Fluent Translation · Read & Reflect
Jeremiah 4
Return and prepare
“If you return, Israel,” declares the LORD,
“return to me.
If you remove your offensive things from my sight
and cease wandering,
and swear, ‘As the LORD lives,’
in truth, justice and righteousness,
then nations will bless themselves by him
and boast in him.”
For this is what the LORD says to the men of Judah and to Jerusalem:
“Break up your unplowed ground;
do not sow among thorns.
Circumcise yourselves to the LORD;
remove the foreskins of your hearts,
men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem,
or my fury will burst out like fire
and burn with no one to quench it,
because of your evil deeds.”
Announce in Judah, proclaim in Jerusalem:
“Blow the ram’s horn through the land!”
Cry out at full voice:
“Gather! Let us enter the fortified cities!”
Raise a banner toward Zion!
Seek safety; do not delay!
For I am bringing disaster from the north,
great destruction.
A lion has come out of his thicket;
a destroyer of nations has set out.
He has left his place to devastate your land;
your cities will become ruins without inhabitants.
So put on sackcloth, mourn and howl,
for the LORD’s burning anger
has not turned away from us.
“On that day,” declares the LORD,
“the king and officials will lose heart;
priests will be appalled,
and prophets stunned.”
Then I said, “Ah, Lord GOD! You have surely deceived this people and Jerusalem, saying, ‘You will have peace,’ while the sword reaches our very lives!”
At that time this people and Jerusalem will be told,
“A scorching wind from the wilderness’s bare heights
comes toward the daughter of my people,
not to winnow, not to clean—
a wind too strong for that comes at my command.
Now I too will pronounce judgments against them.”
Look, he rises like clouds,
his chariots like a whirlwind,
his horses swifter than eagles.
“Woe to us! We are ruined!”
Wash the evil from your heart, Jerusalem,
so you may be saved.
How long will your harmful thoughts lodge within you?
A voice announces news from Dan,
proclaims disaster from Ephraim’s hills.
“Notify the nations!
Look, proclaim against Jerusalem:
besiegers are coming from a distant land;
they raise their voices against Judah’s cities.
Like guards around a field, they surround her,
because she has rebelled against me,” declares the LORD.
“Your way and your deeds have brought this upon you.
This is your bitter disaster;
it reaches your very heart.”
The earth comes undone
My insides, my insides! I writhe!
The walls of my heart! My heart pounds within me.
I cannot keep silent,
for you have heard, my soul,
the ram’s horn and the battle cry.
Destruction upon destruction is announced;
the whole land is devastated.
Suddenly my tents are destroyed,
my curtains in a moment.
How long must I see the banner
and hear the ram’s horn?
“My people are foolish; they do not know me.
They are senseless children without understanding.
They are wise at doing evil,
but do not know how to do good.”
I looked at the earth: it was unformed and empty;
at the heavens: their light was gone.
I looked at the mountains: they were quaking;
all the hills were shaking.
I looked: there was no human being;
all the birds of the heavens had fled.
I looked: the fruitful land was wilderness;
all its cities lay demolished
before the LORD, before his burning anger.
For this is what the LORD says:
“The whole land will become desolate,
but I will not make a complete end.
For this the earth will mourn
and the heavens above grow dark.
I have spoken; I have resolved it.
I have not relented and will not turn back.”
At the sound of horsemen and archers,
every city flees.
They enter thickets and climb among rocks.
Every city is abandoned;
not a person lives in them.
And you, devastated one, what are you doing?
Though you dress in scarlet and adorn yourself with gold,
though you widen your eyes with dark paint,
you make yourself beautiful for nothing.
Your lovers despise you; they seek your life.
I hear a voice like a woman in labor,
distress like one bearing her first child—
the voice of Daughter Zion, gasping,
spreading out her hands:
“Woe to me! My life is failing before killers!”