someone pursue you and seek your life, then the life of my lord will be bound securely by the Lord your God in the bundle of the living. But He shall fling away the lives of your enemies like stones from a sling.

⁶But did not My words and My statutes, which I commanded My servants the prophets, overtake your fathers? They repented and said, ‘Just as the Lord of Hosts purposed to do to us according to our ways and deeds, so He has done to us.’”

²⁰The anger of the Lord will not turn back until He has fully accomplished the purposes of His heart. In the days to come you will understand this clearly.

⁶³Just as it pleased the Lord to make you prosper and multiply, so also it will please Him to annihilate you and destroy you. And you will be uprooted from the land you are entering to possess.

⁶⁴Then the Lord will scatter you among all the nations, from one end of the earth to the other, and there you will worship other gods, gods of wood and stone, which neither you nor your fathers have known.

¹Then the Lord said to me: “Even if Moses and Samuel should stand before Me, My heart would not go out to this people. Send them from My presence, and let them go!

²If they ask you, ‘Where shall we go?’ you are to tell them that this is what the Lord says: ‘Those destined for death, to death; those destined for the sword, to the sword; those destined for famine, to famine; and those destined for captivity, to captivity.’

¹³So I will cast you out of this land into a land that neither you nor your fathers have known. There you will serve other gods day and night, for I will show you no favor.’

⁹Because I have sinned against Him, I must endure the rage of the Lord, until He argues my case and executes justice for me. He will bring me into the light; I will see His righteousness.

¹⁸So I say, “My strength has perished, along with my hope from the Lord.”

¹⁹Remember my affliction and wandering, the wormwood and the gall.

³¹For I hear a cry like a woman in labor, a cry of anguish like one bearing her first child—the cry of the Daughter of Zion gasping for breath, stretching out her hands to say, “Woe is me, for my soul faints before the murderers!”

³⁹Why should any mortal man complain, in view of his sins?

⁴⁰Let us examine and test our ways, and turn back to the Lord.

¹⁷You are to speak this word to them: ‘My eyes overflow with tears; day and night they do not cease, for the virgin daughter of my people has been shattered by a crushing blow, a severely grievous wound.

²She weeps aloud in the night, with tears upon her cheeks. Among all her lovers there is no one to comfort her. All her friends have betrayed her; they have become her enemies.

²⁰Disaster after disaster is proclaimed, for the whole land is laid waste. My tents are destroyed in an instant, my curtains in a moment.

¹⁵This is what the Lord says: “A voice is heard in Ramah, mourning and great weeping, Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted, because they are no more.”

²“Enlarge the site of your tent, stretch out the curtains of your dwellings, do not hold back. Lengthen your ropes and drive your stakes in deep.

²⁰Yet the children of your bereavement will say in your hearing, ‘This place is too small for us; make room for us to live here.’

²¹Then you will say in your heart, ‘Who has begotten these for me? I was bereaved and barren; I was exiled and rejected. So who has reared them? Look, I was left all alone, so where did they come from?’”

⁸The eye that beholds me will no longer see me. You will look for me, but I will be no more.

⁵Her foes have become her masters; her enemies are at ease. For the Lord has brought her grief because of her many transgressions. Her children have gone away as captives before the enemy.

¹⁰Many shepherds have destroyed My vineyard; they have trampled My plot of ground. They have turned My pleasant field into a desolate wasteland.

²“Son of man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel. Prophesy and tell them that this is what the Lord God says: ‘Woe to the shepherds of Israel, who only feed themselves! Should not the shepherds feed their flock?

³You eat the fat, wear the wool, and butcher the fattened sheep, but you do not feed the flock.

¹“Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of My pasture!” declares the Lord.

²Therefore this is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says about the shepherds who tend My people: “You have scattered My flock and driven them away, and have not attended to them. Behold, I will attend to you for the evil of your deeds, declares the Lord.

¹⁰Israel’s watchmen are blind, they are all oblivious; they are all mute dogs, they cannot bark; they are dreamers lying around, loving to slumber.

¹¹Like ravenous dogs, they are never satisfied. They are shepherds with no discernment; they all turn to their own way, each one seeking his own gain:

²⁵The conspiracy of the princes in her midst is like a roaring lion tearing its prey. They devour the people, seize the treasures and precious things, and multiply the widows within her.

²⁶Her priests do violence to My law and profane My holy things. They make no distinction between the holy and the common, and they fail to distinguish between the clean and the unclean. They disregard My Sabbaths, so that I am profaned among them.

⁹The wise will be put to shame; they will be dismayed and trapped. Since they have rejected the word of the Lord, what wisdom do they really have?

¹¹“And I will make Jerusalem a heap of rubble, a haunt for jackals; and I will make the cities of Judah a desolation, without inhabitant.”

¹⁵For I am about to summon all the clans and kingdoms of the north,” declares the Lord. “Their kings will come and set up their thrones at the entrance of the gates of Jerusalem. They will attack all her surrounding walls and all the other cities of Judah.

³but Esau I have hated, and I have made his mountains a wasteland and left his inheritance to the desert jackals.”

¹⁵Behold, I am bringing a distant nation against you, O house of Israel,” declares the Lord. “It is an established nation, an ancient nation, a nation whose language you do not know and whose speech you do not understand.

²²This is what the Lord says: “Behold, an army is coming from the land of the north; a great nation is stirred up from the ends of the earth.

⁶For behold, I am raising up the Chaldeans—that ruthless and impetuous nation which marches through the breadth of the earth to seize dwellings not their own.

⁷They are dreaded and feared; from themselves they derive justice and sovereignty.

²⁴A man’s steps are from the Lord, so how can anyone understand his own way?

²³The steps of a man are ordered by the Lord who takes delight in his journey.

¹The plans of the heart belong to man, but the reply of the tongue is from the Lord.

¹¹⁶Sustain me as You promised, that I may live; let me not be ashamed of my hope.

¹¹⁷Uphold me, and I will be saved, that I may always regard Your statutes.

⁵My steps have held to Your paths; my feet have not slipped.

¹A Psalm of David, for remembrance. O Lord, do not rebuke me in Your anger or discipline me in Your wrath.

¹For the choirmaster. With stringed instruments, according to Sheminith. A Psalm of David. O Lord, do not rebuke me in Your anger or discipline me in Your wrath.

¹¹For I am with you to save you, declares the Lord. Though I will completely destroy all the nations to which I have scattered you, I will not completely destroy you. Yet I will discipline you justly, and will by no means leave you unpunished.”

²³He brings the princes to nothing and makes the rulers of the earth meaningless.

¹⁸Caravans turn aside from their routes; they go into the wasteland and perish.

¹¹Behold, all who rage against you will be ashamed and disgraced; those who contend with you will be reduced to nothing and will perish.

¹²You will seek them but will not find them. Those who wage war against you will come to nothing.

⁶Pour out Your wrath on the nations that do not acknowledge You, on the kingdoms that refuse to call on Your name,

⁷for they have devoured Jacob and devastated his homeland.

¹⁶The snorting of enemy horses is heard from Dan. At the sound of the neighing of mighty steeds, the whole land quakes. They come to devour the land and everything in it, the city and all who dwell in it.

²¹Surely such is the dwelling of the wicked and the place of one who does not know God.”

⁴Will the workers of iniquity never learn? They devour my people like bread; they refuse to call upon the Lord.

¹⁵but I am fiercely angry with the nations that are at ease. For I was a little angry, but they have added to the calamity.’

⁸in blazing fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus.