¹ The word which came to Jeremiah from Yahweh, saying,

² Arise, and go down to the potter's house, and there I will cause you to hear my words.

³ Then I went down to the potter's house, and behold, he was making a work on the wheels.

⁴ When the vessel that he made of the clay was marred in the hand of the potter, he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it.

⁵ Then the word of Yahweh came to me, saying,

⁶ House of Israel, can't I do with you as this potter? says Yahweh. Behold, as the clay in the potter's hand, so are you in my hand, House of Israel.

⁷ At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up and to break down and to destroy it;

⁸ if that nation, concerning which I have spoken, turn from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do to them.

⁹ At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it;

¹⁰ if they do that which is evil in my sight, that they not obey my voice, then I will repent of the good, with which I said I would benefit them.

¹¹ Now therefore, speak to the men of Judah, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, saying, Thus says Yahweh: Behold, I frame evil against you, and devise a device against you: return you now everyone from his evil way, and amend your ways and your doings.

¹² But they say, It is in vain; for we will walk after our own devices, and we will do everyone after the stubbornness of his evil heart.

¹³ Therefore thus says Yahweh: Ask now among the nations, who has heard such things; the virgin of Israel has done a very horrible thing.

¹⁴ Shall the snow of Lebanon fail from the rock of the field? [or] shall the cold waters that flow down from afar be dried up?

¹⁵ For my people have forgotten me, they have burned incense to false [gods]; and they have been made to stumble in their ways, in the ancient paths, to walk in byways, in a way not built up;

¹⁶ to make their land an astonishment, and a perpetual hissing; everyone who passes thereby shall be astonished, and shake his head.

¹⁷ I will scatter them as with an east wind before the enemy; I will show them the back, and not the face, in the day of their calamity.

¹⁸ Then they said, Come, and let us devise devices against Jeremiah; for the law shall not perish from the priest, nor counsel from the wise, nor the word from the prophet. Come, and let us strike him with the tongue, and let us not give heed to any of his words.

¹⁹ Give heed to me, Yahweh, and listen to the voice of those who contend with me.

²⁰ Shall evil be recompensed for good? for they have dug a pit for my soul. Remember how I stood before you to speak good for them, to turn away your wrath from them.

²¹ Therefore deliver up their children to the famine, and give them over to the power of the sword; and let their wives become childless, and widows; and let their men be slain of death, [and] their young men struck of the sword in battle.

²² Let a cry be heard from their houses, when you shall bring a troop suddenly on them; for they have dug a pit to take me, and hid snares for my feet.

²³ Yet, Yahweh, you know all their counsel against me to kill me; don't forgive their iniquity, neither blot out their sin from your sight; but let them be overthrown before you; deal you with them in the time of your anger.

¹ Hear the word which Yahweh speaks to you, house of Israel!

² Thus says Yahweh, "Don't learn the way of the nations, and don't be dismayed at the signs of the sky; for the nations are dismayed at them.

³ For the customs of the peoples are vanity; for one cuts a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman with the axe.

⁴ They deck it with silver and with gold; they fasten it with nails and with hammers, that it not move.

⁵ They are like a palm tree, of turned work, and don't speak: they must be carried, because they can't go. Don't be afraid of them; for they can't do evil, neither is it in them to do good."

⁶ There is none like you, Yahweh; you are great, and your name is great in might.

⁷ Who should not fear you, King of the nations? For it appertains to you; because among all the wise men of the nations, and in all their royal estate, there is none like you.

⁸ But they are together brutish and foolish: the instruction of idols! it is but a stock.

⁹ There is silver beaten into plates, which is brought from Tarshish, and gold from Uphaz, the work of the artificer and of the hands of the goldsmith; blue and purple for their clothing; they are all the work of skillful men.

¹⁰ But Yahweh is the true God; he is the living God, and an everlasting King: at his wrath the earth trembles, and the nations are not able to withstand his indignation.

¹¹ You shall say this to them: The gods that have not made the heavens and the earth, these shall perish from the earth, and from under the heavens.

¹² He has made the earth by his power, he has established the world by his wisdom, and by his understanding has he stretched out the heavens:

¹³ when he utters his voice, there is a tumult of waters in the heavens, and he causes the vapors to ascend from the ends of the earth; he makes lightnings for the rain, and brings forth the wind out of his treasuries.

¹⁴ Every man is become brutish [and is] without knowledge; every goldsmith is disappointed by his engraved image; for his molten image is falsehood, and there is no breath in them.

¹⁵ They are vanity, a work of delusion: in the time of their visitation they shall perish.

¹⁶ The portion of Jacob is not like these; for he is the former of all things; and Israel is the tribe of his inheritance: Yahweh of Armies is his name.

¹⁷ Gather up your wares out of the land, you who live under siege.

¹⁸ For thus says Yahweh, Behold, I will sling out the inhabitants of the land at this time, and will distress them, that they may feel [it].

¹⁹ Woe is me because of my hurt! my wound is grievous: but I said, Truly this is [my] grief, and I must bear it.

²⁰ My tent is destroyed, and all my cords are broken: my children are gone forth from me, and they are no more: there is none to spread my tent any more, and to set up my curtains.

²¹ For the shepherds are become brutish, and have not inquired of Yahweh: therefore they have not prospered, and all their flocks are scattered.

²² The voice of news, behold, it comes, and a great commotion out of the north country, to make the cities of Judah a desolation, a dwelling place of jackals.

²³ Yahweh, I know that the way of man is not in himself: it is not in man who walks to direct his steps.

²⁴ Yahweh, correct me, but in measure: not in your anger, lest you bring me to nothing.

²⁵ Pour out your wrath on the nations that don't know you, and on the families that don't call on your name: for they have devoured Jacob, yes, they have devoured him and consumed him, and have laid waste his habitation.