Jeremiah 9

Deceit and lament

1If only I had a travelers’ shelter in the wilderness!
I would leave my people
and go away from them.
For they are all adulterers,
a gathering of traitors.

2“They bend their tongues like bows;
lies, not faithfulness, prevail in the land.
They go from one evil to another
and do not know me,” declares the LORD.

3“Beware of your neighbor;
do not trust any brother.
Every brother is a schemer,
and every neighbor spreads slander.

4They deceive one another
and do not speak the truth.
They have trained their tongues to lie;
they wear themselves out doing wrong.

5You live surrounded by deceit.
In their deceit they refuse to know me,”
declares the LORD.

6So this is what the LORD of hosts says:
“Look, I will refine them and test them.
What else can I do
because of my daughter, my people?

7Their tongue is a deadly arrow;
it speaks deceit.
With the mouth, someone speaks peace to a neighbor,
while inwardly laying an ambush.

8Should I not call them to account for this?”
declares the LORD.
“Should I not avenge myself
on a nation like this?

9I will lift up weeping and wailing over the mountains,
a lament over the wilderness pastures.
They are burned out; no one passes through.
No sound of livestock is heard.
Birds of the sky and animals alike
have fled and gone.

10I will make Jerusalem a heap of ruins,
a home for jackals.
I will make Judah’s cities desolate,
with no one living there.”

11Who is wise enough to understand this? To whom has the LORD spoken, so that they can explain it? Why has the land perished, burned out like a wilderness where no one passes?

12The LORD said, “Because they abandoned my instruction, which I set before them. They did not listen to my voice or walk in it.

13Instead, they followed their stubborn hearts and the Baals, as their fathers taught them.”

14So this is what the LORD of hosts, Israel’s God, says: “Look, I am feeding this people wormwood and giving them poisoned water to drink.

15I will scatter them among nations neither they nor their fathers knew. I will send the sword after them until I have brought them to an end.”

16This is what the LORD of hosts says:
“Consider this: call the mourning women; let them come.
Send for the skilled women; let them come. 17Let them hurry and lift up a wail over us,
so our eyes stream with tears
and our eyelids flow with water. 18For a voice of wailing is heard from Zion:
‘How we have been devastated!
How deeply we are ashamed!
We have left the land;
our homes have been torn down.’ 19Women, hear the LORD’s word;
let your ears receive what his mouth says.
Teach your daughters to wail,
and one another to lament. 20Death has climbed through our windows
and entered our palaces,
to cut off children from the street
and young men from the squares. 21Say: ‘This is what the LORD declares:
Human corpses will fall like dung on the open field,
like cut grain behind the reaper,
with no one to gather it.’”

What deserves boasting

22This is what the LORD says:
“Let the wise not boast in their wisdom,
the strong not boast in their strength,
or the rich boast in their riches. 23Let anyone who boasts boast in this:
that they understand and know me,
that I am the LORD, who acts with steadfast love,
justice, and righteousness on earth.
For these are what delight me,”
declares the LORD.

24“Look, days are coming,” declares the LORD, “when I will call to account all who are circumcised yet uncircumcised— 25Egypt, Judah, Edom, the Ammonites, Moab, and all who clip the edges of their hair and live in the wilderness. For all these nations are uncircumcised, and the whole house of Israel is uncircumcised in heart.”