Jeremiah 9:1-26
9 If only my head were water and my eyes a fount of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people!
2 * If only I were in the wilderness, in a camping-place by the trail, to leave my people and go from them! for they are all adulterers, a procession of faithless men,
3 * and bend their tongues as a bow; falsehood and not good faith dominates in the country. For they proceed from wickedness to wickedness, and me they do not know, quoth Jehovah.
4 ** Beware of your friends, and do not rely on any brother; for every brother will jacob and every friend will carry scandal;
5 * and they trifle with their word to each other and do not speak truth; they have taught their tongues to speak falsehood; they play foul, they tire themselves out weaving extortion into extortion and fraud into fraud;
6 * they refuse to know me, quoth Jehovah.
7 * So Jehovah of Armies says, Here I am going to smelt and assay them—for what am I to do on account of the wickedness of the daughter of my people?
8 * Their tongue is a throat-cutting arrow, the words of their mouths are false; one talks peace to another but inwardly is laying an ambush for him.
9 Am I not to punish them for these things, quoth Jehovah, or is my soul not to take its revenge on a nation such as this?
10 Over the mountains I will raise a weeping and a lament, and over wilderness pastures a threnody, because they are so singed that there is not a man passing through, they hear no sounds of stock, birds of the air and beasts and all have made off and are gone.
11 And I will make Jerusalem into stone-heaps, a retreat of jackals; and the cities of Judah I will make a desolation without inhabitant.
12 Who is the wise man to understand this, and the one to whom Jehovah’s mouth has spoken, to tell it? On what account has the country perished, is it singed off like the wilderness, without any to pass through?
13 * And Jehovah says “On account of their departing from my instructions which I had put before them, not obeying me
14 * but following the willful way of their hearts and the Baals that their fathers had taught them.”
15 So Israel’s God Jehovah of Armies says “Here I am going to feed them wormwood and give them drink of poppy-juice,
16 and scatter them among the nations that they and their fathers had never known, and let the sword loose after them till I finish them.”
17 * Says Jehovah of Armies, Call the threnodists to come, send to the wise women
18 * to hurry up, and to raise a lament over us and have our eyes run tears and our eyelashes drip water;
19 ** for a sound of lament is heard out of Sion “How we are made havoc of! we are in utter shame because we have left his country, because we have disclaimed our abodes.”
20 For hear Jehovah’s word, women, and let your ears receive the word of his mouth, and teach lamentation to your daughters and threnody to each other.
21 ** For death has got up to our windows, got into our palaces, destroying child at play from street, young men from squares.
22 * And human carcasses will drop like dung dropped on the range and like swaths dropping behind the reaper without anyone to pick them up.
23 Says Jehovah, Let a wise man not boast of his wisdom nor a champion of his prowess; let a rich man not boast of his wealth;
24 but let the one who boasts boast of this, canny dealing and knowing me that I Jehovah do the friendly and right and fair thing in the earth, because in these things I take pleasure, quoth Jehovah.
25 * Here are days coming, quoth Jehovah, when I will punish everybody who is circumcised with a foreskin:
26 Egypt and Judah and Edom and the Bene-ʽAmmon and Moab and all the wilderness-dwellers that are clipped at the side; for all the nations are uncircumcised, and all the house of Israel have uncircumcised hearts.
Footnotes
^ 9:2 Lit. camping-place of travelers on the trail
^ 9:3 Var. as a bow falsely, and not in good faith they dominate
^ 9:4 Lit. Beware each one of his friend
^ 9:4 Var. on your brothers
^ 9:5-6 Codd. tire themselves out going back; extortion upon extortion and fraud upon fraud Var. falsehood; they tire themselves out playing foul; your dwelling is among extortion, fraud upon fraud
^ 9:6 Var. omits quoth Jehovah
^ 9:7 (last half) Susp.
^ 9:8 Var. he speaks falsely with his mouth Conj. the words of their mouths are a net
^ 9:13 Var. had given to them and their fathers
^ 9:14 Var. willful wicked way
^ 9:17 Conj. that Says Jehovah of Armies has been added copying
^ 9:18 Var. over you . . . your eyes . . . your eyelashes
^ 9:19 Codd.* a (or the) country
^ 9:19 Codd. they have thrown our abodes
^ 9:21 Or by our windows
^ 9:21 Var. your windows, got into your land
^ 9:22 Var. range like Conj. drop on the range like
^ 9:25 Lit. all the side-clipped that live in the wilderness
