¹ And the word of the Lord came to me, saying,

² Son of man, let your face be turned to Jerusalem, let your words be dropped in the direction of her holy place, and be a prophet against the land of Israel;

³ And say to the land of Israel, These are the words of the Lord: See, I am against you, and I will take my sword out of its cover, cutting off from you the upright and the evil.

⁴ Because I am going to have the upright and the evil cut off from you, for this cause my sword will go out from its cover against all flesh from the south to the north:

⁵ And all flesh will see that I the Lord have taken my sword out of its cover: and it will never go back.

⁶ Make sounds of grief, son of man; with body bent and a bitter heart make sounds of grief before their eyes.

⁷ And when they say to you, Why are you making sounds of grief? then say, Because of the news, for it is coming: and every heart will become soft, and all hands will be feeble, and every spirit will be burning low, and all knees will be turned to water: see, it is coming and it will be done, says the Lord.

⁸ And the word of the Lord came to me, saying,

⁹ Son of man, say as a prophet, These are the words of the Lord: say, A sword, a sword which has been made sharp and polished:

¹⁰ It has been made sharp to give death; it is polished so that it may be like a thunder-flame: ...

¹¹ And I have given it to the polisher so that it may be taken in the hand: he has made the sword sharp, he has had it polished, to put it into the hand of him who gives death.

¹² Give loud cries and make sounds of grief, O son of man: for it has come on my people, it has come on all the rulers of Israel: fear of the sword has come on my people: for this cause give signs of grief.

¹³ ...

¹⁴ So then, son of man, be a prophet, and put your hands together with a loud sound, and give two blows with the sword, and even three; it is the sword of those who are wounded, even the sword of the wounded; the great sword which goes round about them.

¹⁵ In order that hearts may become soft, and the number of those who are falling may be increased, I have sent death by the sword against all their doors: you are made like a flame, you are polished for death.

¹⁶ Be pointed to the right, to the left, wherever your edge is ordered.

¹⁷ And I will put my hands together with a loud sound, and I will let my wrath have rest: I the Lord have said it.

¹⁸ And the word of the Lord came to me again, saying,

¹⁹ And you, son of man, have two ways marked out, so that the sword of the king of Babylon may come; let the two of them come out of one land: and let there be a pillar at the top of the road:

²⁰ Put a pillar at the top of the road for the sword to come to Rabbah in the land of the children of Ammon, and to Judah and to Jerusalem in the middle of her.

²¹ For the king of Babylon took his place at the parting of the ways, at the top of the two roads, to make use of secret arts: shaking the arrows this way and that, he put questions to the images of his gods, he took note of the inner parts of dead beasts.

²² At his right hand was the fate of Jerusalem, to give orders for destruction, to send up the war-cry, to put engines of war against the doors, lifting up earthworks, building walls.

²³ And this answer given by secret arts will seem false to those who have given their oaths and have let them be broken: but he will keep the memory of evil-doing so that they may be taken.

²⁴ For this cause the Lord has said: Because you have made your evil-doing come to mind by the uncovering of your wrongdoing, causing your sins to be seen in all your evil-doings; because you have come to mind, you will be taken in them.

²⁵ And you, O evil one, wounded to death, O ruler of Israel, whose day has come in the time of the last punishment;

²⁶ This is what the Lord has said: Take away the holy head-dress, take off the crown: this will not be again: let that which is low be lifted up, and that which is high be made low.

²⁷ I will let it be overturned, overturned, overturned: this will not be again till he comes whose right it is; and I will give it to him.

²⁸ And you, son of man, say as a prophet, This is what the Lord has said about the children of Ammon and about their shame: say, A sword, even a sword let loose, polished for death, to make it shining so that it may be like a flame:

²⁹ Your vision is to no purpose, your use of secret arts gives a false answer, to put it on the necks of evil-doers who are wounded to death, whose day has come, in the time of the last punishment.

³⁰ Go back into your cover. In the place where you were made, in the land from which you were taken, I will be your judge.

³¹ And I will let loose my burning passion on you, breathing out on you the fire of my wrath: and I will give you up into the hands of men like beasts, trained to destruction.

³² You will be food for the fire; your blood will be drained out in the land; there will be no more memory of you: for I the Lord have said it.

¹ The word that came to Jeremiah concerning all the Jews who lived in the land of Egypt, who lived at Migdol, and at Tahpanhes, and at Memphis, and in the country of Pathros, saying,

² Thus says Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel: You have seen all the evil that I have brought on Jerusalem, and on all the cities of Judah; and behold, this day they are a desolation, and no man dwells therein,

³ because of their wickedness which they have committed to provoke me to anger, in that they went to burn incense, [and] to serve other gods, that they didn't know, neither they, nor you, nor your fathers.

⁴ However I sent to you all my servants the prophets, rising up early and sending them, saying, Oh, don't do this abominable thing that I hate.

⁵ But they didn't listen, nor inclined their ear to turn from their wickedness, to burn no incense to other gods.

⁶ Therefore my wrath and my anger was poured forth, and was kindled in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem; and they are wasted and desolate, as it is this day.

⁷ Therefore now thus says Yahweh, the God of Armies, the God of Israel: Why do you commit great evil against your own souls, to cut off from yourselves man and woman, infant and nursing child out of the midst of Judah, to leave yourselves none remaining;

⁸ in that you provoke me to anger with the works of your hands, burning incense to other gods in the land of Egypt, where you have gone to live; that you may be cut off, and that you may be a curse and a reproach among all the nations of the earth?

⁹ Have you forgotten the wickedness of your fathers, and the wickedness of the kings of Judah, and the wickedness of their wives, and your own wickedness, and the wickedness of your wives which they committed in the land of Judah, and in the streets of Jerusalem?

¹⁰ They are not humbled even to this day, neither have they feared, nor walked in my law, nor in my statutes, that I set before you and before your fathers.

¹¹ Therefore thus says Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel: Behold, I will set my face against you for evil, even to cut off all Judah.

¹² I will take the remnant of Judah, that have set their faces to go into the land of Egypt to live there, and they shall all be consumed; in the land of Egypt shall they fall; they shall be consumed by the sword and by the famine; they shall die, from the least even to the greatest, by the sword and by the famine; and they shall be an object of horror, [and] an astonishment, and a curse, and a reproach.

¹³ For I will punish those who dwell in the land of Egypt, as I have punished Jerusalem, by the sword, by the famine, and by the pestilence;

¹⁴ so that none of the remnant of Judah, who have gone into the land of Egypt to live there, shall escape or be left, to return into the land of Judah, to which they have a desire to return to dwell there: for none shall return save such as shall escape.

¹⁵ Then all the men who knew that their wives burned incense to other gods, and all the women who stood by, a great assembly, even all the people who lived in the land of Egypt, in Pathros, answered Jeremiah, saying,

¹⁶ As for the word that you have spoken to us in the name of Yahweh, we will not listen to you.

¹⁷ But we will certainly perform every word that is gone forth out of our mouth, to burn incense to the queen of the sky, and to pour out drink offerings to her, as we have done, we and our fathers, our kings and our princes, in the cities of Judah, and in the streets of Jerusalem; for then had we plenty of food, and were well, and saw no evil.

¹⁸ But since we left off burning incense to the queen of the sky, and pouring out drink offerings to her, we have wanted all things, and have been consumed by the sword and by the famine.

¹⁹ When we burned incense to the queen of the sky, and poured out drink offerings to her, did we make her cakes to worship her, and pour out drink offerings to her, without our husbands?

²⁰ Then Jeremiah said to all the people, to the men, and to the women, even to all the people who had given him an answer, saying,

²¹ The incense that you burned in the cities of Judah, and in the streets of Jerusalem, you and your fathers, your kings and your princes, and the people of the land, didn't Yahweh remember them, and didn't it come into his mind?

²² so that Yahweh could no longer bear, because of the evil of your doings, and because of the abominations which you have committed; therefore your land has become a desolation, and an astonishment, and a curse, without inhabitant, as it is this day.

²³ Because you have burned incense, and because you have sinned against Yahweh, and have not obeyed the voice of Yahweh, nor walked in his law, nor in his statutes, nor in his testimonies; therefore this evil has happened to you, as it is this day.

²⁴ Moreover Jeremiah said to all the people, and to all the women, Hear the word of Yahweh, all Judah who are in the land of Egypt:

²⁵ Thus says Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel, saying, You and your wives have both spoken with your mouths, and with your hands have fulfilled it, saying, We will surely perform our vows that we have vowed, to burn incense to the queen of the sky, and to pour out drink offerings to her: establish then your vows, and perform your vows.

²⁶ Therefore hear the word of Yahweh, all Judah who dwell in the land of Egypt: Behold, I have sworn by my great name, says Yahweh, that my name shall no more be named in the mouth of any man of Judah in all the land of Egypt, saying, As the Lord Yahweh lives.

²⁷ Behold, I watch over them for evil, and not for good; and all the men of Judah who are in the land of Egypt shall be consumed by the sword and by the famine, until there be an end of them.

²⁸ Those who escape the sword shall return out of the land of Egypt into the land of Judah, few in number; and all the remnant of Judah, who have gone into the land of Egypt to live there, shall know whose word shall stand, mine, or theirs.

²⁹ This shall be the sign to you, says Yahweh, that I will punish you in this place, that you may know that my words shall surely stand against you for evil:

³⁰ Thus says Yahweh, Behold, I will give Pharaoh Hophra king of Egypt into the hand of his enemies, and into the hand of those who seek his life; as I gave Zedekiah king of Judah into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, who was his enemy, and sought his life.